The Bonkers Rail Trip: Part Two - The Perfume Bit

Shortly after my visitors left yesterday, my main PC suddenly gave up the ghost, the apparent victim of "hard drive failure". As I type, it is hooked up to the computer repair shop equivalent of a dialysis machine, where valiant technicians are endeavouring to salvage the contents from just before the crash, including that day's work.

So I hope to cobble together the remainder of the Bonkers Rail Trip report on a combination of an ancient and infuriatingly slow notebook and Mr Bonkers' laptop (if he will let me borrow it...)

To be honest, the perfume aspects of the German trip do not deserve the build up I may have inadvertently given them by constantly referring to their deferral! And they fall into two parts, basically: the duty free shops on the outward and return legs of the journey, and a handful of stores in downtown Frankfurt.

To take the duty free shops first (at Birmingham and Berlin Schoenefeld airports), I always look forward to trying the latest releases in these, indeed I expect it to be the absolute highlight of that tediously protracted "Wait in Lounge" period, which is otherwise spent mindlessly staring at shelves of miniature travel toiletries in Boots, buying unsuitable hair bobbles in Claire's Accessories, or drinking weak tea from oversized cups in Costa Coffee. I try to avoid Wetherspoons and faux Irish pubs on such occasions, for they are usually packed out with holiday makers whose flight to Monastir has been put back five hours, and who have been necking lager solidly since 7.30am.

But the duty frees at both ends of my journey were even more disappointing than usual - so much so that I only applied two scents on skin at Birmingham (Gucci Guilty and Gucci pour homme II) and NONE at Berlin. Admittedly I was feeling pretty whacked and zombie-like by the end of the week, but I would have expected some new or merely untried scent to have caught my eye.

So here is a quick run down of what I sampled at the airports (mainly on paper, as I say):

JPG Classique (wanted to remind myself why I believed I didn't like this, and the answer became abundantly clear at first whiff - huge tuberose-heavy white floral with that trademark vinyl note also evident in the newer MaDame)

Issey Miyake Fleur de Bois - testing for the second time (forgettable aquatic woody floral?)

Chanel Bleu (boring, generic men's "tonic sport" style cologne)

Thierry Mugler Womanity (scary popcorn on steroids!)

Gucci Guilty (softer and lighter than Gucci by Gucci, a bit sweet initially, a bit fruity maybe - I had difficulty detecting a single note in it for sure, but the drydown was quite sheer and more wearable than Gucci by Gucci, where the honey can be a little cloying.)

Here are the notes at last: "mandarin, pink pepper, peach, lilac, geranium, amber, and patchouli."

Calvin Klein Escape (I can't recall exactly what this was like, but I threw the tester strip away immediately, so it must have been pretty horrid!)

So...I am coming to the reluctant conclusion that from now on, as far as perfume is concerned, duty free shops will continue to be a huge anti-climax, such that I really should not get my hopes up every time I fly somewhere. They mostly carry mainstream lines and "promote" (not that I saw true bargains in either) the latest Calvin Klein or D & G over the classic houses like Chanel or Hermes. A "lowest common denominator" approach was even more apparent in Ryanair's on-board fragrance selection, which was dominated by the likes of Kylie, J-Lo, Beyonce and SJP. In fact, it may not be an overstatement to say that duty free fragrances are fast becoming a microcosm of all that I find depressing about the perfume industry today. That said, they are still THE place to go for boxes of miniature Lindt squares and giant Toblerones the size of iron girders - but even these come at a price... for "duty free" doesn't usually mean cheap in my experience.

The remainder of my sampling was confined to Frankfurt as I said, where the week started with a day off - well, not completely "off", for I was still on standby in case the recruiters made me a last minute appointment - but I didn't really expect to get the call. Instead, I mooched around the city centre, visiting several branches of Douglas (the sense of deja vu was overwhelming by Store No 3), and a couple of department stores: the low-mid market Galeria Kaufhof, and the mid-mid market Karstadt. (Demographic classifications are my own...)

The two scents I tried on skin were JO MALONE PEAR & FREESIA and the relatively new Opium flanker, BELLE D'OPUM. I had been eagerly awaiting the new Jo Malone all summer - not that I am a fan of pear, particularly, if anything quite the contrary - but as the owner of four Jo Malone scents (just pipping Penhaligon's in the "most full bottles from a single house" stakes - I have three Penhaligon's), I am always interested in - and even a little excited by - their latest launches.

