It’s a monster! – Tyrannosaurus Rex from Zoologist

T-Rex on Bloom’s go-to NEW shelf

It’s in the trees…it’s coming 

T-Rex bursts into the clearing meaning business. There’s a crash of deep dark woods, along with a cloying sweetness; a rich, meaty opening, dripping with the metallic edge of blood. And then the fire starts. It crackles and spits; burnt fruits caramelising with charred BBQ. There are flowers here – champaca and ylang ylang, along with fresh green saplings – but they’re crushed underfoot as the fire takes over.

The fruitiness holds, but it’s overwhelmed with smoke, underpinned by a menacing, animalic leather. This is the T-Rex as the asteroid hits, the volcanoes erupt and it all goes to shit. Things are getting quite exciting.

Then suddenly….all is calm. T-Rex makes a bold entrance, but after crashing onto the scene, things start to level out swiftly. After just minutes, it melds into a super-smoky, multi-faceted fragrance.

And as the drydown progresses, it becomes almost warm and cuddly – with charred sandalwood, beauty emerges alongside the beast. The monster turns into a gentle giant, soft but testosterone-heavy, sweet with just the undertone of menace.

THE NOTES

Top:  Bergamot, Black Pepper, Fir balsam, Laurel Leaf, Neroli, Nutmeg

Heart: Champaca, Geranium, Jasmine, Osmanthus, Rose, Ylang ylang

Base: Resins, Cade, Cedar, Civet, Frankincense, Leather, Patchouli, Sandalwood, Vanilla

Cretaceous imaginings aside, this is the scent of journeying home after a festival; the scuzzy scent of last night’s rum oozing from your pores into your leather jacket, your hair reeking of campfire.

T-Rex is everything I expected. I wish it had been everything I’d hoped, too. It was always going to be challenging, but I SO wanted to be able to wear it – how cool would it be, when asked, to say you’re wearing T-Rex?

I can’t pull this off. Others could. When it comes to Zoologist, I’m definitely a hummingbird kind of person. Or maybe moth. No, hummingbird. Moth. Dammit, will someone please just buy me both?!

You can try and buy T-Rex at T-Rex at Bloom in Covent Garden, £175 for 60ml extrait de parfum.

 

Over the Chocolate Shop by 4160 Tuesdays – review

Over the Chocolate Shop from 4160 Tuesdays

Another new 4160 Tuesdays fragrance. Another blind buy. I told myself that I could always pass it on. I don’t NEED a chocolate scent.

I don’t NEED to eat a whole chocolate orange, either. But as I’m polishing off that delicious flakey core (and it is the most delicious part), I know what I need doesn’t really matter. Chocolate is desire and impulse and excess, and all of that’s bottled in this scent.

Over the Chocolate Shop is indie perfumer Sarah McCartney’s latest incarnation of one of her earliest fragrances, made for her goddaughter who lived in a house on top of a chocolate shop. It’s a reworking with superior ingredients including cocoa extract, hazelnut CO2 extract, vanilla absolute and coffee extract. She says she’s ‘happy with it now’. I’m glad. It makes me happy too. 

Although it’s so cocoa-supercharged it’ll have Augustus Gloop pulling his trunks on, this chocolate experience is no guilt-inducing Dairy-milk binge. Over the Chocolate Shop is grown-up, quality stuff. A proper gourmand, and like White Queen, indulgent without the sweetness.

Like an 85% cocoa solids bar from Rabot Estate, you only need a little bit to feel satisfied.

Zero calories. No regrets.

Batch number 1 sold out in under 24 hours. Batch number 2 is macerating right now, from £35 for 30ml. Be quick – it’ll go like hot chocolate. 

Joy by Dior – review

So dull, Dior couldn’t be arsed to come up with a name for it

They say:

“Constructed with multiple nuances, a myriad of facets that lead to an expression that is clear and self-evident…”

I say:

“Yeah, I have nothing to say about it either”.

Holy smokes – Zoologist are launching a T-REX scent?!

What on cretaceous earth does a Tyrannosaurus Rex smell like? Only a couple of months’ wait to find out. This Autumn, Zoologist are releasing a T-Rex fragrance and I am ridiculously over-excited. This boots Etat Libre D’Orange’s ‘I am Trash’ right off the top spot as my most hotly awaited scent of this Autumn.

