Black Orchid smells like making bad decisions. Like staying out way too late, having one too many drinks, going home with a stranger, flirting with your married friend, smoking an entire pack of cigarettes in one night. The scent of a good time party girl. It’s almost besides the point to say what it literally smells like, what the notes try to tell you, when what Black Orchid truly smells like is being sucked into a spiraling vortex of hedonism and regret, knowing that you’ve wrought this upon yourself through terrible ideas that seemed fun at the time, either of your own design or those brought upon you by nefarious others, cascading you down a path of havoc you will need to repent for later.

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When I was a newly-minted adult, in the summer between graduating high school and starting my first semester at college, my friends Blair and Richard1 called me up and asked if I wanted to hang out. An immensely talented painter and illustrator, Blair had recently started an apprenticeship with a tattoo artist, hoping to make some money before she started attending a prestigious art school in the fall. She told me that her tattooing mentor might be able to hook us up with some cocaine. Since I was the only one in the group who had a car, naturally I would need to pick up Richard and Blair and drive them over to Tattoo Guy’s place. I wasn’t super into drugs or drinking—I occasionally smoked a little weed with friends—but I’d never tried coke before and it sounded exciting so I was game. I figured we’d pick up the stuff, drive back to Blair’s house, have a fun night, I’d sleep on her parents’ couch and drive home the next morning. Just a little evening of revelry to send off the last real year of adolescence.

Blair directed me to Tattoo Guy’s apartment. We arrived at a shoddy little complex. Tattoo Guy was waiting inside with a thin, wrung out looking woman who he introduced as his sister, Susan2, the keeper of the coke. What was intended to be a simple transaction turned out to be a little more complicated than I anticipated: instead of selling us a quantity of drugs and letting us go on our way like a normal drug dealer, Susan requested a ride from us. We would take her to some unknown destination not far from there and then she would relinquish the coke. Blair and Richard seemed fine with this so I went along with it. Tattoo Guy offered to give me a free tattoo before we left, which I declined (the only good decision I made this entire day).

Susan suggested we go to a motel; Blair and Richard readily agreed. I was mildly suspicious of the situation at this point. Something seemed off: Susan looked too old to be Tattoo Guy’s sister, for one, and I didn’t get a satisfactory answer for why we needed to go to a motel instead of someone’s house aside from a reassurance that it would be “more fun.” I was still along for the ride, so we checked in and Susan brought out her stash, a brown paper bag filled with white powder and a scale. We gave her what seemed like a moderate amount of money (maybe 60 bucks? I don’t remember exactly) for what seemed like a huge amount of coke. She divvied up the rest of it into teeny tiny bundles that she planned to sell for five dollars each.

Doing a huge pile of cocaine with your friends is a very fun time, of course. Blair, Richard, and I sat around gabbing at each other for a few hours. This was before smoking indoors was banned everywhere so Blair and I chain smoked cigarettes while we yapped. I don’t think we even had any alcohol or music or anything, just each other’s company. We were filled with the kind of hedonic cheer that seems so profound when you are young, the kind that is filled with ease and is endlessly entertaining and creates a moment that you never want to end, but you know is ultimately so fleeting.

Eventually, Susan asked if she could use my phone. I handed it over. She retreated to the bathroom and shut the door behind her.

About twenty minutes later police lights flashed against the curtains on the window. Evidently, whoever Susan called was pissed at her for reasons she would or could not explain and had called the cops on us. I don’t know why she gave him our address. We quickly hid everything and answered the door.

Blair took charge. She explained that Susan was her aunt and made up some semi-plausible story about why we were in the motel. I looked at the floor and tried not to move at all, frozen in place thinking that this was it, this was going to destroy my life. I wouldn’t be going to college in a few weeks, I’d be in a protracted legal situation. My parents were going to kill me. The cops clearly didn’t buy Blair’s story, but they miraculously didn’t find any obvious evidence of wrongdoing so they left.

Blair, Richard, and Susan laughed. “You were all GREAT!” Susan said, “except you,” she pointed at me, “you look like a scared little deer in headlights. If anyone was going to get us busted it would be you. You need to learn how to relax.”

Throughout my adolescence I developed a habit of befriending weirdos and troubled kids. Girls who attended the mental health treatment program school in Philly, kids with bad parents and homes they never wanted to go back to, autists, punks, the few openly gay kids at the Catholic high school I attended. My social circle wasn’t solely composed of these types, but they made up a significant portion. Once, I asked my father why these people seemed to be drawn to me. He told me he thought it was because I was highly empathetic, that I made people feel seen and understood, that I didn’t judge them.

Blair rolled a joint. I asked her if she was crazy. I did not want to smoke a joint. I did not want to do any more cocaine. I wanted to go home, but I was high as a kite and it was two o’clock in the morning, so that wasn’t an option. The reality of the circumstance I was in hit me. Why was I in a seedy motel room with a homeless junkie doing bad cocaine? How had this ever seemed like a good idea? The whole situation felt dumb and embarrassing. For me, the party was over. They figured we were through the worst of it now, so why should the party end? I realized that there was a small but fundamental difference between myself and Blair. While we both craved excitement, novelty, a night that would make a good story, there was a little switch inside me, inside my brain, that would only let me go so far. I was incapable of flipping that switch off. Blair didn’t seem to have that switch at all.3

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Eventually, we settled down for the night and tried to get some sleep. I gathered up all my valuables—keys, phone, wallet—placed them in my bag, and stuffed the bag underneath myself while I feigned sleep. I’d been through enough and I wasn’t going to get my car stolen on top of everything.

The next morning, we piled into my car so I could drive everyone home. Blair lived closest to the motel so I dropped her off first. It’s amazing how dense New Jersey is. Blair’s family lived in a beautiful old Victorian in a historic landmarked neighborhood that frequently topped lists of the best places to live in the country. The kind of place that is charming and picturesque, filled with old trees and old houses. Less than fifteen minutes away was Camden, a blighted, rundown city, then the murder capital of the country, where Susan requested I drop her off. We drove up to an apartment and she asked us to wait a minute, hopping out of the car. She returned a moment later, seemingly distraught that the person she was expecting to be home was not. I asked her if there was somewhere else I could take her. She said yes, that there were a few places we could try. We dropped by a couple neighboring houses to no avail.

With Susan directing, we drove deeper into Camden. We couldn’t keep driving her around. A couple of nice looking white kids in this part of the city were basically a beacon to the cops: PEOPLE BUYING DRUGS! HEY HEY! RIGHT HERE! OVER HERE! COME ARREST ME! Eventually we stopped at a seemingly random corner. She exited my car, trying to find the man she was supposed to meet up with, leaving behind the brown paper bag with her meticulously packaged stash within. Richard and I waited silently. We each glanced at the bag in the back seat; the mountain of cocaine stared back at us. We glanced at each other, both thinking the same thing: we could drive away right now. I looked ahead, my mouth dry, my nerves shot.

I started counting:

Ten…

Twenty…

Thirty…

Susan returned, crying.

“Are you going to be okay?” I asked.

“NO!” Then, “yeah, I’ll be fine,” she grabbed the bag from the back seat, “thanks for the ride.”

Susan probably made a lot of bad decisions in her life. A lot of those decisions probably weren’t real decisions in the proper sense, not like most of the bad decisions that I’ve made, more likely decisions as the result of circumstances largely beyond her control. I’ll never know what her deal actually was. About a week after our evening in the motel, Blair called and told me that Tattoo Guy fessed up that Susan was not actually his sister. He’d never met her before that day. I didn’t ask why he decided to pawn her off on us. Probably he just needed someone with a car to take her away and I happened to be a convenient ride.

Somehow, Richard and I made our way out of Camden and back to the highway. I drove him home. His parents were abusive alcoholics and he and his two siblings had been removed from their house a few years prior. He was on his third foster home. He eventually went back to living with his father who later had a horrific accident cooking while drunk and died as a result. Richard was the one who found him. He went to live with his grandfather in Michigan after that, got his GED, then went to college and became a history teacher.

For a week or so I received calls from strange men at random times asking for Susan. I told them all that this isn’t Susan’s phone, I don’t know where she is, please stop calling. They eventually did.

The mild penchant I have for making bad decisions persists: I still won’t refuse stimulants when they’re offered to me, I smoke cigarettes at parties, I stay up too late and shirk my day job to write (it’s 3AM on a Tuesday as I’m writing this), I still occasionally go galavanting off with strangers in strange places. (I once made out with a Moroccan tour guide in the Sahara desert who then offered to take me home to meet his family back in Fez. “Sure! Sounds great,” I said. “Do NOT tell my parents that I was drinking!” he pleaded as we drove up to his house, feeling guilty about the couple of beers we had at a rooftop bar the night before. I told him I wouldn’t. His mother had prepared a veritable feast for me, the best meal I had in Morocco (and strangely not the only meal I had in a random person’s house during that trip). I gabbed profusely with, like, six of his female relatives while he sat awkward and quiet in the corner. His family made up a bed for me. The next day he drove me to the bus to Chefchaouen. Later, back in Fez, I made him escort me to dinner because I was being hounded by a group of men and I couldn’t take it anymore. I did all of this because I was mad at my boyfriend for bailing on the vacation we were supposed to take together and feeling sorry for myself.) In my heart I’m still a bit of a degenerate party girl.

However, I’ve moderated myself considerably: I’m usually not the last person to leave the party, I never get sick from drinking, I stopped sleeping with strangers years ago, my money is well-invested, I keep my apartment clean, I go to church on Sundays. The little switch remains in place.

Anyway, that’s what Black Orchid smells like.

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Most people I described the idea to were kind of baffled by it. One day, I met up with some friends in Central Park with my Elizabeth-prescribed dinner in hand (turkey breast, stuffing, and pureed summer squash). It wasn’t what I personally would have chosen to eat for dinner on a 90-ish degree day in mid-June but it was what the text dictated, so it was what I had to eat. “Remind me again why you’re doing this?” my friend Tim asked as I forked little bites of the stuffing I’d spent the last hour making into my mouth. I admit, without an explicit goal I could articulate it seemed like a silly exercise in pointless restriction.

A few people have previously undertaken the Elizabeth Taylor Diet and written about it publicly.1 These essays typically focus on the weirdness of the food—one of Liz’s favorite dinners is a hamburger on toast with peanut butter and her recipe for tuna salad includes bits of grapefruit. For the most part though the recipes seemed fairly normal to me: breakfast is always toast and fruit, lunch is usually some type of salad, dinner is a protein and vegetables. There’s always an afternoon snack of crudites (“as much as you can eat”) with two tablespoons of dip chosen from one of Liz’s many dip and dressing recipes. On the Taylor-Made Diet you eat four times a day. I rarely felt hungry while I was following it.

Something I think about often is what I call the relentlessness of life. You never get a break from yourself or the endless effort you must expend to meet your basic needs. The days keep marching without pause until one day they halt completely. The most accurate artistic portrayal of this conceit that I’ve seen is the late Hungarian filmmaker Béla Tarr’s 2011 masterpiece, The Turin Horse. The film follows a farmer and his daughter over the course of a week while they go about their routine, focusing on the quotidian tasks that must be completed to further their meager existence: fetching water from a well, harnessing the horse to a cart, dressing, eating. Mealtime, consisting of a single boiled potato per person, is the highlight of the day. The film utilizes the long, slow shots that are typical of Tarr’s oeuvre, demanding the audience witness as the repetitive chores are completed in real time.

I first saw The Turin Horse during the Paris Theater’s “Bleak Week,” a week-long celebration of films that showcase the dark side of human existence. Though the film is quite bleak, it also has moments of levity and I sometimes fantasize about rewriting the script to turn it into a comedy, transforming the laborious long shots of the family struggling to complete their daily tasks into moments of slapstick levity. After all, humor works best when it reflects a touch of darkness.

Over the duration of the film, the poor peasant family suffers through a series of misfortunes that unfold like the story of Genesis in reverse. First, the horse refuses to work, then the well runs dry, their world incrementally diminishes until at last even the lamps will not light and father and daughter are left in darkness. At one point, before the final cosmic unravelling, the two try to leave. After packing all their belongings into a cart and coaxing the horse from the barn, the father and daughter slowly move further and further from their homestead, eventually leaving the camera frame, only to turn back and return minutes later. The dominant interpretation of this scene is that there is nothing left beyond their farm, that the outside world has ceased to exist, but perhaps they just thought, “what’s the point?” Why leave when it’s just going to be more of the same wherever you go.

No one tells you being an adult means having to decide what to eat for dinner every single day for the rest of your life. With this project, Elizabeth Taylor told me what to eat for dinner every night, but I still found myself rebelling against her plan: using a different herb because I didn’t want to buy yet another one, replacing sole with swordfish because no grocery store seems to sell sole around here (perhaps sole were so popular in the midcentury everyone gobbled them up and now they’re gone forever), microwaving stuff that’s supposed to be baked or boiled because I didn’t want to turn on the oven. Beyond taking shortcuts, I increasingly found myself questioning the plan: eating stuffing and brown rice as sides in the same meal seems like starch overkill, the recipe for Garlic Cream Dip calls for cream cheese and sour cream, but the recipe Creamy Chive Dip calls for cream cheese and yogurt. The only difference between the two recipes is the presence of garlic in the former, so why use different forms of dairy? Did Liz really think that yogurt or sour cream would impart a significant flavor difference between the two dips? So, even though the dinner thing was theoretically all figured out, it really wasn’t, and there was also all the cooking and washing and buying and fretting about produce going bad that came along with it.

A diet is a kind of cruel optimism—an insincere promise that you’ll achieve a more desirable physical form through sacrifice and that once you achieve that form the other pieces of your life will fall into place. It is a trade between the reliable, spreading pleasure of eating with the pleasure of virtuous restraint. A prescribed diet entails giving up some of one’s sovereignty to an outside authority, ceding one of the few facets of daily life that we reliably have control over. I chose to trust Liz and followed the day by day plan, submitting to her scheme. Though I sometimes questioned her wisdom or found ways to rebel, I committed to staying the course.