Curiously, the Jo Malone concession was in the largest of the branches of Douglas I visited, and the sales assistant was both striking looking and exceptionally tall - well over 6ft, at a guess - with a very pale complexion and dyed black hair. She sprayed Pear & Freesia liberally on the prime skin site I had reserved for the purpose, then to my surprise proceeded to pat the perfume thoroughly into my wrist, even though I thought that any kind of rubbing of scent into skin was frowned upon. Perhaps she had my number as a non-pear lover, and wanted to hurry the scent along to a later stage of its development. If that was the aim it didn't work, for the opening still smelt very noticeably of pear to me. There is a much more positive review of this scent on The Scented Salamander here, but I am afraid Pear & Freesia reminded me of an upmarket and more natural smelling take on Armani Idole. In a word, it was too loud, which is not a quality I usually associate with Jo Malone scents, though come to think of it, I gave away my bottles of Nectarine Blossom & Honey and Vintage Gardenia for this very reason!

Moments after applying Pear & Freesia, the SA was already suggesting layering options, and we experimented with Black Vetyver Cafe, which was pretty nice, though she also recommended Pomegranate Noir and Nutmeg & Ginger. Now I know Jo Malone is a line which lends itself to layering, but part of me is always just a little bit suspicious that this may be a way to disguise the fact that a given scent doesn't stand up on its own merits...and to be honest, Pear & Freesia may well smell better toned down by another, more astringent, fragrance from the line.

So that was another little anti-climax. More to my taste, though not exactly groundbreaking, was Belle d'Opium, of which an otherwise faintly hostile SA in one of the department stores actually volunteered a sample, the only one I scored in fact! In reviewing this scent, Denyse of Graindemusc wrote: "Welcome to Blandland", and dubbed Belle d'Opium "Yves Saint Laurent in the Facebook era" - and I know what she means. For Belle d'Opium has no more in common with Opium than Parisienne has with Paris - even less, maybe. When I first sniffed it in store, I remarked to the SA: "Oh, it's a bit woody." "No", came the tart correction: "it's a lily scent". "Is there incense in there at all?" I countered. After a comprehensive rummage in her drawer of sales presenters, which failed to turn up the Belle d'Opium note list, the SA conceded through gritted teeth: "Yes, there is a bit of incense, but as I say it is a lily scent."

Now, I can detect Casablanca lilies if I put my mind to it, but this is a rather fuzzy, amorphous scent overall, and as with Gucci Guilty, I was hard pushed to pick out its different facets. I see that Alberto Morillas co-created Belle d'Opium along with Honorine Blanc of Firmenich, and while I am not familiar with the latter's work, Morillas I associate with a number of indistinct, fuzzy scents, such as Armani She White, Bvlgari Omnia Crystalline and Kenzo Flower Oriental.

I have since managed to find the notes on Osmoz, though I see that the card with the sample also lists Casablanca lilies, incense and nargileh accord, which I am guessing is related to the tobacco note and hookah accord below!

Top note: Mandarin Orange, Lily, Gardenia, White Flowers
Middle notes: Frankincense, Peach, Pepper, Tobacco, Hookah Accord, Fruity Notes
Base notes: Patchouli, Sandalwood, Smoky Notes, Amber

I wouldn't have thought Casablanca lilies could reasonably be combined with incense and tobacco, but the white flowers do seem to meld into the smoky notes surprisingly well. The more I sample this, the more it grows on me, even though I belong to the original Opium generation rather than the young target audience at which this radically reworked flanker is aimed!

The other scents I tried on paper were a motley assortment indeed, and I am not sure I remember what all of them smelt like, but here goes:

S'Oliver Superior (an SA thrust a tester strip into my hand with what she intended as an encouraging comment: "Try this - it is fresh and fruity!")

Gabriela Strehle Strenesse (insipid, citrussy, watery floral?)

Sisley Eau du Soir (animalic chypre - not my thing at all)

Otto Kern Egoluxe (quite liked this but don't ask me why : - ) Have since clocked that its base comprises sandalwood, musk, vanilla & patchouli, for which I am always a sucker.

Clarins Fleurs du Matin (major grapefruit alert!)

But although there were no great discoveries on this trip - Belle d'Opium and Egoluxe being the only scents that remotely caught my interest - there was nonetheless an amusing incident which completely made my day...

