Shalimar Millesime Vanilla Planifolia Review

I have been on vacation all week and swore to myself that I would wear something that I have never worn before and review it. I probably could have reviewed this Monday or Tuesday but it wasn't quite in the cards for this week. It's been a week of dealing with garbage relating to my grandmother who resides in memory care and I wasn't so up to reviewing anything.

It seems like at least in the past couple years, Guerlain has been cranking out flankers of Shalimar. I think Guerlain picked up on people missing the Ode a la Vanille flankers and probably thought it was a great idea to creating more Shalimar flankers. The biggest problem that I have with the slew of Shalimar flankers is that most of them are limited editions. Shalimar and it's flankers have always been on the more "affordable" side but it's still a little too much for me price wise.

After dithering on getting a sample, I got a dabber sample from STC and it's been sitting on my dresser, begging to be tried. Parts of me wanted to give it a go but I was hesitant to. What if I fell in love with it? I love the original Shalimar and love both the Ode a la Vanille flankers but the Odes are long discontinued. So on Tuesday, I gave it a go.

The first time I tried it, I thought that I had put on some Spiriteuese Double Vanille. I figured with all of the perfumes that the ladies at STC had, they could have mistakenly grabbed the wrong bottle and given me SDV instead. After a few minutes, I started to smell what I knew to be Shalimar. The issue is that the SDV parts seem to overpower Shalimar. Guerlain has always been very good at a classy vanilla perfume. But this is a little different It's like SDV and Shalimar had a love child and it's name is Millesime Vanilla but this version of Shalimar is closer SDV than Shalimar. While I do thing that this version of Shalimar is fairly awesome, I think that you would be better off layering SDV with Shalimar or just wear SDV on it's own.

Pre-Reformulation SDV

Since my computer is being a butt, I am writing this on my Kindle. The weather has gotten much cooler and now I can start wearing my heavy hitters. After digging in my unworn bag, I had pulled out a small decant of SDV. I had to take a closer look to why I had a decant in there in the first place. On the label, it has the pre-reformulation 2007 on it, so I had to test it out and do a comparison with the current version.

Guerlain has always been able to make vanilla sing. I had learned to love vanilla a little later in my perfume journey and how I like my vanilla. I like my vanilla either burnt, boozy or inedible. Spirirtuese Double Vanille delivers on all three. The pre-formulated version is smoother, quieter and less boozy than the reformulation. But SDV is still fairly loud on me and has the half life of plutonium on skin, reformulated or not. I would like to have a bottle of the current stuff but it's not in the cards right now.

Guerlain Tonka Imperiale EDP Review

The whole going through Amazon to get  full bottle of Theorema didn't pan out and I am getting a refund. But I did make sure that I was unhappy with the whole situation because it was described as being sold as Theorema but instead Amazon was shipping out Fan di Fendi. I had said that if Amazon is going to sell Theorema and describe a product being sold as Theorema, I should expect to get exactly what I had ordered, not something else.

I had been testing some vanilla perfumes or vanilla like perfumes and had always debated on trying Guerlain's Tonka Imperiale. I'm always a little wary of trying perfumes with a hefty price tag. What if I fall in love with it and finally save up enough to get a full bottle and it's been discontinued and have to wait it out on Ebay?

Tonka Imperiale reminds me of Spiriteueuse Double Vanille in many ways. Just maybe a little more nutty, little less smoky and vanilla like. Tonka Imperiale could possibly be a kissing cousin to Havana Vanille or it probably resembles Havana Vanille more than it does SDV. Could it resemble Shalimar? Maybe in Shalimar's dry down if one can ignore Shalimar's citrus note. While I do like them both and lasting power is good. I'm not sure if I want to shell out $260 for 2.5 ounces. Yes, I still do have a hard time with vanillas due to the fact that there are two routes that vanilla likes to go. It's either cupcake territory or burnt or smoky and sometimes they turn sour or bitter in the end of the wearing.

Guerlain Nahema EDP Review

I've been off and on dabbling in Guerlain perfumes. I've smelled and worn Mitsouko, didn't care for it overly, loved Shalimar, and Spiriteueuse Double Vanille was somewhat of a disaster. Now I must admit to defeat with Guerlain's Nahema EDP. I was starting to go through a little hyacinth kick and wanted to see if I could find a second Guerlain that I could love. I ordered a 2.5ml decant of this and when I got it, I immediately sprayed it on. The first wearing of it, I smelled nothing but jam. In the 4 wearings afterwards, I still got jam but the rose came out to play. The rose was a little strange that I couldn't place and then it hit me. The rose smelled like a rose bouquet and the roses were bruised, giving off a jam like vibe. I smell just bruised roses and jam and nothing else. It's one of those perfumes that doesn't seem to have any kind of anchor on my skin. Staying power is halfway decent but it gets annoying after a while. The reason that I am admitting defeat with Guerlain is that it is a perfume house that doesn't mesh well with me even though Shalimar does. Maybe I just don't really get Guerlain but I don't really find Guerlain to be agreeable to me.

Guerlain Spiriteueuse Double Vanille Review

I have got to stop reading perfume blogs and reviews. It's led to buying and trying way too many perfumes. This is coming after I had counted 25 full bottles of perfumes and 47 decants of perfume of various sizes. But there are some perfumes that I had initially written off as nothing special, I have fallen in love with (Worth Courtesan, Amouage Reflection) and there are some that I had initially loved and now I don't really care for (Amouage Ubar). Tastes do evolve.

Guerlain's Spiriteueuse Double Vanille is one perfume that has gotten many rave reviews on perfume blogs and seems to have a cult following. I was kind of intrigued with this one. After this had arrived in the mail, something did hit me. I have had some difficulty with vanilla dominant perfumes in the past. Most that I have tried turn into those sickly sweet things that make me smell like a cupcake. Or they get this bubblegum type thing (Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille) going on in the dry down.

I have tried this over the past couple days and I am not really that wild over it. SDV is too busy trying to be too many things. But I mainly get the vanilla extract that I use for baking vibe. After about 2 hours SDV peters into a bubblegum vanilla that sticks around for the remainder of the wearing. I was a little dissapointed with the longetivity of this EDP. It only lasts on my skin for about 7 hours at best. Shalimar and Mitsouko, both in EDP form last for a good 12 hours on my skin. It's nice enough but I won't be buying a full bottle.