Elizabeth Taylor and I are both five foot four. We both have dark hair and eyes of an unusual color (her’s famously a striking violet, mine, gray). We both claim short legs amongst our unfortunate physical flaws. That’s about the extent of the physical similarities between us since Elizabeth Taylor was one of the most beautiful women to ever live and I am admittedly mid.

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During the course of my experiment, I tried to find ways to get closer to Liz, to embody her. I wanted to find other ways to hand over my agency to her as I had done with my diet. I watched many of the 50 plus movies she starred in. I drew a beauty mark on my right cheek, mimicking the fabulous mole some Hollywood producer tried to force her to surgically remove early in her career. I considered getting married and divorced several times. I went swimming a few times a week (her preferred form of exercise since a back injury precluded more intense physical activity). I also bought two of her perfumes: Passion, her first fragrance from 1988 and White Diamonds, her 1991 runaway hit that served as a proof of concept for celebrity fragrance. I no longer had to choose what scent I’d wear each day; I would only smell like Elizabeth Taylor.

I admittedly prefer the smell of Passion over White Diamonds, though I enjoy both. Passion is one of those kitchen sink 80s fragrances that has one million notes and would previously be described as “oriental,” but is now classified as a “classical woody amber” by Michael Edwards’s fragrance taxonomy. It opens spicy and herbaceous and dries down to powdery incense and sandalwood with a smidge of something animalic (apparently it was much raunchier when it was first released). It comes in a dark purple bottle and somehow smells dark purple. It would not be out of place in a goth bar or an old timey bordello. Luca Turin gave it one star in The Guide and called it “Z-14 in drag.” I bought a 15 milliliter bottle of it on eBay for five dollars.

White Diamonds needs movement to really shine. If you’re too close it smells a little sour, especially during the opening. It smells incredibly dense on paper, but has a powdery peachiness to it that expands into a white floral bouquet in the air. It’s one of those fragrances where the florals present as a singular mass rather than individual blooms. When I first tried it, I paced back and forth through my apartment with my arms in front of my face, sniffing the blowback radiating towards me. It is designed to waft. Raymond Matts, the evaluator who worked on White Diamonds, assesses perfumes based on how they smell in the air rather than on a blotter, which will hold certain materials for longer than one would experience them diffusing from one’s skin, hence the trailing aura.

White Diamonds is a great perfume. It is great not necessarily because of how it smells—it is a fairly typical classic aldehydic floral. It is great because of its proximity to Elizabeth Taylor and the fantasy it creates by channeling her. It is accompanied by one of the best television advertisements of all time.

My third grade teacher wore a gold orb-shaped pendant around her neck every day. One day the girl who sat next to me in class, Amy, asked her about it. Our teacher opened the orb, revealing two little white tufts dotted with perfume, and told us to smell it. “That’s White Diamonds,” she explained. She left and Amy turned to me and whispered, “those aren’t diamonds, they’re cotton balls.”

Celebrity worship is another kind of cruel optimism—a parasocial proximity to fame that promises, if not transcendence to a realm above an average, unknown existence, then a momentary escape through the fantasy of the life of a star. The kind of life that leads you to believe you’ll have something more interesting to fill your days than concerns with what to make for dinner.

Eventually I fell off the Taylor-Made Diet and went back to my normal, less regimented eating habits. Many of the recipes made it into my regular rotation, as have the two Elizabeth Taylor fragrances I purchased. The only thing I seem to have learned from the experiment is that you can never really get away from yourself.

For Haloscope Magazine, I wrote about dupe culture, the changing meaning of luxury, how we signify taste with scent, and the role of NYC’s “fragrance district” in the local perfume community.

Read the full article here.

I’d also like to welcome all my new subscribers. I’ve been a bit MIA over the last month or so while I was working on this Dossier piece, but I have some exciting things in store coming soon.

Aside from myself, the panelists included Justin Welch and Alexandra Monet from DSM-Firmenich, Emma Vernon from The Perfume Room, and Alexandra Pauly, beauty editor at HighSnobiety and founder of pet care company, Biche. The discussion was moderated by Addison Cain, who works for Spate and writes at Inconsistent Beauty Updates.

It was my first time participating in something like this and I was definitely feeling some impostor syndrome ahead of the event (I don’t work in the fragrance industry or consider myself an “influencer”—I just write for the love of the game). It turns out the pre-performance anxiety was unwarranted; my responses were well-received. I guess if you’re obsessed with something and spend hours thinking about it every day, you can come up with something interesting to say about it!

We were given the questions for the discussion ahead of time, so I took pretty copious notes on the ones I was most keen to respond to. Here’s a recap of my remarks during the discussion:

How has #PerfumeTok changed the way people approach discovering and purchasing fragrances? What is it about the fragrance community that made it translate so well to TikTok despite fragrances being invisible (unlike makeup and skincare, whose effects you can see)?

I answered this question by describing how I’ve seen the influence of TikTok beyond the platform itself and on Substack in particular.

There are two broad areas where I think we really see TikTok’s influence on other forms of fragrance media:

Nomenclature—thinking of fragrance in terms of “compliment getting”, obsession with “performance,” especially the preoccupation with “beastmode” fragrances, etc. are downstream of TikTok. Even if you don't want to describe or engage with fragrance in those terms, it's still something that you end up addressing just because it's such a big part of the dominant narrative of how to experience scent and which fragrances are worthwhile or not.

Norms and attitudes—generosity and openness, I think, are part of the TikTok fragrance community (certainly it's less insular than earlier forms of fragrance-related social media). Concerns about, and reluctance to, “gatekeeping” are definitely part of #PerfumeTok culture that spills out into other areas. This can overstep and contribute to the death of criticism (which is a wider societal trend that definitely isn't limited to, or because of, TikTok). A lot of the sentiment about discussing fragrance critically from influencers seems to boil down to a version of “let people enjoy things” which I guess is fine if you just think of fragrance as a mode of self expression rather than a form of artistry that necessarily has criteria for assessing it.

I think TikTok has helped open up fragrance in terms of who has a voice that people pay attention to—most early fragrance bloggers were middle aged-ish women and gay men and that’s changed a lot—I don’t think we’d be seeing such exploding interest in fragrance from teen and preteen boys if they weren’t seeing people like them talking about fragrance on TikTok.

For Substack in particular, we’re seeing crossover in terms of content (people suggest fragrances to review based on what they see on TikTok, particularly on fragrance-related Substacks that have larger audiences, such as Luca Turin’s) and I think people who have a large following on TikTok are starting to use Substack as an extension of their platform (Emma Vernon for example, or Jen from Immortal Perfumes).

Substack now has a short video feature, so we’ll see what happens with that and if they’re able to eat some of TikTok’s lunch. Substack and TikTok inherently support different forms of content though—Substack is focused on long form writing so it's geared towards going deep into a topic, and usually has less immediacy than TikTok.

…and here’s what I actually said. I trimmed this down to just my remarks so I’m not posting video of the other panelists without their permission. Not sure who took this vid!

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In your experience, what do niche brands offer that mainstream brands often miss?

It's interesting to examine this question in the historical context in which niche perfumery arose:

Mainstream fragrance companies used to set the parameters for innovation and creativity, but that changed in the 90s due to a number of factors (changing consumer behavior, macroeconomic trends caused by the Gulf War, the rise of focus groups and increased expenditures on marketing rather than the fragrance itself). This led to a decline in fragrance sales and a subsequent opening of space in the market, both literally and figuratively.

Since products weren't moving, the big designers looked to discounters to sell their products and suddenly there was more space in the luxury fragrance market. When this vacuum emerged in the United States, niche brands were poised to fill it. American niche brands took cues from European brands such as L'Artisan, Annick Goutal, Diptyque, Jo Malone, etc. in the early 2000s.

Since they aren’t bogged down by the massive infrastructure and need to sell at the same volume as mainstream brands, niche brands can be more nimble. The niche ideal is not looking to fill a hole in the market or chase a particular trend—generally the perception is that niche brands can be more experimental, less mass-appealing, and more focused on artistry than mainstream perfumery. Note: much of the above is cribbed from Michael Edwards’s book American Legends: The Evolution of American Fragrance.

In the present day, the conventional wisdom that there's a dividing line between niche and mainstream breaks down and I reject the notion that there is a necessary distinction between the two. The traditional view of niche is that a niche brand is defined by its market position: it only makes fragrance and its distribution is usually limited to specialty marketplaces. But, niche can include brands that are owned by big mainstream companies, or have massive private equity backing, and there is often overlap between mainstream and niche (for example, Le Labo and Frederic Malle—two brands considered stalwarts of “niche” are owned by Estée Lauder—perhaps the epitome of mainstream).

Mainstream brands are taking cues from niche perfumery now (e.g. a new YSL fragrance inspired by ink that my friend Jessica Murphy recently wrote about). But niche brands also take cues from the mainstream (e.g. Papillon's fragrances often have clear predecessors from classic mainstream fragrances—Dryad is very similar to Estée Lauder's Aliage; Salome is similar to Rochas Femme. Creed released two fragrances last year purportedly inspired by Estée Lauder’s Youth-Dew).

Many people don’t realize this, but the same perfumers work on both niche and mainstream brands (e.g. Dominique Ropion created Portrait of a Lady and Carnal Flower for Frederic Malle, but he also created Alien for Mugler and Amor Amor for Cacharel). A perfumer’s style can/will be inflected across their œuvre regardless of where a particular fragrance sits in the marketplace.

Unfortunately, the ideal that niche brands aspired to is muddled—we increasingly see trend chasing and formulas that aren't particularly innovative (how many same-y vanilla perfumes came out last year from niche brands?).

I think that the role of experimentation and personality that people expect from niche is being taken over by artisan or independent brands. With perfumery training becoming more accessible, more people are entering the space and they're unbound by briefs and marketing concerns in a way that not even most niche brands can be—indie perfumers have sort of taken up the ideal of perfume-as-art at its most pure.

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What trends do you foresee shaping fragrance conversations in the next year?

The macroeconomic situation (tariffs and uncertainty about supply chains, job stability, etc). is leading to a shift in the dominant mode for engaging with fragrance and signaling status within the community. I think this is exemplified by a term that I’ve seen popping up—“denting”. Though I’m not certain, I assume this term comes from TikTok.

The typical visual associated with fragrance communities on social media is based on consumption and novelty-seeking (think: big white shelves stuffed with 100+ bottles of perfume that each have, like, 1 spray taken out of them). This type of influencer experience is often projected as the ideal to aspire to for someone who is into fragrance as a hobby.

I've started to see a lot of people talking about “denting” a favorite bottle of perfume (i.e. using a measurable amount of the fragrance and sort of showing off the empty space). As we move into more uncertain economic times, I think that this mode of engagement will grow and we'll see a shift in what conveys status in the fragrance community. “Denting” can indicate long-term engagement with a fragrance, and as such it imparts experience or expertise in a way that hyperconsumption can't. This will naturally lead to a bit longer turn around time for attention on a given fragrance or brand.

I think we'll also see a shift towards fragrances that are in the midrange price point—especially if fragrances get markedly more expensive because of tariffs, etc. There could be a bit of backlash to writers and influencers hawking $500+ fragrances if people are struggling financially.

Perhaps there will also be a push towards buying from local/indie brands—supporting local artisans rather than big foreign conglomerates. These perfume brands won't be immune from price surges in raw materials, so I don’t think they will necessarily be able to avoid raising their prices, but I think there will be more of a drive to support them from consumers.

On a separate note, I think physical locations will continue to shape the fragrance community and conversations around it. This started with articles about fragrance swaps, and brands are surely starting to take note and want to piggy back and own spaces for people to gather offline. The “perfume alley” a few blocks up Elizabeth Street is still expanding. Dossier is opening their first store, conveniently located next to Scent Bar (I've joked about this being a sign of gentrification).

There’s also lots of hype right now about the Prada cafe and many hipper/younger fashion brands are including a cafe or news stand or some other non-clothier component to their space. Fugazzi down on Canal street has a cafe now, for example. I think that unless the economy completely implodes this will spread to fragrance shops as well. Bigger niche brands are probably the most likely to adopt this model (I could totally see an Amouage cafe adjacent to its new store in Soho).

The last question for the panel was about the evolution of the “signature scent.” I have a full article about this in the works, so I will refrain from including my comments about it here. HOWEVER, I am looking to speak to people who still engage with the concept of a signature scent for my article! Do you still have a signature scent? Do you incorporate the idea of a signature scent in a non-conventional way (e.g. tying a particular scent to important events, making one major buy for the year or for a season, etc.)? Please reach out! You can DM me on Substack or email me at quinn@smellworld.net.

Overall, this was a great discussion and every panelist had interesting, poignant remarks. I encourage all my readers to seek them out. I’d love to participate in something like this again.

More soon <3

Arranged in a number of assemblages, nearly all the items displayed are available for the taking and the buyer can name their price. After selecting an item, the new owner writes why they selected the object on a piece of joss paper, sprays the paper with one of three citron-infused scents designed specifically for the exhibition, and affixes it to the wall. The proceeds from the estate sale are donated to the gallery and the joss paper memorials to the objects in Flack’s collection will be burned after the conclusion of the show. Most of the items are of indeterminate, but presumably relatively low, monetary value. This aspect of the work invites visitors to contemplate the subjective nature of value—the pieces were obviously of high value to Flack, but in the open market of the estate sale their new value is determined solely by the visitor.

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The fragrant components of the exhibition are centered around citron, also known as Etrog, a citrus fruit that is a predecessor to the culinary cultivars we commonly enjoy such as lemons and limes. Marcus chose the fruit because it was an essential component of her mother’s favorite perfume, Eau de Fleurs de Cédrat by Guerlain. (Cédrat is the French name for citron). Marcus’s mother asked for a recreation of the perfume while she was living, and after her death the fragrance took on new significance. In the space of the gallery, it becomes a unifying force linking the objects to the viewer and to Marcus and Flack. At the center of the exhibit is a recreation of Flack’s medicine cabinet—transformed into a kind of altar by Marcus and underscoring the intimate, typically private nature of clearing out a loved one’s belongings. An aroma diffuser inside the cabinet disperses a citron-infused fragrance into the air.