During the group blogging exercise on "Scents of The Mediterranean" last month, there were several mentions of the Greeks liking their cologne and being rather heavy handed in their spritzing technique. Well, nothing prepared me for the sight I saw in Karstadt, where a gentlemen of Mediterranean appearance, let's just say - I can't vouch for his exact nationality - grabbed a tester of Bvlgari pour homme and sprayed himself liberally with it...and I mean liberally. For not only did he give his neck area at least five squirts, but he then sprayed the back of his neck, each armpit and every inch of his upper torso front and back, or as far as he could reach. And in case anyone is wondering, yes, he was wearing clothes on his top half at the time, so after this spritzing spree he must have been absolutely drenched, as well as reeking of the stuff! (At least Bvlgari pour homme is a pretty classy choice...) Eventually the chap noticed me looking at me, put the tester back on the shelf and scuttled out of the store, tapping me conspiratorially on the arm as he passed. I could hardly believe what I had just witnessed, were it not for the monster sillage he left in his wake....


Photo of duty free at Birmingham airport from reuters.com, photo of Gucci Guilty from sewmanstore.com, photo of man holding Toblerone from hitched.co.uk, photo of Jo Malone Pear and Freesia from 26.media.tumblr.com, photo of Belle d'Opium from parfums-tendance.fr, photo of Kaufhof from Wikimedia Commons, photo of Hauptwache district from locationsite.de

Another Tale From Makeupalley: The "Burning Coal" Extras

I still have family staying, so will have to defer the rest of my trip report for a bit longer. Meanwhile, however, I have had another funny experience on Makeupalley in connection with a recent swap, which will only take a moment to relate...

The background to the story is that I was sending a swapper 20ml of Marc Jacobs Fig Splash in return for 10ml of Maison Kurkdjian APOM pour femme. As I had trouble figuring out what extras the swapper might like, I decided to send her 30ml of the Marc Jacobs instead, not least because I had a 30ml atomiser going spare.

When my package arrived containing the APOM, I was crestfallen to note that the atomiser used was only an 8ml, not a 10ml one. In fairness, it is an easy mistake to make, as the two atomisers look pretty similar, except that the 10ml one is taller than the 8ml by 3/4".

I wrestled long and hard with the issue, wondering whether it would be petty of me to mention the shortfall. And yet my 7.5ml of APOM (slightly underfilled to avoid spillages in transit) was just not "sitting well" with me, and I knew that if I didn't speak up, the matter would continue to fester. It might even end up spoiling my enjoyment of the perfume itself, because I would now associate it with being shortchanged.

So I wrote to the swapper and explained the situation, taking care to point out that I was sure it was an honest misunderstanding, as the atomisers are alike, and the exact capacity is not printed on them - which would be handy, come to think of it.

I received a very apologetic reply straight back from the swapper, who was clearly mortified at her mistake. She has relatively few tokens, so is doubtless keen not to blot her copybook at this early stage. She said she would send on the extra 2ml and I thanked her very much.

Imagine my surprise when I opened her package the other day to find not only a top up of c3ml of APOM, but a whole stack of other samples. She had in fact gone completely overboard in her retrospective generosity, and now I was the one who felt hugely indebted.

The photo is pretty fuzzy (taken from my phone for the sake of quickness), but the stash comprises:

APOM pour femme - 3ml

Samples of:

TDC Osmanthus
TDC Oriental Lounge
Prairie Life Threads Silver
Grandi Classici Tuberosa
L'Essenziere Estratto No 4
Byredo Rose Noire
Paneangell Aroma Vaniglia per dolci
Les Parfums de Rosine Rose Praline
WJ Neroli Absolute
L'Artisan Parfumeur Timbuktu
ETRA (sic)
Aromatic Chypre (source unknown)

I am very pleased about the Oriental Lounge as I didn't have a sample of that, and while the others strike me as a fairly mixed bunch - including a few very obscure things by the looks of it - in terms of sheer quantity, I feel completely overwhelmed!

My first thought was that the swapper was getting her own back for my pernickety attitude by heaping burning coals on my head, as per the famous quote from Proverbs 25:

"If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him a drink. If you do this, you will heap burning coals on his head."

But on balance I think she is probably just embarrassed and trying to rectify an awkward situation, and most importantly head off the threat of the dreaded "negative token". Not that it ever entered my head to award her one of those, as I don't believe for a minute that there was any deliberate plan to diddle me.

Hmm....there again, she hasn't left ME a token yet...