Following their stunning recent releases Moth and Hyrax, I can only hope Zoologist stay on their roll for this one and I can’t wait to hear the notes. My guesses: got to be lots of thick, green jungly things. Ferns.  Probably some big shouty florals too (apparently the cretaceous era was when flowering plants stared to emerge, and – new fact alert –  Tyrannosaurus Rex had a surprisingly highly developed sense of smell). It’s got to be packed with animalics –  leather? Perhaps even a touch of something sulphurous and volcano-ey?

There’s got to be loads of resinous amber (for the dino DNA) and maybe a big dollop of Jeff Goldblum for smoothness. Maybe. Can’t wait.

 

 

A new concept in fragrance? – Floral Street scents review

Making my way through Covent Garden after a sneaky trip to Bloom, I passed by ‘a new concept in fragrance’ – Floral Street.

Ok, ok, so I went in cynical.

The ‘new concept’ is eight eau de parfums, ranging from London Poppy at the light and breezy end to Black Lotus at the ‘dark and challenging’ end, all of which can be tried at ‘experience stations’ – platforms with testers laid out. They’ve got shower gels too. And floral lino.

But the staff were warm and welcoming. And on request for samples, were quick to offer me whatever I fancied, as 1.5ml tester sprays. Nice service.

I picked a couple I thought would be most interesting – Ylang ylang Espresso, from the middle of the range, and Black Lotus from the far end.

Ylang Ylang Espresso

Ylang Ylang Espresso has the perfume world’s worst name (I’d rather boast of wearing Zoologist’s ‘Beaver’). But its mix of tangerine, sichuan Pepper, rose, jasmine, tiramisu accord, patchouli, ylang ylang, espresso beans, cocoa beans and guaicwood ain’t all bad. The coffee is rich, creamy and chocolatey, without being too sweet. It’s got a rough edge that occasionally stops it going into pudding territory, and longevity is excellent. It’s best during drydown when an extra soft muskiness emerges every now and then. It’s a nice one to catch a whiff off, if too poorly-blended to wear.

Black Lotus

Onto Black Lotus. This one has an ok first-spritz appeal – a quick blast of spicy fruit. But things go wrong almost immediately. It does a quick pass through generic blokes’ aftershave territory, then heads straight to Horriblesville. It’s musky, peppery rose with a hint of saffron. But above all – ashtray.

Jeez, this stuff is rank. It’s palatable on a strip, but spray it on your skin for the full horrorshow. This reeks like a Friday night in Bromley Firkin pre smoking ban – sickly sweet Impulse body spray mixed with 10 ex-Marlboro lights. ‘Narcotic flowers’ my arse. This perfume’s like going twos on a fag with a cheerleader and stubbing it out in a cherry jelly.

No competition for the challenge of the indies, the decadance of the luxuries, or the pure choice of the High Street, I’m not really sure what Floral Street’s USP is. Fun lino can only get you so far.

Ylang Ylang Espresso and Black Lotus are available for £55 for 50ml eau du parfums from floralstreet.com. Or from the Floral Street store in Covent Garden, which is on King Street. Not Floral Street (SMH).

A cuddle from a mandle – Seven Scents Cuban Tobacco and Oak review

I bloody love scented candles. They have a bit of an unfair rep as a cop-out gift, but not in my present pile. I’ve invested in a Muji fragrance diffuser, which is VMR (Very Much Recommended), but for creating atmos, there’s nothing like a flickering flame, throwing out fragrance willy-nilly.

So I was squealy-chuffed when my friend Verity sent me a whacking great Cuban Toboacco and Oak candle from her home-made and beautifully-packaged range – Seven Scents.

Pre-lighting, the scent is surprisingly clean, almost soapy. Set it on fire and it comes to life. It has a beautiful, sweet woodiness, almost musky. There’s some whisky-spiciness too. After half an hour or so the scent takes a little turn, becoming broader and slightly candied.

The throw is gentle, but pervasive. After an hour, it fills the room comfortably. And, as I’d hoped, it was still hanging around like a good smell the next morning.

Verity describes this with a cheeky portmanteau –  ‘mandle’ (man candle), but this is not a smoky power-scent that divides the room. This is a cuddle in a candle.

It’s not for Summer. But get one now and save it for September; for that first chilly day when you get the fluffy socks out of the drawer; light it and let it mingle with that cosy dusty smell you get from a newly-switched-on radiator. VMR.