I happened to visit the gallery while the artist was present and several of Audrey’s friends stopped by to chat with Marcus and choose objects. These friends shared tales of Audrey’s life and reminisced about her collection. The presence or absence of a personal relationship with the deceased surely influences one’s evaluation of value for her former belongings, as does an understanding of Flack’s place in the contemporary artistic canon. The press release conspicuously omits details about Flack, so casual visitors who aren’t familiar with contemporary art might not know that she was a highly acclaimed artist who has work in every major museum in New York City and often sells for hundreds of thousands of dollars at auction.

The proximity to celebrity adds another axis on which we can assess value—an otherwise worthless object suddenly becomes valuable purely on the basis of the owner’s prominence in society. Costume jewelry, ordinary clothing, even notes and other detritus routinely sell for thousands of dollars above their typical value at auction when the name attached to them is famous.

Several of the assemblages contain items that are objectively more monetarily valuable than the part of the collection that is available for public consumption. These objects are specifically set aside by Marcus to be taken into a reciprocal custody agreement with specific individuals who will meet certain requirements for continued custody of the assemblage for a period of time. All of these assemblages have a sort of fragrant ritual maintenance associated with them, such as filling a small basin with fragrant oil or anointing a citron fruit.

Every collector wonders what will happen to their collection after they are gone. Having it transformed into a work of interactive art where friends and strangers alike can make your treasures their own is a beautiful ending for a lifetime of gathering and curating objects and is perhaps one of the best outcomes one could hope for when it comes to the discharge of their belongings.

I chose to take custody of a little plastic nose, clearly once belonging to…something. A doll perhaps? A game of some sort? Marcus didn’t know where the nose originally came from, but she said her mother had numerous objects like it—items that she used for references in her art. It joins an assortment of similar small, somewhat ephemeral art objects that now make up a tiny part of my overall collection—a puzzle piece from a Yoko Ono performance, a piece of black candy from a Felix Gonzalez-Torres work. One day, after I’m gone, someone will sort through these objects and perhaps they will be charmed by the little plastic nose as I was, but probably not. They’ll probably just throw it away.

Hannah Marie Marcus’s Commodity Exchange is on view until April 19. Olfactory Art Keller is located at 25 Henry Street, New York, NY 10002.

A special event with the artist will take place at the gallery this evening:

On Saturday, April 5 from 4pm to 6pm, Marcus will be in the gallery for a collaborative hallucination of value aided by cedrat peel the artist candied for the occasion. Marcus will talk about the curious objects of undetermined value left behind by her mother, the photorealism pioneer Audrey Flack, that visitors can purchase for a price of their choosing. Cedrat-based cocktails will be served.

Hank mellowed out considerably after that first night, but he always retained some playful quirks. He developed an affinity for bottle caps and if anyone opened a beer or a soda he would come running into the kitchen from wherever he was and sit down in front of you, patiently waiting for you to place the bottle cap in front of him, which he would then lick a few times before chasing it around the room until it got lost under a piece of furniture or he grew bored. Eventually he stopped the bottle cap thing and moved on to eating hair.

I remember the first time Hank tried to eat my hair. I was laying on the couch in the living room and he came up behind me. I felt a few licks and nibbles on my head and thought, haha, that’s pretty cute. After those few tentative bites, Hank took off, frantically chomping mouthfuls of my hair while I scream-laughed and tried to get him off of me. Because of the angle I was laying I couldn’t reach around to get him so I called out to my brother for help. He untangled Hank from me and from then on I was mindful anytime he got behind my head. Usually I’d let him get a few hair nibbles in when he wanted, but I used caution to prevent him from going full chomp mode.

I used to joke that the reason Hank and I got along so well was because I hate picking up animals and he hated being picked up. While Banjo was content to be carried around like a baby by my brother in law (within limits), Hank did not want to be held. It was odd, because he was supremely affectionate and social—he would come hang out and have everyone pet him even during loud parties. His favorite thing to do was to plunk down on the couch next to us for hours. But he never really wanted to be picked up. And I somehow never got the hang of holding animals. I’m always awkward and hesitant and they can tell. If Hank was in the chair I wanted to sit in, I would contort myself around him and share the seat. I’d say it was because he was there first. When I did have to move him, I would sort of make my arms into a sling and pick him up around the middle, his little chicken legs dangling under him, like a horse or sheep being transported. To his credit, he always tolerated this indignity, as though he was aware that this was far more humiliating for me than for him.

Hank was a highly empathetic animal, an effect which was heightened by the little black stripes near his eyes that gave him a look of perpetual concern. He always seemed to know if you needed some comfort, and he was happy to provide it. I spent every breakup I’ve had with him snuggled next to me, purring.

I was usually the last to leave the apartment since my work day started slightly later. Every morning, I would emerge from the shower and Hank would be sitting on my bed waiting for me. As soon as I spotted him, I would feign surprise and he would roll over onto his back so I could pet his soft belly. I would give him a dozen kisses and whisper, “you are my favorite creature, you are the best cat in the whole world, I love you, I love you, I love you,” inhaling the sweet smell of his fur.

Warm cat fur smell is one of the best smells. It is the comforting scent of freshly baked cookies mixed with something a little dusty and slightly musky. Something vaguely like vanilla and skin. I’ve tried to google various combinations of keywords to figure out why cats smell so good but never came up with a truly satisfactory answer. The most common response seems to be that cats are very clean, and perhaps there is some sort of enzyme in their saliva that smells nice to us, or their pleasant aroma is merely the natural scent of their clean fur and skin. I feel it must be deeper than that, perhaps there is a specific aroma chemical we could point to that explains the cat fur smell.

After they got married, my brother and his husband moved to their own apartment, taking Banjo and Hank with them. I moved into my own apartment that doesn’t allow pets. We lived close to each other though and I could get my Hank fix fairly frequently. A couple years ago they moved again to Durham, North Carolina, so I don’t get to see them as often. The first time I visited after they moved, I told my brother I was afraid Hank wouldn’t remember me and he assured me that was silly. Of course he would remember me—I’d lived with him for practically his entire life. Whenever I came to visit Hank would sleep next to me all night every night I was there. I knew he had missed me.

Earlier this week Hank was diagnosed with an aggressive form of lymphoma. The vet said he probably had about a week to live. When I heard his prognosis, in between bouts of weeping, I tried to memorize how it felt to pet his fur: the warm, slight glossiness of his back, the velvety feeling of the little spots behind ears. He died yesterday, in the afternoon.

I am very sorry that I wasn’t there for his last few days of life, but I am grateful that we got to spend time together relatively recently.

I will miss him forever.

My favorite creature,

My special little guy,

My Hanky doodle dandy, born on the fourth of July.

Action News on 6ABC in Philadelphia holds the record for the longest running theme song on any news program. It has withstood the test of time because it is a legit banger. The full version of the song is accompanied by a Ray Conniff-esque chorus singing hippie-dippy 70s lyrics about moving closer to the world and coming together.

When I learned a friend of mine would be featured on an upcoming Action News segment I delightedly informed him that he will be ushered in with one of the greatest theme songs in TV history. None of my friends are from the Philly area so naturally I had to educate them about the theme so they would understand its greatness. I shared a YouTube video in the group chat and commented:

I am glad this is still played as the news forecast begins every night in the greater Philadelphia area.

I immediately sent a followup saying of course I meant cast not forecast. But the idea of a news forecast is good. It is very Philip K. Dick sci-fi but also speaks to a desire that is very ancient and human. We want to know what is in store for our future, which is why trend predictions and forecasting are so popular.

I started this list of predictions a few weeks ago over a month ago, then got sidetracked (and then I was delayed AGAIN by a five day work-related trip). While sidetracked, I read a couple articles about trend forecasting and the annoyance of repackaging trends that we’re already seeing and giving them a new name. Also, a bunch of 2025 fragrance trend articles and podcasts came out. So, I decided to add two categories to each of my predictions:

1. Is this already happening?—an assessment of whether or not the trend has already started or if it will be truly novel in 2025 (with the caveat that nothing is ever truly novel, blah blah blah).

2. Who else is saying?—calling out if I’ve come across anyone else making the same prediction, either in the media or IRL. If other people are sayin’ maybe the trend is more likely to manifest.

So although the year is 1/12th over, here are my predictions.

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Feeling so fresh and fancy free

Lighter floral fragrances return and give our exhausted noses a break

Blown out from the BR540s and Delinas of the world, we collectively need a refresher. This year, we will see the return of breezy, ladylike florals. Proper florals done with a light handed touch. Peony, orange blossom, muguet, and lighter, dewier interpretations of rose will abound. I think we will see two opposing marketing concepts supporting this olfactory trend, each evoking feminine archetypes: 1) commodified girlhood, fueled by the prevailing online discourse over the past couple years. Expect photoshoots with baby deer and bows used as visuals to support an airy, delicate pink and white olfactive garland of blossoms dancing through the air. There may even be some boys wearing pearl earrings and ruffles thrown in the mix as well, á la Simone Rocha. 2) a responsible, mature but still buoyant vision of womanhood. This vision will be different from the severe, yet somehow stunted, girlboss. Picture the original Sunflowers ads for Elizabeth Arden or Isabella Rosellini for Tresor. Perhaps the stranglehold of perpetual youth will begin to loosen and we’ll be ready to grow up a little.

Who else is sayin’?: Allure’s fragrance trends article says “florals are ready for their comeback” but it doesn’t really go into how or in what form so I am going to say it DOESN’T COUNT. Chloe on the Nose Candy podcast said something about soapy florals coming back, which seems adjacent to my prediction so I say it counts.

Is this already happening?: I don’t think this was an existing trend in 2024, but this is already starting in 2025. DS & Durga just released Cowgirl Grass, which I smelled at their launch a couple weeks ago, and it fits into this category. It is centered around a breezy peony accord atop the grassy vetiver base cribbed from their existing Cowboy Grass fragrance. I also recently sniffed the lab mod for a soon-to-be-released BDK fragrance which was very much a ladylike floral—a springy orange blossom concoction. We only need one more example for this to be a real trend.

90s revival incoming

Speaking of Sunflowers and Tresor, perfumers will start to crib retro notes and compositions this year and 90s style fragrances will become du jour. Freesia, aquatic, and melon notes will pop up. Expect olfactory tributes to fragrances like L’Eau d’Issey, CKOne, and Tommy Girl. Josh Meyer from Imaginary Authors recently stated in a Fragrantica article that his next fragrance will use calone, that stalwart molecule of 90s aquatic fragrances. Although these fragrances have a reputation for being light and watery they are often quite tenacious and embracing them may be a way to satisfy consumer demand for longevity and “performance” without resorting to the typical #beastmode scent profiles that have proliferated over the past few years.

Who else is sayin’: I haven’t seen anyone else make this specific prediction, but correct me if I am wrong.

Is this already happening?: Yes. 2024 saw the release of a few aquatic floral fragrances such as Osmo by Andrea Maack and The Point by Clue, both with sea salt and jasmine notes. I should note that I do not think niche interpretations of 90s style fragrances will market them as such. The scent profiles and notes will be there but the branding and marketing will position it as something new rather than a throwback.

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More limited release fragrances and media or product tie-ins

All the talk of exclusivity and gatekeeping in the niche perfume market is mostly facetious. Anyone who has four or five dollars to spend can order a sample on Luckyscent or Scent Split and have access to pretty much any new niche release of note. In fact, I’d argue niche fragrances are probably more readily available and accessible to sample than most designer or department store brands. People may be starting to catch on to the fact that “niche” may not inherently have the amount of cache that they’re led to believe it does. And, with more and more releases every year, how does one stand out and ensure customers will flock to one’s fragrance over all the others? Limited releases are one answer to creating a sense of scarcity and driving sales and interest. Appeals to seasonality and/or small batches using rare ingredients will proliferate to create real, rather than perceived exclusivity. Some of these releases may take a note from Le Labo’s playbook and be tied to a particular physical location (or event).

A specific type of limited release I believe we will see more of in 2025 are fragrances tied to specific media properties or products. Fragrance can be a natural experiential extension of other types of art, capturing ineffable qualities portrayed through visual media such as film and television or literature. However, the tie-in needs to be done well in order to be successful and perceived as considered and artful rather than a novelty gimmick (e.g. the Hellman’s Mayonnaise fragrance released by Tennessee Titan’s quarterback Will Levis or the Miller High Life Dive Bar-Fume, both of which sold out but were they sold to fragrance hobbyists or to bemused fans of the brand or practical jokers?).

Who else is sayin’?: Sable Yong and Tynan Buck have mentioned the fragrance product tie-in on their podcast and in this article for Cosmo. My friend Rachel Ann and I discussed fragrances released for books at an event last year around the time Sable’s book of essays and related perfume, Die Hot With A Vengeance, were released.

Is this already happening?: Yes. Jorum Studio had some big (for a small brand) hits with their limited releases Monolith, Opaline, and Boswellia Scotia. All sold out quickly. And the most coveted perfume for serious fragheads last year was probably Roberto Greco’s blink-and-you-missed-it release, Rauque (if anyone out there has a bottle and is willing to sell me a decant, or even just let me sniff it, please contact me). Ffern (established in 2019) is probably the forerunner of this marketing model since they exclusively sell limited release fragrances.

We also saw marketing tie-ins for media cropping up last year. The original run of Heretic’s Nosferatu perfume sold out quickly and commanded a list of 30,000 people waiting for another batch of it to be released. 2024’s Die Hot With A Vengeance is the most recent example of a fragrance with a book tie-in; others include Etat Libre d’Orange’s You or Someone Like You, created for Chandler Burr’s novel of the same name and Nature’s Candy, created by Pearfat Perfume for Camilla Wynne’s cookbook.

“Artisanal” starts to outpace “niche” (in terms of clout)

Niche fragrances are marketed as a promise of creativity and artistry—a departure from the same-ness of crowd pleasing, focus-grouped-to-death department store fragrances. The extent to which niche brands actually deliver on this is, of course, up for debate, and this year we will start to see a shift to extolling independent and artisan perfumery in fragrance marketing. I don’t mean that independent brands helmed by a single perfumer who typically fulfills all of the roles required to bring a fragrance to market will somehow outpace a corporation (even a small one) in terms of sales volume. This is about perception and marketing. Bigger brands, even those considered niche, will start to use appeals to artisanship in how they present themselves and position their products. I predict a resurgence of oil-based perfumery, often the purview of witchy indie perfumers who sell their wares at the farmer’s market, back into the luxury fragrance space. We will see at least one fragrance brand create an “artisan” or “indie” line differentiated from their primary offerings. Expect quirky note pyramids and an emphasis on creative freedom for the perfumer. Legit indie brands will be picked up by bigger retailers and go into wider distribution.