Photo of atomisers from the Accessories for Fragrance website, photo of coals from matthewling.typepad.com

Fragrance Blotters Revisited - A Surprisingly Flexible Friend

I plan to post Part Two of the Bonkers Rail Trip later this week, though work and preparations for a visit from my brother and his wife have rather overtaken me for the moment. So this is just a quick line to mention an innovative and unexpected use I found for a perfume tester strip at the weekend, while madly cleaning the kitchen in anticipation of my brother and his wife's visit...

Yes, I reached for a smelling strip from my recent German sampling session for the very specific purpose of reaching elusive bits of encrusted foodstuffs caught in the interstices around the fridge shelves. In theory these heavy glass sheets can be removed, giving you complete access to the rear wall and sides of the fridge. However, as with metal oven racks, I find that once you take the shelves out they are the very devil to shove back in. The degree of aperture is awkward and there simply doesn't seem to be enough manoeuvring space for the re-insertion procedure without taking the whole door off or guillotining yourself at an angle of 45 degrees.

But a tester strip is firm and slim enough to slide down behind the shelves and fetch out those little specks of food that resist capture by all other means. Flushed with success, I began to wonder to what other handy uses I could put these versatile bits of paper (preferably unused strips, obviously, but there is always the unperfumed end if needs must).

Well, obvious applications would be bookmarks, by which I mean in a conscious "place recording" sense, as opposed to slipping the strips anywhere into a book to preserve the integrity of their scent, as discussed in my earlier post on this topic.

Then I have often resorted to tester strips (some of which will inevitably be lurking at the bottom of my handbag at any given time) to scribble notes on, though space constraints make this a far from ideal format. Why. only the other day at the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof I managed to transcribe the whole of the contents page of "Bass Professor" and "Bass Quarterly" on to two thin and rather flimsy blotters, to help Mr Bonkers make an informed choice when asking me to custom purchase a copy of either magazine (he went for both).

Now if the strips were a bit wider - more like the ones in Chanel boutiques, or possibly even bigger still - they could be perfectly serviceable for capturing spiders, along similar lines to the hotel barman last week with his tooth mug and paper coaster.

And I wouldn't completely rule out flossing with them, but the wide gauge is probably only suited to a couple of my gappier molars. Hmm, looking at that picture, I can see a new use for a business card, which I usually have on me as well...

Also, I have eaten yoghurt on work trips with the back end of a toothbrush and even a comb (less successfully, it must be said). Tester strips as cutlery might be pushing it a bit, for knowing my luck I would get a mouthful of yoghurt, soggy card and the latest Opium flanker (of which more anon).


Photo of Maria Shriver from mentalfloss.com

The Bonkers Rail Trip: Part One - The Travel Bit

When I went away last weekend, I thought I might have overcooked things again (as is my wont) with the title of my last post, for a train trip between Frankfurt and Berlin sounds on the face of it like a fairly sedate exercise. This was to be supplemented by a little light pootling around these cities on public transport to get to my appointments, which were all with nursing and procurement staff at hospitals.

Light pootling? An utterly bonkers and borderline impossible multimodal trip, more like. For I had divided my time exactly between the two cities in anticipation of five meetings in each, but in the end the recruitment agency only managed to set up two interviews for me in Frankfurt, and banged the remaining eight into a two day period in Berlin (plus one late evening slot!). Each appointment was one and a half to two hours from the next, which meant some seriously fancy footwork using all the available transport modes to which my day pass entitled me: U-Bahn, S-Bahn, regional train, tram and bus - I rode them all. Yesterday, for example, I took an S-Bahn, then a bus, then another bus, then an S-Bahn, then a tram, then another tram, then an S-Bahn, then two tubes, then two more tubes, then an S-Bahn, then a regional express train, then a plane, and finally an airport transfer taxi. Oh, and there were some meetings in there too somewhere.

This punishing travel schedule meant that sleep and food rather went by the board, and I was typically surviving on 4-6 hours' kip a night, McFish Menus, bags of pretzels (of which I still fail to quite see the point), egg rolls, warm miniature bottles of Sekt, potato crisps (you can have any flavour as long as it is paprika), and the odd croissant snatched from the breakfast table. Well, I use the word "croissant" advisedly, for this particular morning good is not a croissant as we know it and should be approached with caution, even if bearing the label "französischer Art" (French-style), which it very likely won't be.

