Serge Lutens Bois de Violette Review and Other Stuff

It's been really difficult to blog lately and I mean really difficult to blog about anything, let alone perfume. My dad had surgery almost a week and a half ago due to colon cancer and we are waiting for the biopsy results to come in. Having my dad home means less time to blog (not like I do a whole lot of it) and work leaves almost no time to write about perfume. I do still wear perfume but I haven't really attempted to wear anything new. Financial troubles have also taken their toll on me but I am starting to see some marginal progress. With financial troubles makes me hesitant to reach into my unworn bag of decants. I just can't afford to buy anymore perfume right now and buying decants is almost out of the question right now.

With finances being very out of wack, it is making me appreciate my perfume collection a whole lot more. I am being forced to be content with the collection that I do have and I am hoping that I can drain a few bottles and sell off the ones that I don't wear. I haven't gotten around to seeing if Goodwill will accept perfume. Maybe a consignment shop would work a little better.

I was craving something new to wear, my hand picked out Serge Lutens Bois de Violette. I've always had somewhat of a rocky road with Serge Lutens offerings. Some don't smell good to my nose or too fleeting. It doesn't help that his exclusive line is sold at Barney's for an Amouage price. A Serge Lutens perfume works better for me if I spray, not dab. Dabbing just doesn't work all that well for me considering. I can't fathom why Serge Lutens refuses to include spray tops with his bell jars just like he does with the export line. With his export line, you have the option of spraying or dabbing. I'm too lazy as well to decant my own perfumes.

In the review, there will be a lot of comparisons between Bois de Violette and it's eldest sister, Feminite du Bois. Feminite du Bois is actually the mother ship for the whole Bois line, so there will be tons of comparisons between the two. The whole structure of Violette is almost identical to FdB from top to bottom. I'm not kidding, in a blind test, I probably wouldn't be able to differentiate between the two. Not at first sniff at least but then the violet comes out to play. It's not a shrinking violet but not an aggressive violet either, the violet is more of the assertive type. Then the whole FdB thing kind of quiets down and hums along. The sad thing is that Violette doesn't last long on me with a spray decant. I maybe get 3 and a half hours worth of wear out of this. I don't know when Serge moved Violette from the export line to the non export line but it must have been in the past 3 or 4 years. Most export sprays that I have last me at least 8 hours. Will I ever get a bottle of this? Probably not because I already have a bottle of FdB in my arsenal. I wouldn't turn my nose up if someone gifted me with a bottle of it either. My wallet is thanking me right now.

Chanel no 5 L'Eau Review

It took me quite a while to love and enjoy the original no 5 in all of it's current forms. Since I now love the original no 5, I own the EDP, EDT, and some of the extrait and some of the extrait is the vintage version. I do wear no 5 on a regular basis. But when I learned to love Chanel no 5, I wasn't wearing it as I could have, which is quite a bit. Then Eau Premiere came out. I had bought a bottle within the first two months and wore it at least three times a week. I loved Eau Premiere in the beginning and I'm not sure what had changed to make me dislike it but now I do. This leads me to no 5 L'Eau.

When I had heard that Chanel was doing a new flanker of no 5, a little bit of me was horrified. I wasn't amused that they were messing around with their flagship perfume. Let's think about it, no 5 is their most famous perfume and most classic perfume. Mademoiselle gets a lot of press but it's not really a classic yet but probably one of their best sellers. Chanel had already played the flanker game with Coco and their Chance line and I am wondering why they need to mess around with no 5 by needing 2 flankers. So off I went to get my paws on a decant.

Every time that I try a new perfume, I always half hope that the clouds will part and the angels will start singing. That didn't happen with L'Eau. All I had got was something really generic with hints of the no 5 structure. I think that the massive citrus note and how it was presented did me in. The floral component was incredibly generic and the aldehydes were pretty faint in this. I could smell a relation to the original no 5. If Eau Premiere was the daughter of no 5, then L'Eau is the grand daughter. This could have been a blatant ripoff of no 5 by another company if I wasn't really into perfume. For an EDT, I do get some longevity with this one. I get about 7 hours of wear before it fades a way into nothing. Yes, I dislike it, and won't be getting a bottle.