Seven Scents candles are made in Market Harborough, hand-poured and made with soy wax. My limited edition 220g Cuban Tobacco and Oak candle is available here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fathom V from Beaufort London

 

“Full fathom five thy father lies
Of his bones are coral made
Those are pearls that were his eyes
Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange”

Beaufort’s Come Hell or High Water collection is dark, moody and fuelled by testosterone. Inspired by Britain’s seafaring history, the fragrances – 1805 Tonnerre, Couer de Noir, Vi et Armis and Lignum Vitae – are full of adventure and high treason, wth a yo ho ho (and dare I say it, a bottle of rum) thrown in for good measure.

But then there’s a fifth – Fathom V – a siren that sucked me in from the moment its top came off in Bloom in Covent Garden.

It boasts an overwhelming notes list – blackcurrant, green leaves, juniper, tangerine, cumin, ginger, mimosa, jasmine, thyme, black pepper, ylang ylang, lily, amber, patchouli, atlas cedar, vetiver, moss, frankincense, sea salt – this is a shrieking chord of weirdness that just….sings. Maybe it’s the olfactory equivalent of jazz. I’ve never understood jazz.

And don’t for a second think the spices or amber bring warmth to this fragrance. This is an icy cold scent; a frosty white lily swirling down, down into the depths.

Although you’d expect this to be a defined marine fragrance, Fathom V is super-green; it’s freshly-cut stems from a flower shop and the most accurate representation of lilies I’ve ever experienced in a perfume.

And despite the long list of ingredients, Fathom V is surprisingly linear. Where you might anticipate a rollicking voyage from opening to drydown, the promised ‘sea-change’ doesn’t occur. Instead, every moment is constant, but deep and weird and impossible to explain.

I appreciate the grammatical aberration in describing this as totally unique. But it is. Totally unique. And I don’t want anyone else to wear this, ever.

This one’s mine.

White Queen from 4160 Tuesdays with CaFleureBon

“Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast”

Created by 4160 Tuesdays to celebrate CaFleureBon’s 8th anniversary, White Queen is also one quarter of 4160T’s Spring Scents collection – a set of limited editions, crowd-funded by fans of the fragrance house.

I ordered 9mls of each, and eagerly testing the four, I wrinkled my nose a little on first sniff of White Queen. Odd. Spicy incense with bagfuls of fruit. Not for me.

Still, three out of four ain’t bad, and I’d read enough enthusings to know someone’d be up for a swap. I could tell it was special. Shame it wasn’t my type.

AND THEN I KEPT COMING BACK TO IT. Ah, here we go.

Having initially written it off as deep and interesting but not for me, just a couple of wears later, it’d taken off its glasses and shaken its hair out. I was hooked.

Thing is, White Queen is one of the finest examples of a non-linear scent I’ve experienced, with three distinct stages of development. And that intriguing complexity is what rocketed it out of the friend-zone and into my heart.

It starts off boozy and woody, like a rum cocktail spilt on an old bar-top. There’s something faintly medicinal there too.

As the booze develops, the fruitiness comes in, along with warming spices. This is no light and breezy spring scent – this is a Dickensian Christmas in a bottle. There’s a marshmallowy-ness there too. This must be how my nose understands the Methyl Laitone, which others have picked up as a creamy note.

Some hours later, it all of a sudden turns very wet and earthy (this must be down to the vetiver and maybe the veramoss), just like sticking your nose down a rabbit hole. How topsy-turvy. How clever.

Actually, I think it’s one of Sarah McCartney’s masterpieces. Well worth a try.

And then another one, just in case.

 

Truth and Beauty in Eden’s Garden from 4160 Tuesdays

Join the 4160 Tuesdays News group on facebook, and you step into a world of temptation.

Populated by true passionistas for all things Sarah McCartney (the house’s Nose), their enthusings have turned my handful-sized collection of 4160T scents into a fragrant drawerload.

So it’s apt that Sarah’s latest venture, fan-funded via Indiegogo, is called Truth and Beauty in Eden’s Garden; a collection of four Spring scents. And the hum on the 4160T facebook group has been building for weeks.

Silk scarf to complement the range, designed by James Skinner of Dalliance & Noble. Image from 4160 Tuesday’s Indiegogo page.

That hum turned into a buzz I couldn’t resist. Four 9ml spring scents plucked from the tree and eagerly awaited.

Will report back.