Oh, and a few cups of tea "to go". And I fear there were the inevitable tea issues again on this trip, if anything more acute than usual. My hotel in Frankfurt, for example, had run out of Klassik Tee, perhaps precisely because it WAS a "classic". McDonald's at the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof had no black tea either, and tried to fob me off with a selection of green and berry-centric varieties, which are not to my liking at all. Then yesterday in a kebab shop in the centre of Berlin I was offered black tea from an urn, which looked characterful, however, the black liquid emitted was so stewed and bitter you could have stood the Berlin wall back up in it. It was at least mercifully cheap.

So it gives me great pleasure to give the award for the most anglophiliac purveyor of tea to the Deutsche Bahn, for the buffet on the train to Berlin offered not one but THREE sorts of black tea: Earl Grey, Assam and English Breakfast. I was surreally spoilt for choice!

And while we are on the subject of awards, the one for the most heroic act of customer service goes to the barman at the Hotel Ibis in Berlin-Ost, who came up to my room to remove a large spider just to the left of the lavatory cistern, even though he readily admitted to being frightened of them himself. Then, in the act of explaining how the flat screen TV worked, to which end he set the spider in its toothmug down for a moment, I fear he may have unwittingly given the creature a window of opportunity to escape, for after he had gone I spotted another, remarkably similar looking, spider hanging from the edge of the shelf beneath the TV.... But if I was too afraid to watch television now, I could at least use the loo with confidence. : - )

Having made it through the week, I can also comment with authority on the pros and cons of carrying out interviews in hospitals. On the plus side, they are open 24/7, which means that - depending on the shift patterns of the people you wish to see - you may be able to make a very late or a very early appointment. Now YOU might not wish to keep those hours yourself, but that is another matter... And because hospitals are public buildings which are open all the time, if you arrive early you can just wander in and find somewhere warm to sit, freshen up in the ladies, or get a drink in the cafeteria without asking permission, which is not the case with the normal sort of business premises I visit. And the very fact that I was able to make such spectacular use of my travel card is proof that hospitals must be well served by public transport links and accessible to all, which again is not typically the case with the industrial companies I interview. (Hence the bonkers road trips...)

The main downside to hospitals is that they are such large places that reception staff may well not have heard of the person you have come to see. There may not be a telephone directory as such, or if there is, not everyone will necessarily be listed in it. Two reception staff even denied the existence of my respondent point blank, which caused my heart to lurch a little, while two others gave contradictory and airy sets of directions, which had me running round in circles looking for a building that was either up and to the left, or behind and round and to the right, but exactly how far either way was anybody's guess. Most of the time, the person I am meeting comes to the foyer to collect me, or sends an assistant, but here the onus was very much on me to winkle these people out in their far flung buildings. Even though this seems to be general practice for visitors, several nursing staff declared themselves to be astonished that I had a) found their office at all and b) showed up on time. Arriving by bus or tram garnered extra Brownie points for initiative and thrift.

There is one shameful incident to which I should perhaps own up, namely that while the caning of my travel pass in Berlin was legitimate, I did also get caught without a ticket on a short tram journey in Frankfurt. I had attempted to feed a 20 euro note into the automated ticket machine, which was the smallest note I had on me, but to no avail. I tried it facing both ways - and even tried buying a more expensive ticket than I needed - but the machine wasn't having any of it. I decided to chance it on the three stops to the train station, but kept the 20 euro note ostentatiously visible in my hand in case an inspector jumped on. And sure enough, an inspector did get on at the next stop and having heard me out, said that I should not have tried to pay with anything larger than a 10 euro note, as per the illustration of accepted coins and notes displayed on the front panel of the machine (a minor visual detail which had completely escaped my notice). Luckily, he let me off the 40 euro fine as I was "not from Frankfurt". Had he enforced the letter of the law, I would not only not be "from Frankfurt", but not planning to go "to Frankfurt" again any time soon.

The perfume aspects of the trip will, as ever, be covered in a separate post. Perfume sniffing was confined to Frankfurt, and to some fairly mainstream outlets at that. I can't be sure, but I sense Berlin might have been a better hunting ground. Mind you, I am a huge fan of the city, and my default position is that it is better than anywhere else in Germany for most things. Or let's just say that for graffiti, edgy clubs, wacky clothes shops, atmospheric courtyard cafes and all manner of bizarre and random stuff generally, it is simply unbeatable.


Photo of Hackescher Markt from Wikimedia Commons, photo of egg roll from stadtbaeckerei-gatenbroecker.de, photo of tea from food-shop24.com, photo of hospital from morgenpost.de, photo of ticket machine from trampage.de, graffiti photo my own.

Off On A Bonkers Rail Trip...!