Tauerville Vanilla Flash Review

Yes, I actually did go ahead and test something new and now I have to review it. For the longest time, I thought I hated vanilla in perfume, especially if it was the dominant note. Vanilla had to be buried under a bunch of other notes before I would even try it out, Then came Havana Vanille (traumatically discontinued) and Guerlain SDV and to a lesser degree Tobacco Vanille. I figured out why I didn't care for vanilla too much. Most of what I have been smelling was the edible vanilla and I didn't like smelling like I just baked a batch of cupcakes. My vanillas must be inedible to be worn. This leads me to trying out Andy Tauer's Vanilla Flash.

For a while, I have been debating about exploring the Tauerville line for some reason. I love Andy Tauer's work even though I don't care for some of his offerings. That's OK though, there are plenty of Andy Tauer offerings to go around. When STC was offering a 15% or 20% off sale, I figured why not try it out? I might actually enjoy a couple out of this line.

First up was Vanilla Flash. Vanilla is the dominant note of this one (obviously) but it's not the cupcake variety. It's a slightly burnt vanilla with maybe a little hint of booze. Even after a few hours of wearing it, I thought that there might be a hint of tobacco in there lending the slightest leaning to Havana Vanille. There probably is a hint of tobacco in there. From start to finish, I did smell the Tauer base. The Tauer base isn't in your face like some of Andy Tauer's offerings and Vanilla Flash does need something to make it as something recognizable to be Mr. Tauer's work. A whopping dose of Tauerade would have rendered this as kind of bad. I was really impressed with the lasting power of Vanilla Flash. I had applied this one at 11am and by 10pm, the last of Vanilla Flash disappeared.

If you find that SDV is too burnt, boozy and expensive or Havana Vanille to be too hard to find and expensive, this is for you. What make this perfume even better, for a niche perfume, this is practically free. Luckyscent is selling the largest bottle available (30ml) for $63 and that it free for niche perfume. This is going on my wish list because it might be quite a while before I can get a bottle. Unless it gets discontinued like Ingrid did.

Not Often Worn but Not Forgotten About

I can't believe that I went almost a month without posting a thing. It's been a wacky month for me and blogging kept slipping my mind. Mostly because I had nothing to blog about. Not wanting really to wear and review, nothing that I haven't blogged about at one point or another.

I think that everyone has a handful of perfumes that they haven't exactly forgotten about but haven't been wearing them either. It's more than you "forgot" about them. You just are not wearing them. The larger the full bottle collection and the bigger the decant pile, the harder it is to keep track of things. I might have to really force myself to wear and review a minimum of one or two perfumes a week to get the ball rolling.

I'm not talking about just vintage perfume. I'm talking about the current formulations of some perfumes. I do have a couple vintages that I am hoarding because I have so little of the vintage formulation. L'Heure Bleue is one of those vintages that I do tend to hoard. I do own a fairly current version of L'Heure Bleue but it's such a powder bomb and kind of a sad scent that doesn't get worn often. Yes, I don't find LHB to be a cheerful perfume to wear.

When I go to pick out my scent of the day, I gaze at my collection and tend to wear the same thing over and over again. But when I do wear something a little different, I wear it for days. Take Amouage Epic for example. Even though I somewhat wear it regularly, I will wear it for days on end. But it always seems to be the same ones that I will wear day after day.

Some that are not quite forgotten about are the ones that are more of a seasonal thing than the ones that can be worn year round. Many of the classic Amouages do seem to wear much better in the winter than any other time of year. Can you tell that I haven't been enthused by the latest released that I have tried with Amouage? Some of them I have worn but haven't reviewed.

Coty Chypre Vintage EDT

For the longest while, I've had a small spray decant of Coty's Chypre in my unworn pile. And when I was trying to make a decision on what I should wear, I noticed that my decant was almost empty due to evaporation. So I had to finish it and review it.