Who else is sayin’: No one? I haven’t seen or heard anyone else make this specific prediction, but correct me if I am wrong.

Is this already happening?: Sort of. Indie brands like Clue Perfumery are now being sold in Luckyscent and perfume retailer extraordinaire Stéle sells local NYC indies like Amphora Parfum and Alloy Studio alongside bigger niche houses like BDK and Matiere Premiere. We haven’t yet seen the “artisan division” of a bigger brand that I am predicting yet though.

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The gourmand reign of terror persists, but begins to mutate

Sugary sweetness recedes and we see signs of a mounting gourmand resistance

Sticky-sweet gourmands have been the belle of the ball for a while now. The market for this type of scent seems saturated and is trickling down from fine fragrance into other categories—a sure sign of the decadent period and nascent decay of a trend (see the Crumb x Dove collab Brian Buchanan decried a few weeks ago for evidence), but I don’t think we’ll whiplash away from it. Instead, the gourmand category will start to smell like perfume again. The beauty of Angel and other early gourmand fragrances is that they aren’t completely literal—the patchouli part of Angel is just as important as the sugary sweet component, but we’ve over indexed on the latter and forgotten the importance of the former. In 2025 we’ll start to see a shift away from super literal gourmands to interpretations that retain gourmand elements but incorporate other, perhaps more traditional, styles of perfumery.

Who else is sayin’?: Emma Vernon discussed this on her trend prediction podcast episode earlier this week a couple weeks ago and created a brilliant graphic demonstrating the lifecycle of a fragrance trend. We’re moving into the “unexpected”/”adjacent” phases for dessert-y gourmand notes.

Is this already happening?: Yes. The emergence of several “floral gourmands” (or “fleurmands” to use Jessica Murphy’s apt turn of phrase) from popular niche and indie perfumeries late last year are indicative that this is a trend that is starting already (see: Lilac Brulee from Bruno Fzolari, Fleur d'Éclaire from Regime des Fleurs, Fior di Pane from Profumo di Firenze).

The kitchen pantry opens up

2024 was the year of starch in fragrance. Rice and bread notes proliferated, complimenting the sugary dessert carbs that dominate the gourmand category. In 2025, we’ll see further exploration of gourmand accoutrements through the proliferation of spicy and herbal notes. Rather than baking spices, which I think have already had/will continue to have a moment, I predict we will see more aromatics taking the center stage. Think: lemongrass, basil, rosemary, mint, cilantro. Also, riding on the popularity of tomato (both leaf and fruit), and the wider cultural influence of RFK’s MAHA initiative and Ozempic, I think we will see more vegetables incorporated into the note pyramid. Healthy, wholesome vegetables! I, for one, would love to sniff a celery-centric fragrance.

Who else is sayin’: Emma also mentioned this in her trend forecast episode, but she seems more bullish on warm spices than I am. Sable and Tynan from Smell Ya Later are big promoters of the incoming vegetable scent trend (both on their podcast and in that aforementioned Cosmo article about fragrance trends). The initial impetus for this prediction is a conversation I had at a party Addison Cain of Inconsistent Beauty Updates hosted back in December.

Is this already happening?: Yes. It’s not like aromatic and spice notes are completely novel, but I think the positioning here is important: the core idea will center on being edible rather than atmospheric or environmental. DS&Durga’s Bistro Waters is an early example of this. Last year also brought us Pho Breakfast from d’Annam and Coriandre 39 from Le Labo (which fits the brief note-wise but not necessarily conceptually, as it was a City Exclusive release and thus about place not cuisine).

What I want to see but don’t think will happen

Stupid ancillary fragrance products driven by spurious marketing claims go away

Hair perfume is a scam. Its existence is ostensibly justified by the ridiculous notion that the alcohol in perfume is DrYinG and will DaMAgE youR HaIR. While, yes, this is true in the most literal technical sense, NO ONE is spraying enough perfume in their hair that it will have any effect on its texture and relative level of moisture whatsoever. One or two spritzes of perfume will not destroy your hair since the alcohol in it evaporates in about two seconds, hardly enough time for it to cause any damage. Anyone who is wary of damage but wants to have a fragrant mane can always spritz a comb first then run it through their hair, thereby avoiding any drying effects.

Hair perfume is just the tip of the iceberg. I think we will start to see more objectionable products that are attempting to market a sprayable fragrance for a single use-case that is perfectly met with perfume.

I will note that a perusal of Sephora’s latest fragrance products includes a lot of “hair perfumes” but many of them are described as “hair and body mists” now, which is less annoying to me since it essentially fulfills the niche that an EDT or other lower-concentration (and therefore lower priced) fragrance would. I guess upscale brands like Diptyque or Byredo are too fancy to sell body mist and therefore need to pretend that their product is exclusively for hair.

Brands slow down and decide not to release anything new in 2025

It’s a not uncommon refrain that there are way too many fragrances being released every year. Sadly, our hyper-accelerated news and trend cycles mean that if you aren’t constantly putting something new out there, you’re basically dead to consumers. Or that’s the perception in any case.

I would love to see brands mine their own history and archives for inspiration and bring back previous releases into their current line of offerings. Long standing designer brands are especially positioned to make this happen. Imagine if Bulgari re-released Black this year! Or if those who missed out on Feu d’Issey the first time around got another chance to smell it. Sometimes a fragrance is a bit too early for its time and is under-appreciated. With the fervor for fragrance at an all-time high, old gems just might find the love they deserve from a new audience.

What are your predictions for 2025? What have you seen so far that might turn into a trend for the rest of the year? The comments are open <3

Lynch is, of course, remembered for his wildly original films, including Eraserhead, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive, and Inland Empire, as well as the groundbreaking television series, Twin Peaks. Less well known than his film and television work are the commercials Lynch filmed. He directed ads for a multitude of products, from shoes, to coffee, to pregnancy tests and public service announcements. Amongst his commercial work, his advertisements for perfume stand out. Fragrance, after all, can be a doorway into another life or another world, and the intangibility and allure of scent pairs perfectly with Lynch’s dreamlike, surreal style and his exploration of themes such as desire and fantasy.

Yesterday a friend remarked, “well, you gotta pay the bills somehow” when I told him about Lynch’s advertising work, but I think there was probably more to it for him than just the economic incentive. Lynch transformed the TV commercial into something intellectual, cinematic, and captivating, much like how he celebrated and elevated the oft-dismissed soap opera genre through his television show Twin Peaks. Before Lynch, a film director turning to television was mostly unheard of; TV was seen as “beneath” film, a step down from what was considered the loftier artistic medium for the moving image.

Connections between Lynch’s cinematic work and his commercial work abound and his perfume ads stand as a testament to his creativity. Below are a few of my favorites.

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Obsession and Obsession for Men, Calvin Klein (1988?)

Lynch created four commercials for Calvin Klein’s Obsession fragrances1. The series of 30 second spots feature couples with poems and prose discussing infatuation and desire from Ernest Hemingway, D.H. Lawrence, Gustave Flaubert and F. Scott Fitzgerald alongside the visuals. Closeups of the male face in his ad featuring a piece by D.H. Lawrence echo the final scene of his 1986 film Blue Velvet, where the camera slowly zooms out from an extreme closeup of a human ear (recalling the initial sequence that sets the events of film in motion) and lingers over Kyle MacLachlan’s lovely face.

Images fade over each other in several of the Calvin Klein ads, overlapping to create a collage-like effect that crafts psychologically-charged associations between them and driving the narrative forward. Lynch used this technique across his oeuvre, beginning with his early work. The finale of his last Obsession spot mirrors the final scene of The Elephant Man (1980) where we see the image of John Merrick’s mother dissolving and reappearing over a sea of stars.

Gio, Giorgio Armani (1992)

Perhaps the most Lynchian of all his perfume commercials, this 1992 spot for Giorgio Armani is essentially a super-short, silent Noir film. Featuring a Badalamenti-tinged score, a femme fatale character travels from her lover’s arms, to the mean streets, to a swinging nightclub, tracked by paparazzi and a mysterious man sometimes lurking in the shadows.

The ad includes a great shot towards the beginning of a man twirling, snapping his fingers, then vanishing over a single beat of the music heard later in the piece, an enigmatic sequence that invites introspection and interpretation, like much of Lynch’s work.

Opium, Yves Saint Laurent (1992)

A richly-hued homage to the opulence of YSL’s most famous fragrance (as well as female self-love). The ad drips with sensuality through sight and touch, implying that the fragrance of Opium completes the indulgent scene. The camera dives into the opening of the perfume bottle and when we reemerge the luscious climax of the Opium experience is fulfilled.

Lynch used similar shots of diving into objects or the environment to establish transitions from one state to another throughout his work. Perhaps the most notorious example is the opening scene of Blue Velvet where the camera dives into an idyllic suburban lawn, driving deeper and deeper into the ground, revealing the darkness beneath the surface. In Mulholland Drive (2001), the key transition of the film takes place when Rita opens the enigmatic blue box matching the key she discovered in her purse earlier. The camera dives into the void, the box drops, and we’ve awoken from the dream (or shifted to another reality or however you want to interpret the sequence).

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Background, Jil Sander (1993)

Entitled “Instinct of Life”, this spot for Jil Sander’s fragrance for men juxtaposes a man and a panther running across an arid landscape. The spare interior environment the man emerges from is decked with objects ripe with symbolism and visual intrigue (a piano, a single lamp, a candle that extinguishes halfway through the ad) and perhaps evokes the surreal dream space of the red room in Twin Peaks (1990-1991).

Many of the techniques used here seem to foreshadow Lynch’s 1997 film Lost Highway. The flashing lights, abundant use of colorful, glowing smoke, and stormy atmosphere are used at key points of the feature when the main character(s) Fred/Pete transform.

Gucci by Gucci, Gucci (2008)

Lynch revisited the Mulholland Drive trope of a blonde and a brunette crossing paths in a world of glamor, and raised questions about identity in his acclaimed ad for Gucci’s 2007 fragrance. Supermodels Raquel Zimmermann, Natasha Poly and Freja Beha Erichsen, the three faces of the fragrance, bop along to Blondie’s Heart of Glass until their images dissolve and merge, juxtaposed atop each other in a trance-like rapture, unified by the waft of fragrance.

A cute short film about the shoot for the commercial offers glimpses into Lynch’s creative process. A shot of Lynch filming a cascade of gold glitter with a cigarette hanging from the side of his mouth is especially charming.

Lynch’s perfume commercials clearly demonstrate an understanding of and reverence for the transformative power of fragrance. While surrealistic imagery is not out of place in fragrance advertising, it is elevated and taken to an exceptional level in Lynch’s ads, and his commercials blend seamlessly into the canon of his work. Perhaps there is a lesson here we can all take away from Lynch—put the same amount of care and artistry into everything you do, no project is necessarily beneath you, all opportunities are opportunities to express your vision.

Well, we’re at the end of another year. They just keep coming! 2024 was the first year that I put effort into writing for Smell World, and I am (for the most part) proud of what I’ve managed to publish. Though my footprint is small I am so grateful for it and for everyone who takes the time to read my writing. I became much more socially-involved in the “fragrance community” this year as well and it was very rewarding intellectually and spiritually. I am pleased to have made so many new friends, both online and offline.

Let’s have a look back on all the fragrances I’ve encountered over the year. Ahead you will find a thoroughly unhinged, excessively data-rich post full of statistics, reviews, and fun minutia. I’ve included information breaking down:

• The number of fragrances I reviewed this year

• How I rated those fragrances on a scale of 1 to 5 stars

• Number of fragrances by decade, perfumer, and category

• Reviews of the fragrances that defined 2024 for me, favorite new releases of the year, and new-to-me favorites of the year

• Perfumes I changed my mind about over the course of the year

• The amount of money I spent pursuing this hobby, broken down by category

• A little recap on the posts I’ve published this year

I’ve been compelled, for some reason, to do this kind of obsessive cataloging privately for years, so I am pleased that I can share some of the output with you all. Enjoy!

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Notes on the data and methodology

All of this data was compiled from the fragrance database that I built in Airtable to inventory and describe my personal collection, with the exception of the financial breakdown, which I crunched in a separate spreadsheet. I filtered the whole dataset to limit it to just the fragrances that I reviewed between 1/1/2024 and 12/31/2024. Just because I reviewed a fragrance this year does not mean I had never smelled it before or was unaware of it before I completed the review. In fact, I acquired a lot of the fragrances I reviewed this year in 2023 or earlier and hadn’t gotten around to reviewing them until now. I also smelled A LOT more than what is presented here (I only review a fragrance and add it to my database if I own at least a sample of it and have worn it for 4+ hours on my skin; I generally do not do reviews solely based on how a fragrance smells on paper. There are exceptions to this but they are very few). Some numbers may not add up perfectly because of missing data points or indiscrete categories (e.g. the same perfume may fit into both the “floral” category and the “amber” category and thus would be counted in both). I skipped analyzing fragrances by notes because it was just too much to slog through and this post is already quite long. Most of this analysis was compiled by hand by filtering on various attributes and using simple Excel formulas. I used Google’s Gemini AI to provide additional analysis with a couple Python scripts, but I didn’t have time to check its work so if anything is off, blame the machine.

This was a fun exercise and I think it really proved that the attributes I’ve been capturing are useful and robust enough for some interesting analysis. Though I’ve been compiling all this data for years, this is the first time I really sat down and analyzed a subset of it (at heart I am a wordcel not a mathcel). I don’t think that data alone should be used for decision making or drawing broad conclusions, and I think that technical knowledge is generally overrated, but there are some provoking insights into my tastes and behavior, and insights into the fragrance market that can be gleaned from this little set of data.