Bonkers about Perfume will be offline for a week or so, as I am going to Germany again on business. Just two main cities on the itinerary this time - Frankfurt and Berlin - so I shall spare my back (still a bit dicky from the 7000+ miles I drove on the last two trips!), and "let the train take the strain". German trains are particularly fast, clean and well appointed.

It goes without saying that I will keep my eyes peeled for interesting perfume emporia, and meanwhile Dansak the micro-elephant (who is sufficiently compact to be my travelling companion) has been sorting out some samples for the week ahead. He suggested three themes:

INDIAN SUMMER (reminds him of home...)

Chanel Eau de Cologne
Chanel Cristalle EDT
EL PC Tuberose Gardenia
Hermes Vanille Galante
FM Lys Mediterranee

SOMETHING A BIT WARM AND FUZZY FOR AN AUTUMNAL NIP IN THE AIR

Prada L'Eau Ambree
Guerlain 180 Ans de Creation
Sonoma Scent Studio Opal
Maison Kurkdjian APOM pour femme
Chanel Eau Premiere

SOMETHING EVEN FUZZIER FOR AN UNSEASONALLY COLD SNAP

Tauer L'Air Du Desert Marocain
Serge Lutens Chergui

And yes, I know it is only a week, but it is comforting to have so much choice...

Apologies for the lack of accents, but I am against the clock!

Photo of Berlin graffiti from Pbase

Elephant Perfume Bottle

On a whim the other day, I bought this elephant perfume bottle on Ebay. (It is unusual, but doesn't quite qualify as a "bonkers flacon" like this one).

You see, I couldn't resist the bluntness of the seller's sales pitch...

"Not your cheap tacky tourist muck, but made by our own workshops in Cairo."

Or the cute elephant design...

Yes, I have a penchant for pachyderms - I own a cuddly toy elephant called Delhi, whom I rescued from a bargain bin at Pforzheim services, and a tiny, bean bag-style elephant called Dansak, who was a souvenir from a holiday in Majorca.

Or the craftsmanship...

"Each bottle is completely hand blown (rather than being blown into a mould, which is not quite the same thing), and each bottle takes approximately 40 minutes to one hour to complete - decorating time is extra."

Or the unexpectedly sumptuous materials...

"The gold used, which we always assumed was gold paint, is, in fact, 12 carat gold."

Or the humane working conditions...

"Everyone who works for us is over school leaving age and the working conditions are good."

Or the seller's quirky sense of humour...

"It will, of course, be carefully packed in industrial quantities of bubblewrap in order to foil our postmen."

And it WAS - "copious" doesn't come close to describing the generous wodges of bubblewrap involved, the whole packed snugly in a cardboard box that had once housed 32 Double Deckers (as in the chocolate bar).

Or the price...

Just £4.99 + P & P!

I have no plans to put perfume in it for the moment. The seal on the stopper doesn't look particularly hermetic and I can just see the elephant making mischief with his trunk.

Top photo from phileasfox1's Ebay listing, bottom photo my own.

"Aromancing The Stone" - Scents Of Time: Night Star, Maya & Nenúfar

It is two years since David Pybus, author, “(al)chemist” and “aromancer” - a "dealer in aromas" - presented his idea for the Scents of Time range to the team of business investors on the Dragon’s Den TV programme. Two of the dragons, Peter Jones and Theo Paphitis, were impressed by Pybus’s concept of creating replicas of historical perfumes, and each bought into his fledgling business to the tune of £40,000. Pybus’s swashbuckling pursuit of ancient smells earnt him the nickname: “the Indiana Jones of the perfume industry”, and much has been written about the stories behind each scent, five of which have now been marketed (Night Star, Maya, Nenúfar, Ankh and Pyxis), with one more release planned each year. Originally stocked by John Lewis, the full range of scents is currently available via the Scents of Time website and its exclusive US distributor, Aquadeluna, while all the scents except for Night Star are also on sale in the British Museum shop in London.

Lovethescents kindly sent me a smidge of her own tiny samples from The Perfumed Court of three of the Scents of Time range, and as there are relatively few reviews of the actual perfumes themselves, I thought I would add our twopennyworth. On the Scents of Time website are links to pdfs of booklets accompanying each scent, with the rather thoughtful warning that the white writing on a brown background “might not suit your eyesight”. : - ) Fragrantica has reproduced the story behind Night Star here. The Scents of Time website also gives details of the exact techniques used to recreate each fragrance, comprising a mix of headspace technology, found materials, old formulae and anecdotal records.

