Tauerville Rose Flash Review

I've blogged quite a bit about Andy Tauer's work and how much of a fan girl I am. I might not have liked a few of his offerings but I have liked or loved most of what he has made.

Yesterday, I've done something kind of bad. You see, Luckyscent e-mailed me a coupon for 15% off a purchase. Luckyscent doesn't really hand out coupons for most everything in their store. So naturally, I take advantage and buy Incense Flashed, without smelling it first. Yeah, I probably shouldn't have done that but I've had some luck with blind buys with Andy Tauer's work. Then I was reminded that I have Rose Flash and needed to try it.

Rose Flash is definitely a rose dominant perfume. A huge, jammy rose. I can try to compare this to Nahema but I cannot begin to try. After about 10 or 15 minutes in, Rose Flash begins to become a green rose. The green aspect isn't huge but it is noticeable. The green compliments the rose, it's the stem of the rose but without the thorns. A half an hour in, I did notice that I did smell some amber that lends some depth to the composition. What I did notice is that I didn't smell the Tauer base that is always prominent in the Tauer perfumes. I had gotten 7 hours of wear but I don't think that a bottle will be in my collection. Rose Flash just didn't do it for me.

Evaporation

Let's get this straight, I have tons of bottles like any good perfumista. This means back up bottles. I have back ups for discontinued perfumes and a whole lot more back ups in vintage perfumes. The vintages that I do have are mostly in splash or dabber bottles. But I always seem to run into the same problem. The dreaded evaporation.

The older the vintage is, the less likely the dabber seems to hold the perfume. A lot of the vintage bottles I have date from the 1950's to the 1990's. I love my vintage Guerlain's but find that the ones that are earlier than the 1970's don't seem to have plastic over the glass part of the stopper that goes into the bottle. My newer ones do. This means that I have to start wearing some of these and use the bottles up. Truth be told, I don't mind it so much when the vintage splash bottles are screw top and wither EDT or EDC concentration. I mind the most when the vintage extraits are doing this. Vintage extrait is fairly expensive and I have less of vintage extrait. I don't wear my vintage L'Heure Bleue too often but noticed that one of the bottles did have some noticeable evaporation. It isn't a huge amount but it was noticeable and the other one, I'm not totally sure. It looks like I have to get some snack sized Zip lock bags to prevent some of the evaporation and start wearing them more often.

Perfumes That Have Grown on Me

Every time Surrender to Chance or The Perfumed Court has some sort of sale, I am taking a look and most likely buying a decant or two. It just happens, I could ignore it but I don't. There is always something that I read that puts a certain perfume on my radar or back on my radar. I have rediscovered my copy of The Guide by Luca Turin and was looking through it. I came across his review of Ubar and suddenly, I had a craving to try it again.

Even though I hated Ubar but tried to find something good to say about it, I hadn't smelled it in years. But I had to try it again. Why? I knew that when I tried Ubar, I was still pretty new to the scene with niche. Now since I am not so new, I wanted to give Ubar another look. I have lost the whole bug spray thing that I smelled years ago and now I am rocking it. So now I am thinking that a full bottle is on my list.

Do I have a couple others that I that are growing on me? Yep but I am having trouble remembering what they are. And that is what happens with a large collection of perfume, things getting lost in the shuffle.

Tom Ford Private Blend Vanille Fatale

I haven't been much of a fan of Tom Ford's campaign ads for anything. His pornographic images to buy his stuff just turns me off. I don't need naked people shown in a crude manner to try something of his out. I've only really spent time with Tobacco Vanille, so I can't say much about the rest of his perfume line. When I heard that Tom Ford was releasing another vanilla perfume, I had to roll my eyes. Think about it, he already had Tobacco Vanille that seemed to be universally well liked or loved. I've always been pretty iffy on vanilla centric perfumes. Most fall into the too sweet and too edible to be a perfume.