If you have any questions about these numbers I am happy to answer them or provide additional analysis (e.g. “What perfumes released in 2023 or 2024 that contain vanilla did you rate 4 stars?” “What was your favorite woody fragrance you smelled this year?” etc.)

Substack Stats and A Look Back

14x Growth
I started the year with 15 subscribers (thank you to the pioneers who believed in me when I had but one post on my blog) and over the course of the year I’ve added 200 201 new subscribers. I am so pleased that my work is resonating with people and I hope I continue to deliver for my readers in 2025.

Total essays published: 12
I hope to up this number substantially in 2025.

Posts You Loved

My NYC Fragrance Scene Report from August was my most viewed post and generated the most subscribers.

My long-form essay on How to Get Into Fragrance was my second most viewed article and also generated a sizeable number of new subscribers.

Rounding out the top three is my review of Comme des Garçons EDP, celebrating my 500th fragrance logged in the database.

Personal Favorites

My screed against “office safe” fragrances and a call to wage olfactory warfare in the workplace.

A personal essay celebrating tenement building living.

2024 Fragrance Review Stats

Number of fragrances reviewed: 198

Of which, were new releases: 25

Number of brands: 111

Month with the most reviews: November (30)

I set aside an evening to review a cache of fragrances held over from ScentXplore 2023 so I could add them to the list of fragrances I have available to swap, which really upped the numbers here.

Month with the least reviews: January (7)

198 is a lot of smells, especially for someone who isn’t professionally involved in the fragrance industry. I don’t have brands sending me stuff unsolicited and unless I pick something up at a swap, as a gift, or through an event I pay for everything I review myself.

Fragrances received at events (Sniffapalooza, ScentXplore, Pitti Fragranze, Smell Club): 83

Which leaves roughly 115 fragrances that I added to my collection of my own volition. To me this seems like a reasonable number, though maybe still a bit high.

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Ratings

Notes about ratings: ratings are mostly based on how much I personally liked the perfume, with “points” given or taken away based on originality, innovation, historical significance, clarity of point of view/communication/storytelling. If I think a perfume is overly-derivative, unbalanced in an unintentional or displeasing way, or chasing a trend rather than having something to say on its own, I give it a low score. Obviously this is all very subjective; I don’t adhere to a rigorous rubric and I change my mind occasionally. Three stars generally means something is recommended. Two stars means I could take it or leave it or vaguely dislike it. One star means it made me angry or disgusted. Four stars means the fragrance is great and I would go out of my way to smell it. Five stars means it’s a masterpiece.

Are stars really the right mechanism for reviewing a work of art? I’m not convinced they are, but for now I use them as a convenient shorthand for evaluating the success or failure of a particular perfume. (Once I was at a talk on the state of art criticism hosted by Dean Kissick and some big deal art critic lady was part of the discussion and at one point, exasperated, she asked, “is this really what we need to do?? Are you saying we should be giving STAR RATINGS to gallery shows!?” and people in the crowd were like, “YES WE LOVE STARS.” So maybe stars are good, idk.)

Also, I realize that this is the only place where I am listing every single perfume I reviewed this year and I could have picked something more neutral, like listing them all by category or alphabetically, but I didn’t because you deserve to see me be a little cunty, as a treat.

5 stars: 12 - of these, the latest is from 2012. I did not give any perfumes released this year five stars, but one came close and I may change my rating in the future.

• Youth-Dew, Estee Lauder

• Fougere Royale, Houbigant

• Shocking, Schiaparelli

• Comme des Garcons, Comme des Garcons

• Bandit, Robert Piguet

• White Diamonds, Elizabeth Taylor

• Paloma Picasso, Paloma Picasso

• Diorissimo, Dior

• Relique d'Amour, Oriza L. Legrand

• Apres l'Ondee, Guerlain

• Dune, Dior

• Comme des Garçons, Comme des Garcons

4 stars: 50

• Iris Nazarena, Aedes de Venustas

• Matin a Mogador, Botanicae Expressions

• Lunar Vetiver, Amouroud

• Ormonde Elixir, Ormonde Jayne

• Anubis, Papillon

• Wedding in Oaxaca, Kismet Olfactive

• Dinudisit, January Scent Project

• Encre Noire, Lalique

• Iris Poudre, Frederic Malle

• Synthetic Jungle, Frederic Malle

• Arpege, Lanvin

• Niki de Saint Phalle, Niki de Saint Phalle

• Tilia, Marc-Antoine Barrois

• Heaven Can Wait, Frederic Malle

• Concrete, Comme des Garcons

• Parasite, Moth and Rabbit

• Rouge, Comme des Garcons

• Private Collection, Estee Lauder

• Passion, Elizabeth Taylor

• Rabbit Rabbit, Pearfat Parfums

• Maggie the Cat is Alive!, I'm Alive!, Marissa Zappas

• Tóor Tóor, Regime des Fleurs

• Vetiver Ecarlate, L'Artisan Parfumeur

• Primal Yell, Amphora Parfum

• Acne Studios, Frederic Malle

• Tragedy, Marissa Zappas

• Dream Sequence, Marissa Zappas

• Night Flyer, Olympic Orchids

• Chevelier Vert, Olympic Orchids

• Tropic of Capricorn, Olympic Orchids

• Ballets Rouges, Olympic Orchids

• M/Mink, Byredo

• Eau de Protection, Etat Libre d'Orange

• Tendre Poison, Dior

• Miss Dior, Dior

• Epona, Papillon

• White, Comme des Garcons

• Reliqvia, Unum

• Attaquer le Soleil Marquis de Sade, Etat Libre d'Orange

• Ki'lei, Source Adage

• Coney Island Baby, Scout Dixon West

• L'Orpheline, Serge Lutens

• Rien, Etat Libre d'Orange

• Halston, Halston

• Incarnate, Scout Dixon West

• Baby Boy, Amphora Parfum

• Poudrextase, Marlou

• Light, Neandertal

• Joy, Jean Patou

• I'll Never Learn, Pearfat Parfums

3 stars: 68

• Myrrhe, Headspace

• Eau My Soul, 4160 Tuesdays

• A Une Madone, Pierre Guillaume

• Mortel, Maison Trudon

• Lilacs & Heliotrope, Soivohle

• Spice Rose Attar, al Has

• Yellow Rose Incense, Bohoboco

• Night, Akro

• Eau de Couture, Cher

• Silences Sublime, Jacomo

• Osmanthe Yunan, Hermes

• Desir Infini, Navitus Parfums

• Vetiver 46, Le Labo

• Tanger, Ormonde Jayne

• Aphelie, Maison Trudon

• For Her, Adam Levine

• Rose, Caswell-Massey

• Médie, Maison Trudon

• Fig Extasy, Mancera

• Bruma, Maison Trudon

• L'Homme Accompli, Divine

• Jubilation 40, Amouage

• My Love Has the Colour of the Night, Floraiku

• Copper, Comme des Garcons

• Black Magenta, DS & Durga

• Muget Fleuri, Oriza L. Legrand

• Cavatina, Dusita

• Lilac, Caswell-Massey

• Odile, Gummamina

• 2030 Park Ave, Pearfat Parfums

• High Frequency, Initio

• Ummo, Xinù

• Parfum Ensoleillé, Frederico Parfums

• Vetiverissimo, Bruno Fazzolari

• Poems One Through Twelve, Universal Flowering

• Incident Diplomatique, Jovoy

• Vetifleur, Rogue Perfumery

• The Pink Bedroom, Marissa Zappas

• Nympheas, Kismet Olfactive

• Noisette, Maison D'Etto

• Olympic Amber, Olympic Orchids

• Golden Cattleya, Olympic Orchids

• Bay Rum, Olympic Orchids

• Blackbird, Olympic Orchids

• Love Delight, Amouage

• Bull's Blood, Imaginary Authors

• Vacances, Jean Patou

• No. 7 Rose Impolie, Binet-Papillion

• Garden Song, Racyne

• Kajal IV, Kajal

• Gujarat, Olympic Orchids

• Oscuro, Monom

• Marseille, Comme des Garcons

• Odeur 71, Comme des Garcons

• Odeur 53, Comme des Garcons

• Passage d'Enfer, L'Artisan Parfumeur

• Selperniku, January Scent Project

• The Secret History, Marissa Zappas

• Santal Ceremony, Racyne

• Rien Intense Incense, Etat Libre d'Orange

• Ume Amaretto, Oath J-Scent

• Nosferatu, Heretic Parfums

• Respiro, Monom

• Nardo, Monom

• Melograno, Santa Maria Novella

• Mantes la Jolie, Astier de Villatte

• Lust Oud Delice, Chris Collins

• Boswellia Scotia, Jorum Studio

2 stars: 43

• Guidance, Amouage

• First Sight, The Gate

• Bois, Arquiste

• L'Iris, Santa Maria Novella

• Dreaming With Ghosts, Mark Buxton

• Strawberry, Malin + Goetz

• Red, Giorgio Beverly Hills

• J'adoube, Mind Games

• Neroli 36, Le Labo

• Tonic Water, Mizensir

• Mallow, Sora Dora

• Celeste, Giardini Di Toscana

• Angels of Florence, Santa Maria Novella

• Amour de Cacao, Comptoir Sud Pacifique

• Mango Skin, Vilhelm Parfumerie

• Morn to Dusk, Eau d'Italie

• Soda Snob, Snif Perfumes

• Glass Blooms, Regime des Fleurs

• Ceramic, Andrea Maack

• The Poet, Kismet Olfactive

• La Vierge de Fer, Serge Lutens

• God Bless Cola, Versatile Paris

• Lenore, Immortal Perfumes

• Carolina, Olympic Orchids

• Khypi, Olympic Orchids

• Like This, Etat Libre d'Orange

• She Was An Anomaly, Etat Libre d'Orange

• Remarkable People, Etat Libre d'Orange

• Urban Oud, Habibi New York

• Oud Aquilaria, Oman Luxury

• Verona, Primera Perfumes

• Splendeur Absolu, Navitus Parfums

• Mossland 12.09, Neydo

• Saturn, NicheEnd

• La Tacita de Cafe, Day Three Fragrances

• Renaissance, Shauran

• Elysium, Roja

• Beyond Oblivion, J-Scent

• Sacred Animal, J-Scent

• Tari, Monom

• Don't Get Me Wrong Baby, Yes I Do, Etat Libre d'Orange

• Pelagos, Dusita

• Eden, Cacharel

1 star: 25 - most of these I received for free while attending various events and I probably wouldn’t have bothered to pick them up on my own. I think January Scent Project is the only brand right now with the distinction of having a one star fragrance and a five star fragrance in my database (for the record I love JSP and think John Biebel does exciting work).

• Coco Moon, Beach Geeza

• Ocean Water, Beach Geeza

• Vaporocindro, January Scent Project

• Fior di Pane, Profumo di Firenze

• Bosphorus Pearl, Alghabra

• Noces de Nerola, Brecourt

• Viandante, Profumo di Firenze

• Notte d'Amore, Pantheon Roma

• Peregrina, Thameen

• Elektra, Olympic Orchids

• Slice Society, Snif Perfumes

• Atomic Rose, Initio

• Delphinus, Creed

• Centaurus, Creed

• Delice, M. Micallef

• No. 1 Alkemist Pepper, Binet-Papillion

• La Terre, La Nuit, Racyne

• Ajyal, The Spirit of Dubai

• III, Kajal

• Crush on Me, Unique'e Luxury

• Accento Viola, Sospiro

• Herbal Aquatica, Montale

• Apple Brandy on the Rocks, By Killian

• Tres Chere, Mizensir

• Almanera, Epico

When we limit the data set to the 115 perfumes I didn’t receive at large events, the ratings break down like so:

5 stars: 12
4 stars: 43
3 stars: 35
2 stars: 19
1 star: 6

100% of the fragrances I rated five stars I sought out on my own. I was very surprised to see that I only picked up 7 fragrances that I rated four stars at an event. The difference at the lower end is most striking though: I was 4 times more likely to rate a fragrance from an event as one star than if it was something I picked up on my own.

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By the Decade

I was surprised how overrepresented the past two decades were in the fragrances I reviewed this year. I feel like I spend more time thinking about and advocating for older fragrances, but I suppose this is another consequence of the volume of fragrances I received from events rather than shopping on my own.

2020s: 92

2010s: 69

2000s: 8

1990s: 8

1980s: 4

1970s: 2

1960s: 1

1950s: 2

1940s: 2

1930s: 3

1920s: 1

1900s and older: 2

Oldest perfume reviewed: Fougere Royale by Houbigant (1882)

By Perfumer

Ellen Covey: 11
I picked up a sizable Olympic Orchids sample set this summer so Ellen blew everyone away for first place this year.

Mark Buxton: 5

Marissa Zappas: 5

Quentin Bisch: 5

Yann Vasnier: 5

I was surprised and delighted by this four way tie for second place!

Antoine Lie: 4

Bertrand Duchaufour: 4

Antoine and Bertrand rounding out third place.

I did not have information about the perfumer for 49 of the fragrances I reviewed this year.

By Category

Categories are pretty fungible and I don’t really like the classification system I am using right now. I’m considering other ways to broadly categorize fragrances and hope to explore different options in the future. This topic will likely become a stand alone blog post. Stay tuned.

Each of these are listed as stand alone categories but I often use them in combination with each other (e.g. Amber + Woody or Floral + Gourmand). For ease of use I’ve listed them based on the first category described even if multiples were used.

Amber: 39

Floral: 73 (!)

Fruity: 13

Gourmand: 15

Woody: 23

Aquatic: 4

Spicy: 7

Green: 9

Musk: 2

Leather: 3

Aromatic: 5

Fragrances that defined my year

Note: I didn’t start keeping track of my daily fragrance wears until May, so this data is incomplete. I’m using the numbers from my diary to guide me, but some of this information is based on my intuition about what fragrances felt important to me and defining for 2024 rather than what I wore most often or another quantifiable metric.

Youth-Dew, Estee Lauder

Review: Sparkling aldehydes and warm spices. Like Coca-Cola mixed with face powder and a mid-century bouquet of classic florals over an earthy, musky base. The DNA of this is great, but I wish I could smell the original version as the modern one feels a little thin to my nose, but she might just need to cook for a minute.