NIGHT STAR (Perfumer – Christopher Sheldrake)

Mr Bonkers’ ears pricked up when I mentioned that a number of scent samples went down with The Titanic (in the luggage of a German perfumer, Adolphe Saalfeld), but had been recovered from the ocean floor in 2001. One in particular - the so-called “Rosa Maris”, or “rose of the sea” - was subsequently recreated by the Scents of Time team with slight concessions to modern taste. The reason his curiosity was piqued by this perfume is because according to Mr Bonkers, Titanic is “the best film ever made”, even though it doesn’t feature Nicolas Cage, “the best actor ever made”, and - unlike his usual fodder of corpse-strewn zombie films - only has “minimal violence”. (That's if you exclude the not inconsiderable impact of ship against iceberg.) Mr Bonkers has another personal interest in all things Titanic-related, for rumour has it that his family is directly descended from Captain Smith, who, like Mr B, was born in Stoke-on-Trent. You may say that that is not the most auspicious of family connections to broadcast, but still.

But anyway, Night Star is NOT the replica of the scent that sank with the The Titanic. Out of deference to the deceased perfumer and to the last survivor of the wreck, Elizabeth (Millvina) Dean, who was consulted on the matter, a completely different perfume was developed instead, which was to be "a fragrance of the future" - Night Star. As Pybus explains: "For steam ship read star ship. For latitude and longitude read galactic coordinates. And Night Star, a symbol of future hope, would be dedicated to Millvina, who, along with Adolphe, has now joined the night stars above."

The planet that was singled out as the destination for the "star ship" was Gliese 581d, which astronomers believe may be similar to Earth. The brief was to create “a fantasy fragrance based on earthlike aromas which would be both alien in make up, and yet have a comfortable, earthly feel, reflecting Gliese 581d’s potential as our new home.”

Top notes: bergamot and lavender
Middle notes: rose, violet, heliotrope, orris and lily of the valley
Base notes: sandalwood, vanilla and hawthorn blossom

Lovethescents’ comment on the three scents overall:

“I'm a bit disappointed because all three have a bit of a cheap quality to them in the opening, something I did not expect. After about half an hour, that alcoholic-y start disappeared in all three and they all improved.”

And specifically on Night Star…

“Night Star- reallllllly wanted to love this. Lots of violet and hints of powder in the middle, base is probably the best part here with less powder, although more violet than I would ever want/need.”

When I first tried Night Star, I also got this alcohol-y, oily note, which jarred with the powderiness of the formulation as a whole. Today, however, the opening was less rasping, and the scent dried down to a much smoother and almost creamy finish. Fundamentally, however, for at least some of its development, Night Star still has that austere, powdery iris-violet thing going on which I struggle with in Creed Love in Black (even though I own a bottle). So, texturally speaking, for me it lacked the crisp, bright feel that I would expect from a perfume inspired by a star in a clear night sky. I do detect the “earthlike aromas”, however to my nose there is an old fashioned quality to Night Star (thanks to the violet and iris), which would have fitted right in with the original Titanic scenario, but seems at odds with its positioning as a symbol of the future, and the notion of intragalactic travel. I guess I was envisaging something clean and futuristic like Thierry Mugler Cologne, say, or one of those ozony, "now you sniff it, now you don't" Escentric Molecules.

MAYA (Perfumer - Jorg Lee)

Below is a short excerpt from a description of the story behind this scent on the Aquadeluna website, involving chocolate and the watery sacrifice of young Indian women:

“Maya (Mystic Scent of the Americas) takes its name from the central and North Americans who inhabited present day Mexico and Guatemala…. It is believed that young maidens were drugged at a temple by concoctions using the narcotic effect of tropical flowers, vanilla and chocolate as well as the smoking incense of burning copal resin and that this aroma was their first sense of eternity and led them more willingly to sacrifice.”

Top notes: sweet copal incense and ozone
Middle notes of night blooming jasmine, foliage, tropical fruits and tropical flowers
Base notes: cacao beans and pure vanilla extract.

Lovethescents’ comment:

“Maya - hints of bitter chocolate with some light florals and light incense. A bit bland; might be better with more incense.”

Although the notes are only broadly similar, Maya reminded me stylistically of Romea d’Ameor’s Les Grandes Pretresses Incas.