There are many chypres out there still in production today but I think that Chypre may have been the first modern chypre. Chypre is slightly brutal with a few rough edges in it but it is wonderful. I find that it's more akin to Chanel no 19 or maybe a little like Chamade. The version of no 19 that Chypre is akin to is the EDT and not the EDP. No 19 in EDP form is a little smoother and a lot more rosy but there is no way that Chypre is like no 19 in extrait form.

While I did find Chypre enjoyable, I'm not so sure that I will be seeking out a bottle but maybe a small decant for reference. I am starting to prefer stuff that is in current circulation.

L'Heure de Nuit and Bottles

After yapping, panicking and a little bit of whining, I did manage to get my paws on a full bottle of L'Heure de Nuit. It was somewhat difficult to find a bottle because it has been discontinued and I didn't know about it. There have been a couple of perfumes that were being discontinued and I did manage to become aware of it beforehand to get a couple bottles. Sometimes I find out and can only afford one bottle. So now the hoarding begins.

After my bee bottle had arrived, I don't know what I was exactly expecting but this wasn't it. Let me be frank, I own some huge bottles of perfume and I mean huge. I had bought Cuir de Russie and Sycomore before they came in a manageable 2.5 ounce bottle. I own 8 ounce bottles of Chamade and Jicky and a 9 ounce bottle of vintage Bal. So it was a little bit of a shock to see how little 4.2 ounces is compared to the bottles that I have mentioned. Maybe it's the fact that the bottle is like the Serge Lutens bell jars, they are round. But I was still excited to add a bee bottle to the collection.

It's not often that I actually do buy a brand spanking new bottle of perfume. Just can't afford that often. After the rush of tearing off the cellophane and opening the box, I have to gaze at the bottle.There is something about getting a brand new bottle of perfume, especially if it has been discontinued. A good most of my collection isn't in a cool cabinet but out in the open and mostly protected from light. Yeah, I'm sure that some are clutching their pearls but what's the point in having some good looking bottles and not look at them. I will admit to the fact that I can be a bottle slut once in a while.

Some bottles are pretty utilitarian when you look at them. The classic Chanel bottles are pretty plain and so are Serge Lutens' export line. Serge Lutens must have taken a couple notes from Chanel but still has his exclusive line in bell jars. But Guerlain might have been the first to create bottle swag to help sell perfume.

Chanel Cormandel EDT Review

It's time for me to just review Coromandel due to the fact that I've spent more time than I really needed to with it. I picked Coromandel due to the fact is that I've kind of been wanting to slowly work my way through the Les Exclusifs line by Chanel. My thought about the line is that Chanel is trying to get somewhat of a foothold in the niche department but still be mainstream. And I'm confused by that. Chanel's prices are already in the price range for niche but the Les Exclusifs line has some of the old offerings (Cuir de Russie and no 22 for starters) from way back when. Maybe they are marketing this line for perfume people like be who don't tend to shop mainstream and have smelled much more than the average consumer.

When I had first put on Coromandel, I smelled something akin to Frapin 1270 without the booze. I initially liked that but did need to wear it again because I knew that there was something that I was missing and it had something very familiar about it. On my second and third wearing, I knew what I was missing and what was familiar about it. It smelled an awful lot like Coco Mademoiselle. The patchouli and the fruity parts are tones down in Coromandel but still there. The thread of vanilla that shows itself an hour in tames the fruit and patchouli. I've said before that anything that has patchouli as a dominant player really isn't my friend. There is something about patchouli that I haven't come around to, probably the fact that it always smells kind of dirty to me. Yes, the patchouli is smoothed out and toned down but it's still there and still detectable to me. I will admit that Mademoiselle is a frenemy to me and Coromandel is a little more of a friend but not much. The decant that I have is at least a couple years old and obviously the EDT since the EDP version came out a couple months ago. Lasting power on my skin is about 6 hours and the sillage is about medium. Maybe my luck will change with Coromandel and I do fall in love with it but my track record with CM tells me otherwise.