My original review was lukewarm, but this became a real go-to for me over the course of the year. When in doubt: Youth-Dew.

Paloma Picasso, Paloma Picasso

Review: Another one I guess I forgot to review? Benchmark 80s chypre. Rosy, dry, big on the base notes—patchouli, oakmoss, a tinge of civet-y funk. Begs to be worn while smoking.

The fragrance I most frequently wore to go out to parties and social gatherings. Feels special and unique enough to stand out, and has a bit of raunch that’s perfect degenerate party girl vibes. I feel like the number of times I wore it was testament to the bounty of friends and fun in my life this year.

Shocking, Schiaparelli

Review: From a 1950s nip. A bright fresh opening filled with effervescent aldehydes and an herbaceous tarragon note, which soon gives way to a dry-sweet spicy honey accord complimented by a bouquet of rose, jasmine, and narcissus. The rose and honey play together beautifully and are followed by powdery musk and velvety civet notes. The whole thing definitely has a dirty panties vibe but it's absolutely gorgeous.

I wanted to try this one for a long time and last year I picked up a collection of vintage perfume nips. I cracked this one open to celebrate my birthday in April and it was a magical experience. Here’s a reel where I describe what nips are:

2024 New Release Favorites

Acne par Frederic Malle

Review: Fizzy, tinny aldehydes floating over fuzzy peach with a creamy, vanilla-tinged sandalwood backbone. At the store, they describe this as "the first aldehydic gourmand" which I don't necessarily agree with (for both "the first" and "gourmand" assertions, ironically), but it is good and very much my kind of shit. Like Arpege for Zoomers. If it gets the Tiktok perfume children into old fashioned soapy aldehydes I'm all for it.

I was very lucky and among the first people to smell this fragrance when it was released earlier this year. The consensus at the time seemed to be that it was pretty mid and evidence that Malle is cooked. I sheepishly disagreed and thought about pre-ordering a full bottle. Months later the sentiment turned and it started to pick up steam and positive reviews. I just need everyone to know that I LIKED IT FIRST.

Epona, Papillon Parfum

Review: Like all of Liz Moore's work, Epona is a vintage-styled fragrance, but unlike her other creations I've tried, this one feels like a completely new beast. Her other fragrances are, of course, gorgeous, but they all have a distinct reference point. Epona manages to smell like a vintage fragrance, but unlike any that I've smelled before. It's a soapy floral that blends into a skin-like animalic accord, that blends into a hearty floral leather. Unlike other vintage leather compositions I've tried, there's no sharpness here, just a smooth well-worn leatheriness. The scene it sets out to capture is perfect—a ride through the English countryside in spring. A remarkable achievement, full of emotion. This feels like the beginning of a new, masterful phase of Moore's career.

Tilia, Marc-Antoine Barrois

Review: Gorgeous metallic solar floral. Like a bouquet of flowers on the moon. Blooms made of sparkling stainless steel. Kind of a funny one—takes a long time to build on skin. For the first 20 minutes or so all I get is a puff of heliotrope, but about half an hour in the core of the scent builds up and it's a gorgeous jasmine along with some pollen-y facets and the aforementioned metallic-woody notes. Feels related to Gannymede without being very close to it. A great floral, summery interpretation of the house's core idea.

I think I like Tilia because it has the heft of a vintage-style white floral but the overdose of ambroxan keeps it from becoming a throwback fragrance and feels very contemporary.

Primal Yell, Amphora Parfum

Review: The olfactory equivalent to the 1978 British folk horror film The Shout. Cherry and metal backed with smoky castoreum, and a balsamic rose. Earthy, bodily, a touch supernatural. Takes some time to really develop. Exemplifies what indie perfumery should be.

I am historically not a fan of sweet fragrances but Noah’s compositions have changed the way I feel about having a bit of sugar thrown in the mix. This is how you can go right up to the edge without going over it. Like Angel, it’s sweet but still smells like perfume rather than dessert.

2024 New-to-Me Favorites

Relique d’Amour, Oriza L. Legrand

Review: Melancholy lilies planted next to a mossy wet stone walkway leading to a church filled with the memory of snuffed-out incense. Watery eyes wiped away with the resolve to go on. 19th century watercolor landscape painted en plein air.

I was already a fan of Oriza Legrand fragrances but somehow hadn’t tried this one until recently. It is gorgeous and I definitely want a full bottle of it.

Dune, Dior

Review: A mysterious beauty. Windswept, foreboding sandalwood. A stunning exercise in using warm materials to create a cooling effect. Winter on the beach, absent any marine notes, but with a slight saltiness. Could probably add this to the hangover fragrance pantheon. Lasts all day but isn't obnoxious about it.

This one came from a vintage coffret that I bought mostly because I wanted to try Tendre Poison.

Diorissimo, Dior

Review: Gorgeous. A transcendent muget blossom—round, heady, a touch soapy. So clear and beautiful. Smells like optimism.

Another one from the vintage Dior coffret.

Bandit, Robert Piguet

Review: FINALLY got a hold of this and it did not disappoint. Bitter, sharp green leather with herbaceous muted florals. Smells almost as evil as Leather Petals. A perfect dark green fragrance.

Comme des Garçons, Comme des Garçons (2011)

I wrote a whole post about this one (linked above). Smells like glue that gets you high and lilacs.

Perfumes I Changed My Mind About

Heaven Can Wait, Frederic Malle

Original Review: Opens with a battery of cool, fresh spiciness dominated by clove and carrot, which has an almost savory affect. Rooty iris brings up the back, but the whole composition seems to fade to a scant skin scent after a couple hours. Wish it had more tenacity.

Update from 4 months later: Re-evaluating my lukewarm initial reaction. This feels a lot richer/stronger than I thought. Maybe she just needed to cook a bit.

Maggie the Cat Is Alive! I’m Alive!, Marissa Zappas

Original Review: Spilled champagne, fuzzy peach lactones, makeup powder, musk musk musk. A bit of a mossy background. Retro but not entirely a throwback perfume. Blind bought a full bottle during a sale and not 100% sold on it yet, but maybe it will grow on me.

Update from 3 months later: I need to figure out what ambrette actually smells like—I think it might be something that I often interpret as "clove" or "carrot seed" something savory-spicy-musky. This one is growing on me a bit.

Then I went on to wear it like 3 more times this year. It may even be my New Years Eve fragrance choice!

Gujarat, Olympic Orchids

Original Review: Expecting something more sweaty/BO/bodily based on reputation. Sour-spicy notes dominate the composition—I mainly get tumeric and the plasticy note of saffron. Sweetens up a bit with some floral edges after 30-60 mins of wear. Cumin starts to peak out around then. Base feels a bit leathery. Overall very dense; I wish there was more room in this. Might grow on me. A few hours in the cumin-woody dry down is quite nice.

Update: This one did in fact grow on me a bit over time.

Money Spent

Most collecting hobbies can get expensive and fragrance is obviously no exception. The numbers I am going to list will probably seem absurd to some people; to others they will seem like pocket change. While I didn’t compile data to compare with previous years, intuitively I think I probably spent more this year than in the past.

I don’t typically keep a budget or track my expenses beyond trying to rein it in a bit when I feel like I’ve been spending too much. Aside from student loans I have no debt and I pay all credit cards off in full every month and never carry a balance. Beyond my full time job, I have a couple odd jobs that generate a few grand per year that I typically use on non-essential purchases; a lot of the money I spent on fragrance came from this pool.

Total: $4798.94

Includes all purchases with a record of transaction (credit card, PayPal, or Venmo), including full bottles, samples, admission to fragrance-related events, books and Substack subscriptions, and a few other random expenses. Tax, shipping, etc. are always included where applicable to reflect the true cost.

Total Expenses Per Month

• March: $852.94

• April: $824.81

• May: $696.21

• December: $582.31

• September: $461.60

• October: $450.85

• June: $271.77

• July: $238.24

• November: $214.17

• August: $73.45

• January: $47.59

• February: $0

My birthday is April 1st so I’m not terribly surprised that March and April were my most expensive months.

By Type

New fragrance purchases: 21
Secondhand purchases (eBay and Mercari): 21

An exactly evenly split! I generally prefer to buy vintage and secondhand when I can so hopefully the percentages will shift in the future.

Full bottles: $2624.79 for 34 bottles total (average cost $77 per bottle)
Most Expensive: Carnal Flower, Frederic Malle ($273, purchased at the FM store with a 15% discount)
Least Expensive: White Diamonds, Elizabeth Taylor ($13.78)

Samples: $272.73 total
Of which, were for Smell Club events: $80.56 (4 sessions x 5 samples per session)
Of which, were gifts for others: $124.56 - I created custom sample packs for two friends this year as birthday gifts

Minus those two categories I spent $67.61 on samples for myself

Coffrets, minis, and discovery sets: $565.43
Most expensive: $227.55 - vintage Dior coffret with 5 mini fragrances
Least expensive: $19.58 - vintage Paloma Picasso mini (smells basically the same as the current formulation—just buy the new one)

Gifts: $214.56 - how generous of me. In addition to the sample packs I also bought a full bottle as a gift.

Events and Workshops: $740.28

Note: This total only includes admission fees, it doesn’t include any related expenses like food, travel, etc.

Most expensive: $402 - Arabelle Sicardi’s Perfumed Pages writing workshop. This was also my single biggest expense overall for the year.
Least expensive: $12.51 - Smell Club perfume swap at Susan Alexandra in July

Most of the events I attended this year were free. I expect this total will be lower in 2025.

Books, Magazines, and Newsletter Subscriptions: $261.59
Most Expensive: American Legends: The Evolution of American Fragrances by Michael Edwards: $120
Least Expensive (not counting recurring monthly subscription fees): Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins $18.45

Other expenses: $344.12

Cabinet from Facebook Marketplace: $85 - I upgraded my perfume storage situation this year with a cute secondhand glass front cabinet.

Vintage Cher Uninhibited factice bottle: $259.12 - ok this was kind of frivolous but the hammer price itself wasn’t too bad. Shipping and auction fees were what really got me here. When will I ever find one of these again though?! Buying art is always worth it.

Best Buys

Eau de Kiki, The Zoo (aka Kiki Smith Plant Sex)

All fragrances from The Zoo are now discontinued. This one was an instant love for me but I hemmed and hawed over buying a full bottle for about a year. At one point you could pick up a bottle for $50 (what was I thinking?!). I set an eBay alert that I never expected to hit, only to get a ping from someone in Brooklyn just a few days before my birthday. That’s called MANIFESTING.

Vintage Dior Coffret

At some point during the summer I became obsessed with a discontinued Dior Poison flanker, Tendre Poison. I needed to smell it or I would die. Secondhand bottles are super expensive, even partially-used ones, so I looked for minis and coffrets. The one I ended up purchasing was one of my pricier acquisitions this year but it included five fragrances instead of the typical four and they’re all classic Dior hits. Two of them ended up on my list of favorite fragrances for the year, as noted above. I might write a standalone post just about vintage Dior so I will hold off on elaborating further.

Leather Petals, Regime des Fleurs

I won a $50 luckyscent gift card back in JANUARY and spent the rest of the year trying to decide what to spend it on. I decided that the best strategy would be to spend it on a full bottle of a perfume that I typically wouldn’t buy at full retail price so I could bring something from prohibitively expensive to realistically expensive. After months of deliberating I decided that Leather Petals was it. Of course, by the time I was ready to check out Luckyscent was no longer selling it. I debated buying it elsewhere without the aid of the gift card. A few days later I got a hit on an eBay alert I had set up and I knew it was meant to be. The total cost for the barely used secondhand bottle was about a hundred dollars less than the retail price. I still haven’t used the gift card.

Samples of Boswellia Scotia, Jorum Studio and Northern Flicker, January Scent Project

Both of these were limited releases and I am glad I got to try them without blind buying a full bottle.

Goals for 2025

Acquire fewer perfume samples

It’s very hard to say no to gift bags and freebies even when it’s a scent I’m not really interested in, but as we can see with the inflated low ratings numbers for fragrances that I received at events, most of the time it isn’t really worth it for me. Justifying grabbing all the samples I can by thinking that I can give the ones I don’t like away to someone who will appreciate them or sell them on Mercari or whatever is fallacious thinking: I brought 50+ samples to a fragrance swap earlier this month and only managed to deaccession 11 of them. I might do a giveaway contest or something or send them out randomly to interested subscribers. In 2025 I might forgo big fragrance conferences, we’ll see.

Be more diligent about responding to comments

Sometimes I forget to reply or I am unsure what to say in response—I’m sorry!

Publish more consistently

I have so many half-finished pieces I want to pick up and finally get out there. In the meantime, I think I probably need to commit to publishing more reviews and recommendations because although they aren’t necessarily the pieces I am most interested in writing, people seem to like them and they require a lot less effort than more rigorous essays so I will incorporate them more intentionally into Smell World next year.

Get published somewhere that isn’t Substack

If someone who isn’t me wanted to publish something I wrote it would be very validating. I don’t really understand how pitching articles works so I need to figure that out first I guess.

Collaborate with other people

As I mentioned at the top of this post, I’ve met a lot of great people who love fragrance this year and I would love to take on some collaborative projects next year. I’ve thought about reaching out to people for interviews, but I am intimidated because I have poor social skills. I resolve to get over this fear in 2024! Additionally, I hope one of the things that comes across through this blog is that fragrance is important and can be tied into so many aspects of our lives (history, culture, art, etc.) so I would love to bring that to other outlets, especially ones that are not directly related to fragrance.

Cheers to a fabulous 2025!

My Christmas movie viewing habits dropped off as an adult. I’d still watch a couple films every year with my family, but it felt like less of an event, especially after my father passed. During the Christmas of 2020, however, that changed a bit. I knew I wouldn’t be seeing my family but I still wanted to do something that felt special and celebratory so I turned once again to seasonal holiday films to lock into the festive spirit. In the years that have followed I’ve developed my own canon of films I watch every Christmas to celebrate the season; some of them are classics held over from my childhood, while others are personal selections that were gradually added to the rotation.

In the spirit of holiday giving, here are some of my favorites, paired with a fragrance to enjoy while you watch.