Notes: mandarin orange, grapefruit, orange, red apple, mango, orchid, sea water, lily of the valley, jasmine, sandalwood, oakmoss, teak wood, nectarine, dark chocolate, caramel and musk.

Both scents combine fruit and chocolate, which has always struck me as a curious match, and while this is my "favourite" of the three tested, I didn’t really care for it. I certainly didn't find it compelling enough to allow myself to be tossed into a Sacred Well.

NENUFAR (Perfumer – Montserrat Moline)

Nenúfar (The Sacred Scent of Cleopatra) is based on a recreation using headspace technology of the blue lotus flower or blue water lily, which was a sacred bloom to the Pharaohs. According to Pybus, Nenúfar "is as near as we can get to the aromatic experience of the ancients".

Top notes: green watery accord, nutmeg and angelica
Middle notes: muguet with a sweet watery floral accord
Base notes: sandalwood, musks, orris, heliotrope, almond and patchouli.

Pybus adds that the blue lotus flower's chemistry contained a hallucinogen, myristicin. Egyptians apparently made a kind of home brew by steeping the flower's petals in wine and drinking the resulting heady concoction – as recounted in Tennyson’s poem, The Lotus Eaters. Myristicin is also found in nutmeg, which has been included in the formulation for reasons of pharmacological exactitude!

Lovethescents’ comment:

“Nenufar- a very familiar floral-aquatic. Nice enough, but completely unoriginal. Reminds me a bit of a high-end body wash in 'water lily' or the like.”

I agree with her Body Shop / BBW analogy, for this scent was the least innovative for me, and I would never have guessed it had such an ancient pedigree. Cleopatra is the sort of diva-ish historical personage with whom I would have associated a scent with a lot more oomph – perhaps a sumptious oriental of some kind. So whilst I am distinctly underwhelmed by Nenúfar the fragrance, it is still interesting to learn more of its antecedents.

And finally, on the FAQs section of the Scents of Time website, I was surprised to read the following answer to a customer’s question – which may have been prompted by the limited distribution of this range:

“Q - Can the fragrances be in any way linked to modern perfumes - just so I know without testing that I would like them?

A - Well we use Michael Edwards' fragrance families to describe my perfumes so there is a loose connection as follows:"

The perfumes listed to illustrate the fragrance family of each scent are as follows:

NIGHT STAR

"Quelques Fleurs Royale (Houbigant),Nina (Nina Ricci), Fleurs de Rocaille (Caron) L'Air du Temps (Nina Ricci), Dolce Y Gabbana Light Blue."

MAYA

"Ambre Sultan (Serge Lutyens (sic) & Palais Royal Shisheido (sic)), Opium (Yves St Laurent) Youth Dew (Estee Lauder), Maja (Myrurgia), Coco (Chanel)."

NENUFAR

"L'eau D'Issey d'ete (Issey Miyake), Polo Sport Woman (Ralph Lauren), Sunflowers (Elizabeth Arden), Escape (Calvin Klein)."

Light Blue? Sunflowers? I know the aim is just to convey the "vibe" of each fragrance category, but hello...? Actually, Sunflowers is not a bad analogy for Nenúfar, but Light Blue is a million miles away from Night Star. I suppose L’Air du Temps has a similarly spiky quality, but completely different notes. Bvlgari Femme or Creed Love in Black might have been a bit nearer the mark.

And anyway, what in the world were the Scents of Time people thinking of, encouraging blind buys in this manner, even had the scents listed above been a closer match?

So in summary, I think the concept is a great one, in tune with the growing lobby for more memorable and interesting perfumes outside the tired formulae of the mainstream. Two of the three scents are unusual, but not particularly to my taste, while the third – though historically authentic - smells remarkably like a mass market fragrance to me. For anyone familiar with the Romea D’Ameor range (which also takes its inspiration, if not its formulae, from historical figures and cultures) - and purely based on the three I have tried, which is not strictly fair, I know - I'd say that the Scents of Time are similarly mixed in style and execution: for example, Romea d'Ameor's Les Princesses de Venise is a fairly bland fruity floral, and though others in the line had more of a twist, none moved me.

Historical replicas of scents lost in time? It is only one (highly subjective) opinion, but some things are lost for a reason...


Erratum - Mr Bonkers has asked me to point out that his comments about the film Titanic and Nicolas Cage were ironic. He does like zombie films though.

All photos from the Scents of Time website except the photo of The Titanic (from cruiseline.org), the Romea D'Ameor bottle (from dameor.fr) and the photo of Gliese 581d (from textually.org)