I was bored and decided to test this one out just to see what the difference was between Tobacco Vanille and Vanille Fatale. There is a definite difference. Vanille Fatale starts off with a huge blast of vanilla that smells a little plastic like and something else that I couldn't place. I started to smell a sunscreen note. The sunscreen note has a huge coconut element to it. Yes, coconut and vanilla that's trying to take me to the tropics where the smell of coconuts and vanilla reign supreme. After a while, I do get a little bit of coffee in the background but it gets smothered with vanilla and coconuts.

Vanille Fatale has the lasting power of nuclear waste and has a fairly loud projection. It can be enjoyable for me in the right circumstances but not something I'd wear on a regular basis. I'd rather spend the money on another bottle of Amouage Memior or Lyric for what I would spend of a bottle of Vanille Fatale. It's not really worth $230 in my book.

Summer Perfume

It's that time of year. The time of grilling, mosquitoes and mosquito bites, bees and most of all hot weather. That muggy type of hot, that insufferable type of hot. I got to thinking about perfumes that can work when the heat is insufferable.

A few of my picks are from the Commes des Garcones incense line, specifically Kyoto and Zagorsk. Summer heats doesn't make anything really stick around all that much, maybe 3 or 4 hours at best. Kyoto and Zagorsk are not heavy perfumes and in heat, they are great. Dry but not bone dry, airy but not really. They just seem to work in summer.

Another favorite in summer in Chanel no 19 in EDT form. It's bitey, it's light, slightly bitter but it works in summer. The extrait and EDP don't do the trick in summer, early spring, maybe but not summer. The extrait and EDP just get annoying and seem to be too much in summer. Worth Courtesan is another good one to. It's cheerful, relativity cheap and it's fun. That slightly sweaty pineapple and the barest hint of musk make it a wonderful perfume for the summer.

The last perfume that seems to suit in my collection is En Passant. The lilac, cucumber, wheat and the watery aspect just work in heat, if you use a light hand. Spray with a heavy hand, it might not work.

Amouage Gold for Men

I've been struggling with Amouage's offerings for men. None of what I had tried didn't wow me, let alone impress me. They were light, thin and weak things. I couldn't understand nor see the correlation between the men's version and the women's version of any of them. Then came Gold for men.

I have always found Gold for women a little difficult to wear. Too big, too dense, and way too much civet that got really fecal. As difficult as the women's version is, I do wear it from time to time.

Gold for men starts out as almost a dead ringer for the women's version. I noticed that everything is toned down and drier. The floral aspect is still prominant but doesn't smell overwhelming to my nose. What made me really happy is the civet note wasn't huge and fecal. There was just enough to give it a bit of a growl. Gold Woman has a civet note was huge to the point of crass and was very poopy. I loved how the frankincense was very prominant and didn't allow anything to get out of hand. Gold Man has the lasting power of nuclear waste of my perfume eating skin.

I'm in love with Gold Man because I see how it ties into Gold Woman. Could I see a man wearing this? It would take a very confidant man to wear it but I would gladly take a bottle. So I have to save my pennies and get it for my birthday, or Christmas or when I get my next tax refund.

Spring is here to stay

It looks like spring is here to stay. I have been pretty busy. With the new puppy and many changes at work, I don't have much of a motivation to blog or try anything new. But since the weather is much warmer, almost unseasonably warm, it's difficult with my perfume collection.

A few days ago, while having the new puppy outside to use the bathroom, I end up getting stung on the top of my head by a hornet. I don't know why but I remember wearing vintage Bal that day. That's the little dickens to the left. I have forgotten many things with having a puppy in the house. How often I need to take them out to go to the bathroom, playing, chewing everything, even hands and much more. Right now, she is napping on the couch downstairs, so I have a little bit of time to blog.

But back to the hornet sting and vintage Bal, I had to take a look at my collection. Most of my collection is on the oriental side or kind of on the sweet side. I don't have much in the way of stuff that will keep the bees away or be overwhelming. I have Chanel no 19, Mitsouko on cooler days, Deneuve might be a little sketchy and LADDM. So I have just four perfumes that probably would bet me through spring and summer but I'm not counting on it. I am looking for another spring/summer perfume that won't attract bugs and things that sting but coming up short with what would be good.