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Bell Book and Candle (1958, dir. Richard Quine)

On Christmas Eve, sexy witch Kim Novak enchants her new neighbor James Stewart so he will fall in love with her. The timing of the beginning of the film is really the only Christmas-related aspect of it (and it doesn’t really make sense because Stewart is set to elope with his fiancee the following day, which is Christmas Day, and how exactly was that going to work? Are courts open on Christmas Day? I don’t think so). The film is based on a play of the same title, and all of the performances have a charming theatricality to them—Jack Lemmon as Kim Novak’s campy, bongo playing warlock brother is a favorite. Honestly though, this is a movie you mostly watch for the aesthetics—the Technicolor is popping, the late-50s costumes are magnificent, the beatnik nightclub where all the witches hang out is called The Zodiac and there’s a cute bit where the doorman decides who can come in based on the vibes of their astrological sign. Every apartment in the film makes me want to scream and rip all of my hair out of my head with envy. The end of the movie is a bit of a bummer—Kim Novak loses her witch powers after tragically falling in love with James Stewart for real.

Fun fact: this was released the same year as VERTIGO lol

Paired with: Spell 125 (2021, Papillon Artisan Perfumes, Liz Moores)

Spell 125 has a witchy name and is inspired by an ancient Egyptian incantation, but the scent itself is Christmas central. It’s a vintage-tinged floral, unsurprising given the style of perfumery Liz Moore is (respectfully) known for, but the real heart of the scent is a bright combination of resin, pine, and lightly churchy incense. Wear it if you want to smell like an alluring Christmas tree.

Remember the Night (1940, dir. Mitchell Leisen)

Written by Preston Sturges (his last screenplay before he turned to directing), this 1940 Christmas rom com could be considered an early predecessor to the cookie-cutter Hallmark Christmas pictures that are popular today: the joy of Christmas in a small town and a tight-knit family bring a couple of Hoosiers-turned-big-city-New-Yorkers together when they return to Indiana for the holidays.

Barbara Stanwyck plays Lee, a shoplifter who is being prosecuted by Fred MacMurray’s lawyer character, Jack. Lee’s trial is set to extend past Christmas and Jack feels bad for her, so he posts her bail and, since she has nowhere to go, she joins him for a road trip back home when they realize they grew up not far from each other (as an aside: I love Preston Sturges’s absurd set-ups—the complete disregard for realism is inspiring). A touching portrayal of the transformative power of love, and a great Barbara Stanwyck vehicle—during filming, Sturges promised to write a screwball comedy for her to star in, which was realized the following year in one of his all-time-greatest films, THE LADY EVE.

Like all Sturges films, REMEMBER THE NIGHT is best viewed with a crowd to really bring the comedic moments to life. Perfect for anyone who wants the particular charm of a 1940s Christmas film but has watched IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE or WHITE CHRISTMAS to death.

Paired with: Joy, Jean Patou (1930, Henri Almeras)

Once billed as “the most costliest perfume in the world,” Joy is regarded as one of the greatest floral beauties in all perfumery. A luscious bouquet of jasmine, rose, and ylang ylang, it’s exactly the perfume that Stanwyck’s shoplifter character would steal from a fancy department store. Arresting and optimistic, it was an antidote to the gloom of the Great Depression when it was released, and it would similarly serve as a balm for Lee’s economically-precarious state.

There is a Christmas morning scene in the film where all the characters are exchanging gifts: Jack gives his mother a bottle of perfume called The Hour of Ecstasy, without realizing that he gave her the same perfume the prior year, which she in turn has regifted to Lee. I imagine Hour of Ecstasy to smell something like Bourjois’s Evening in Paris—an ionone-heavy powdery violet concoction that would already smell a bit dated and downmarket even during the year of its release.

Eyes Wide Shut (1999, dir. Stanley Kubrik)

This was the first movie to become part of my personal Christmas movie canon. Left alone to my own devices in the winter of 2020, I decided to put it on and it’s been a seasonal viewing treat ever since. EYES WIDE SHUT played at The Roxy over the summer but I didn’t go to see it at the time because it felt wrong watching it outside of the Christmas movie viewing window (Black Friday up to and including December 30th).

The original novel that serves as the source for the story is set during Carnival; Kubrick updated it to take place during Christmas. The choice to set the movie during the holiday season is very intentional and bolsters thematic and aesthetic motifs throughout the film. The holiday is ever-present, especially through the lighting and set design; nearly every setting contains a Christmas tree and strings of Christmas lights illuminate many of the scenes. Little reminders of the season are sprinkled throughout—Christmas cards on Bill Harford’s office desk, his daughter Helena asks to stay up late to watch The Nutcracker on television while he and his wife go out to a Christmas party, etc. The whole timeline is subtly shaped by the necessities of preparing for the holiday (party-going, gift wrapping, shopping) to the point where Christmas is almost a character in the film.

Essentially, EYES WIDE SHUT is a movie about forgiveness and redemption—the ultimate message of Christianity. The movie ends with Tom Cruise’s and Nicole Kidman’s characters looking forward to reconciling their misdeeds and recommitting their erotic desires to their monogamous relationship.

The film also critiques materialism and illuminates the limits of wealth: Bill uses cash as a cudgel against any obstacle he encounters throughout the film, throwing wads of it at the proprietor of a costume store in the middle of the night, using the promise of a hundred dollar bill to entice his cab driver to wait for him at the isolated Long Island estate where the infamous orgy party takes place, paying off a prostitute although he is thwarted from procuring her services. Bill uses his professional status to manipulate others just as often as he uses his wealth—he opens a conversation with, “I’m a doctor…” at least a dozen times throughout the film. Despite all his attempts to infiltrate and understand them, Bill is locked out of the enticing mysterious traditions and rituals of the upper echelon that he covets, humbled in the face of the true worldly elites just as all of humanity is humbled by the divinity of Christ—a reflection of the fact that we can never be elevated through our own efforts.

Last night, a friend pointed out that EYES WIDE SHUT follows the same basic structure as IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE—a man unsatisfied with his life realizes he actually has it pretty good after experiencing a dream-like alternative reality over the course of an evening. I am absolutely incensed that I did not think of this myself, but it is such a good point I had to add it to my analysis.

Paired with: Obsession for Men (1986, Calvin Klein, Robert Slattery)
LaCrima (2020, Liquides Imaginaires, Anne-Sophie Behaghel)

Obsession for Men is the more literal of my two fragrance options—the name fits perfectly with the theme of the film and its olfactive profile has a wintery vibe: a base of warm, comforting spices with a slug of herbaceous lavender to butch it up a bit. An explicitly masculine fragrance also felt appropriate for a movie about a man trying to explore an underworld of illicit sex after being emasculated by his wife.

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LaCrima is my choice specifically for the orgy scene. The heart of the fragrance is a ritualistic incense and resin paired with a soft lacquered wood and raunched up a bit with an animalic civet note, keeping the whole composition from becoming properly church-going.

The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992, dir. Brian Henson)

The 1984 George C. Scott version of A CHRISTMAS CAROL reigned supreme when I was growing up—it was my dad’s favorite iteration of the story so we rarely if ever watched the Muppet version, which was deemed a bit too silly for my father’s sophisticated tastes. As an adult I’ve come to appreciate it and I’ve watched it annually over the last few years. Michael Cain’s phenomenal acting really makes this version a masterpiece—he treats all the Muppets like they are real actors and delivers lines like, “why, this is Fozziwig’s old rubber chicken factory!” with the utmost seriousness. The musical numbers are cute and fun. All of the Muppets are also playing characters (e.g. Kermit is Bob Cratchit; Statler and Waldorf play Jacob and Robert Marley, etc.) which sort of adds another layer of embedded narrative to the film as the Muppets retain their signature characteristics yet also embody their characters as a role.

Cape Heartache, Imaginary Authors (2013, Josh Meyer)

Cape Heartache by Imaginary Authors is a path of strawberry candies weaving through a Christmas-y conifer forest. It has the hallmarks of a wintry walk through the woods but the two main components are so consciously artificial that it’s a bit like a cartoon version of an evergreen landscape populated with Muppet strawberries.

A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965, dir. Bill Melendez)

This is my number one Christmas movie. I will watch A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS every holiday season no matter what obstacles may try to thwart me; the fact that this classic is GATEKEPT by AppleTV except for one random weekend in December when they allow it to be streamed for free is a TRAVESTY.

A TV special that came together at the last minute and whose eccentricities (lack of laugh track, jazz soundtrack, use of child actors to voice the characters) made executives very nervous, this is one of the few Christmas films that has an overtly religious message but still resonates with non-religious people. Linus’s recitation of Luke Chapter 2 at the end of the film after Charlie Brown asks, “isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about!?” is a cinematic mic drop moment. In a time where the popular sentiment is to declare DIE HARD one’s favorite Christmas movie, the fact that A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS still resonates so strongly is testament to the power of sincerity and genuine honest feeling. It tackles heavy topics such as seasonal depression (I always used to go through a bout of the blues around Christmas time as a kid, so I could relate to Charlie Brown’s desire to see a psychiatrist to deal with his holiday-induced malaise) and the emptiness of consumerism with a deft and lighthearted hand. It represents the best of animated storytelling—blending sophistication that can be appreciated by adults with a message that is simple enough for children to understand and contemplate.

A fresh Christmas wreath, ginger cookies baking in the oven, or whatever scent reminds you of Christmas at home (2024, you and your loved ones)

It feels wrong to pair a commercial fragrance with this movie, like somehow the commercialism will taint its purity since it kind of goes against the central message of the film. Thus, I propose that you create your own olfactory Christmas experience to go along with viewing it. Sniff your Christmas tree, bake a plate of gingerbread people, dip a candy cane into a mug of hot chocolate. If none of these options are available, I recommend lighting the Cedar Balsam scented candle from Trader Joe’s—it is a close-enough approximation to the scent of a Christmas tree and readily available for an affordable price.

I've had the 2011 CDG EDP (reissued in 2021) for a while now, but I hadn't reviewed it and it seems like the perfect fragrance to reflect on now that I've reached the milestone of 500 fragrances logged in my personal database.

Comme des Garçons was one of the first fragrance brands to capture my attention. Opening Ceremony (RIP) carried the Play series back in the early 2010s and I was blown away the first time I sniffed Play Black. I couldn't get over how revelatory it smelled: completely different than the department store fruity floral fragrances I was accustomed to at that point. CDG became the touch point for me as to what was possible when you treat fragrance as an art designed for a specific audience rather than a product designed to maximize likability and mainstream appeal.

The 2011 Comme des Garçons (the date is necessary to differentiate it from their original self-titled release from 1994), was designed to be a "fragrance that couldn't exist" in a "bottle that shouldn't exist." Indeed, the bottle is an art object in itself—it comes suspended in a shrink-wrapped sheet of plastic, like an archeological artifact from the future trapped in amber. It is shaped like a melted, bulging pear and the glass is permeated with tiny bubbles, giving it a sort of handblown organic feel like an artisan cup from Pier 1 Imports. It cannot stand on its own.

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The fragrance itself opens with a notorious symphony of industrial notes: packing tape, glue, fresh printer toner. The chemical notes are so uncannily realistic that you expect to be able to get high by huffing the perfume. Reviews are peppered with specific scent memories of working in mail rooms and warehouses. The saffron-leather scent of safraleine bubbles up as well, giving the fragrance a plush sueded texture while bolstering the plasticy industrial notes. Inorganic smells are a common theme throughout CDG's repertoire (the Odeur series in particular comes to mind), but I think this example is particularly successful because it deftly conveys the tension between the inorganic and the organic in one composition: after a while a remarkable shift takes place and the scent morphs into a beautiful rendition of lilac. Like a bouquet of freshly-cut flowers in a crystal vase in the center of a freshly-painted white room, the scent weaves back and forth between the industrial and the organic as it dries down. This tension between the two serves as a metaphor for the art of perfumery itself—a meticulously considered blend of the synthetic and natural, designed to create an olfactory illusion.

I love art.
I love perfume.
Here's to 500 more reviews and to the ceaseless joy of smelling.

Notes: aldehydes, saffron, leather, lilac, hawthorn, styrax, industrial glue, brown scotch tape

Nose: Antoine Maisondieu

Olfactory Art Keller presents "Long Night Moontime": A Guided Aromatic Encounter with Amy Anthony on Wednesday, December 11th. Adams will present aromatic materials such as frankincense and pine needles. Participants will “feel scent by going beyond perception and recognition, thereby connecting to the scent on a deeper, emotional and physiological level [and] will talk about strategies of engaging with smells beyond the analytical mind.” The encounter includes a frankincense water tasting (!) and attendees will receive a 5ml bottle of frankincense oil as a gift. If I weren’t already committed to seeing the Rockettes with my bff and his boyfriend on Weds evening I’d be there. Tickets here

Credo Beauty on Prince Street will host a lil party featuring Ourside and a few beauty brands on Thursday, December 12th from 4-6PM. The event includes some gift with purchase specials, including the notorious expensive Oishii strawberries, which I once shamefully purchased and enjoyed, but vow never to buy again because $1/berry is outrageous. Ourside’s Nostalgia is of my favorite jasmine perfumes—it has the heft you want from a heady white floral, but it’s lightened up a bit with grapefruit and mint (it’s also one of the only perfumes I like that includes grapefruit in its listed notes—it tends to turn rubbery and flat on me). Free RSVP here

Viscose Journal Issue 7: Scent will launch at Storefront NYC’s book bash this Saturday, December 14th and Sunday, December 15th from 12-6PM. The journal contains essays by NYC fragrance luminaries Jessica Murphy and Andreas Keller, amongst other great contributors. I wish I had known that it wasn’t yet released in the US because I took them literally when they said it is OUT NOW and went to all of their NYC stockists to look for it (3 Iconic Magazines locations, 2 McNally Jackson locations, Mast Books, and Assembly NY). None of the sales associates even knew what I was talking about when I asked about it! Defeated, I finally ended up ordering it online, like a sucker (I hate buying things online with the exception of eBay purchases).

Anyway, you can pick it up this weekend and avoid paying $14 for shipping.

Also at Olfactory Art Keller this Sunday, December 15th from 11-2PM, is Distilling Memories: A Distillation Workshop and Performance with Amy Anthony. In addition to learning about various scent extraction methods, participants are invited to bring a sentimental material to be distilled into a communal fragrance essence, a sample of which will be distributed to all in attendance. Tickets here

Finally, I recommend stopping by any street-side Christmas tree vendor and tarrying for a bit. This is the one time of year where the NYC sidewalks smell great and we should all take advantage of the opportunity to enjoy the wintry transformation while it lasts. I recently learned that most tree vendors will give you free trimmings from trees they’ve sold, so even if you don’t have room for a full tree you can take a bit of the olfactory holiday spirit home with you.

Happy sniffing!

Everything below this line was previously published, but scroll down a bit if you are seeing this post for the first time; there are additional upcoming events for the 10th-14th in the list.

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December is shaping up to be a busy month for NYC fragrance enthusiasts.

Today (Tuesday, December 3rd), from 5-7PM, Scent Bar on Elizabeth Street is hosting Italian perfume house Nobile 1942 for an evening of gourmand-focused sniffing.

On Wednesday, December 4th, from 6-8PM Stéle is hosting a launch party for indie darling Amphora Parfum’s newest releases, Baby Boy and Virginal. RSVP required. Don’t miss this one!

ScentXplore, the international niche fragrance convention, is back for its 5th edition from Thursday, December 5th through Saturday, December 7th. The list of exhibitors can be found here and the program of events can be found here. I am particularly looking forward to meeting Michael Edwards at the signing for his new book American Legends. Expect lots of samples, free drinks, and convivial conversations with fellow fragrance enthusiasts. Check out the afterparty on Saturday evening if you can. Last year I witnessed Jeremy Fragrance doing push ups in the middle of a room for no discernible reason. I hear he is looking for a wife. Perhaps I will charm him and this time next year I will be Mrs. Fragrance.

Muse is hosting a launch party salon for Zernell Gillie’s Jazz. Gillie will introduce his newest creation and discuss the connections between music and fragrance. He may even dj a set for the party. Thursday, December 5th from 6-9PM. Dress code is “holiday festive;” tickets are $10.

Not fragrance related but definitely worth checking out: Lynn Yaeger is hosting a closet sale at Screaming Mimi’s vintage from 5-8PM on Friday, December 6th. Expect a bounty of rare antique, vintage, and designer pieces from this fashion legend.

The Oddities Flea Market returns Saturday, December 7th from 11AM to 6PM. While the focus of the market is on art and antiques, there are usually a few fragrance vendors there as well, typically (though not exclusively) with a witchy/occult bent. Might be a good break during the third day of ScentXplore. Tickets are $30 for 1PM entry or $60 for early entry starting at 11AM.

A second event at Stéle this week, this time it’s the launch party for Mabelle O’Rama’s Phoenix Flame on Sunday, December 8th from 6 to 8PM.

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Also on December 8th, Leonora Zoninsein will lead another fragrance composition workshop at Olfactory Art Keller at 1PM.

Speaking of Olfactory Art Keller, their excellent fall show Missense featuring works by Maxwell Williams and Sean Raspet is on view until December 21st.

Next Tuesday, December 10th, from 5 to 7PM Scent Bar is hosting an event with French fragrance house D’Orsay highlighting their extrait collection. This event has yet to be announced (a Scent Bar employee told me about it when I stopped in earlier today), so consider this a SMELL WORLD EXCLUSIVE !!

Stéle is hosting an event with Arquiste next Thursday, December 12th from 6-8PM. I’ve been told Carlos Huber and Rodrigo Flores Roux will be in attendance.

HEART is hosting a launch party for Are.na’s 2025 book, Document. Copies of the book will be available along with drinks and readings. Friday, December 13th from 7-9PM.

Arabelle Sicardi is co-hosting a Sample Swap alongside Sable and Tynan of Smell Ya Later on Saturday, December 14th from 6 to 9PM in Williamsburg. This should be a swap with tons of great options. They are also offering a decanting station for additional fragrance sharing.

Finally, The Fragrance Alliance Network has a ton of classes and events coming up this month. If I were not already double-booked I would check out the Origins of American Perfumery class on December 7th.

That’s all for now! I will definitely make an appearance at many of these events, awkwardly avoiding eye contact while I yap about chypres or whatever and handing out business cards with my Substack info because that’s networking, baby!

There’s already plenty of good information out there about how to get into fragrance as a hobby and enjoying perfume as a beginner that I don’t want to repeat. My goal here is to share some fundamental advice that anyone can follow to start appreciating their sense of smell more fully.

I want to note that all of the advice herein does not require you to buy anything. Though I am an avid perfume collector I also firmly believe that you can love and appreciate fragrance without amassing a collection. A lot of the aforementioned advice includes tips about what to buy and how, which, again, I don’t think needs to be repeated.

Start paying attention to how things smell

It’s literally that easy. You can stop reading now. Just go out there and smell everything.

When you’re out in the world take a second to observe the smells around you. You’d probably notice if you walked by a bakery that was pumping out delicious morning pastries, right? You might even stop for a minute to enjoy it. Start treating every moment as an opportunity to engage your sense of smell. How does the air smell while you’re walking through a local park? Go back to the same spot on a later day and notice how it smells different from your previous visit. Think about how the air changes throughout the seasons: what smells are dominant in fall versus winter? Spring versus summer? Everyone’s house smells different. How does your best friend’s house smell? How does your mom’s house smell?

A sub point of this principle that I want to emphasize is:

Don’t Shy Away From Any Opportunity to Cultivate Your Olfactive Prowess

No matter how disagreeable, even bad smells can be an opportunity to exercise your olfactive powers. Walking by some particularly gross garbage? How would you describe it? How does it smell different from the garbage down the street?

I live in New York City—the land of freely-strewn garbage—so this is the easiest example to draw on from my personal experience, but if you live elsewhere you surely have scenarios particular to your locale: maybe you live in the land of traffic jams or abundant horse shit or in close proximity to a paper mill. Any stink-portunity is fair game.

Once, I was trapped on the subway sitting next to a guy who smelled absolutely awful. Rather than shy away from him, or resign myself to passively stewing in his stink, seething and wishing I was elsewhere, I faced the situation head on and used it as an exercise in describing smell:

I guess this is, like, a mindfulness cultivation kind of thing, which is kind of corny, but it works. Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, it’s an opportunity to exercise your nose.

Get to know the smells around you

The easiest way to do this is to dive into your kitchen spice cabinet. Sniff all your herbs and spices. Which ones seem similar? If you’re having trouble describing any of them beyond “spicy”, pick up a few and compare them to each other. Try cardamom, coriander, and cinnamon. Perfumers categorize spice smells as “warm” or “fresh”. Which spices would you describe as warm? Which ones would you say are fresh? Which have aspects of both categories? Comparisons can be one of the best ways to learn different facets of a fragrance. How does red pepper smell compared to black pepper? How does fresh basil smell compared to dried basil? Vanilla is one of the trendiest notes in commercial perfumery right now. If you have a bottle of vanilla extract give it a sniff so you understand what it smells like. Even better, if you have real vanilla extract and artificial vanilla extract, compare them to each other. Which one is sweeter? Which one smells more “perfume-y”?

Give other things in your kitchen a sniff. Tea can have a particularly complex scent all on its own—how would you describe it? If you have a bag of Earl Grey you can learn to recognize the smell of bergamot, a type of citrus fruit that is very commonly used in perfumery.

Arabelle Sicardi wrote up a nice post with similar advice, using citrus as an example. Even with a simple orange you have several opportunities to cultivate your sense of smell. Cut the orange open. Peel off a bit of the rind. How does the peel smell compared to the flesh of the fruit? Which is sweeter? Which parts would you describe as “sharp” or “tart” or “bitter”?

Move beyond the kitchen. Give any wood furniture you have a sniff. Smell your leather jacket. Smell things in your environment that you wouldn’t consider particularly fragrant.

In addition to collecting perfume, I also collect taxidermy. I have a taxidermy flamingo that is one of the highlights of my menagerie. It also happens to smell fabulous and I dream of having a perfumer recreate its scent. The flamingo smells like: wood wool (dry wood, a little cedar-y, like a pencil), dust, and something clean but a little animalic, a bit like cat fur. Sniff all the things in your house you’d never think to smell.

Find your oldest book. Fan its pages open and inhale. “Old book smell” is often cited as a favorite fragrance. What does it smell like? A bit dusty and woody, perhaps. Maybe a bit tannic like the tea in your cupboard. Depending on how old the book is it might even smell a little bit like vanilla. Vanillin is an aroma molecule present in natural vanilla that can be synthesized from the lignins in wood pulp for use in perfumery and flavoring.

Write down your observations about the fragrances around you, or record them as voice notes. Keep track of what you like and don’t like. Think about why you like or don’t like particular smells.

Which brings me to my next point:

Think About How to Describe Smells

Professional perfumers and other people working in the fragrance industry have a shared vocabulary that they work from when describing fragrances. For the first year or so of perfume school students basically just smell things and describe them. There are classes where you can get an overview of how to talk about fragrance using this framework. Or if you want to explore it on your own there are resources that can guide you.

A shared vocabulary is required for the categorical precision that is necessary to produce a commercial fragrance, or to understand and contextualize the historic evolution of perfumery over time, but you don’t have to limit yourself to describing fragrance using this vocabulary. It can be helpful if you want to approach fragrance academically, but it can also be rather limiting when it comes to expression.

Maybe you are completely uninterested in describing fragrance with words; you just want to experience it—that’s totally understandable (even a bit admirable), in which case you can feel free to skip this section.

A lot of fragrance writing/“content” is really just a regurgitation of the notes that a marketer delineates for a given perfume, as though “X smells like A,B,C” is the endpoint of critical analysis for fragrance. This is boring and exemplifies the cultural moment we live in where an unambiguous explanation of any particular work of art is considered a requirement to appreciating it—if art cannot be fully exculpated it is considered “bad” (see for example: the thousands Youtube explainer videos entitled “[NAME OF FILM] Ending Explained” as further evidence of this phenomenon). I want to dig into this a bit more in a separate post, but I think this effect is part of the reason why gourmands are so popular right now. A perfume that smells like vanilla candy and says that it smells like vanilla candy right on the bottle is easy to describe literally, which is comfortable for people who need unambiguous interpretation to enjoy an artistic or aesthetic experience. It’s easy to understand and describe a vanilla cupcake gourmand in a way that it is not for, say, a complex aldehydic floral. Chanel No. 5, for example, is classified as a floral perfume but it doesn’t smell like a bouquet of flowers. Its olfactory objective isn’t to smell like a composite of the individual floral notes that are described in its marketing.

The elusive nature of describing scent can be a playground for expression—it is an invitation to lean into the incomprehensible in a world that demands everything be comprehensible. Maybe you want to approach fragrance from a more emotional place. Many fragrances elicit some sort of emotional response, and approaching the boundaries of expression and critique using that response as a starting point can be more interesting than straightforward description. Treating quotidian scents as subjects of critique can alleviate the impulse to rely on literalism when it comes to describing fragrance, freeing you from the confines of notes and categories (though, again, they have their place when it comes to contextualizing perfume).

Some Examples of Expressive Fragrance Writing

One of my favorite fragrance writers is Kashina, whose work is collected in several volumes published by Antifurniture, including her recent release Messages from a Dark Room. Her ongoing scent journal is also available through her Instagram account. Kashina’s writing tends towards the figurative and imagistic, full of personal associations, poetics, and observations. She writes equally evocatively about perfume and scents she encounters in nature:

The Instagram account @itsmellscrazyinhere is primarily regarded as an avenue for entertainment of the “gawking and staring” type, but it often reveals a higher truth about a fragrance than any literal description of its notes as dictated by a marketing department can. Many of these “unhinged” musings are quite expressive, narratively-rich, even poetic:

If poetics and weird narratives aren’t your thing, I recommend checking out Audrey Robinovitz/@foldyrhands—another favorite fragrance writer of mine. Audrey’s reviews go into deep dive reviews that are often full of allusions to history, literature, and philosophy, demonstrating how we can contextualize the olfactory within other disciplines:

eat your lipstick

La Mort en Rose: Myroblysic perfume, Thérèse of Lisieux, and the blessed odor of sanctity

I wrote about perfume and spirituality on this blog for the first time almost exactly a year ago. My concerns then were of scent’s relation to ritual, and the ways in which perfume presents a habit of being to my own life. Needless to say, not only have I lived with the perfumes I wrote about then more profoundly, but I have also made the smell of incen…

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2 years ago · 37 likes · 3 comments · audrey robinovitz

eat your lipstick

my favorite perfumes: diorissimo

in the beginning, there was the word, and the word was with dior, and the word was dior. i consider the notorious french house to comprise a third of classical perfumery’s haute couture designer triumvirate. alongside chanel and yves saint laurent, most of the stylistic innovations to have occurred in the landscape of twentieth century mass-market perfu…

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2 years ago · 38 likes · audrey robinovitz

Beyond the Pleasure Principle, Haloscope, https://www.haloscope.org/post/beyond-the-pleasure-principle

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Approach commercial fragrance with an exploratory mindset

These fundamentals to cultivating an appreciation for the olfactory should keep you going for a good long while, perhaps even forever! But maybe you’re like, “Quinn, I didn’t ask you about how to get into fragrance so I could hear some hippie dippy bullshit about smelling a pineapple or whatever, tell me about PERFUME!”

Even if you want to get into Fragrance with a capital F so you too can become a perfume snob, the process is still basically the same: smell everything you can get your hands on and be thoughtful about it.

Here’s some advice for aspiring fragheads specifically:

Go to places where you can smell lots of fragrances in one spot

For most people, this will probably entail a visit to a department store, Sephora, or Ulta. If you’re lucky you might live in a city with an independently-owned perfume store as well.

On the plus side, most places have bottles out on display so anyone can browse and sniff at their leisure, which is much less stressful than having to ask a sales associate to spray every fragrance you want to try. However, a good sales associate can be helpful if you want a little guidance. The maxim used to be that the sales people at the perfume counter often were not interested in perfume themselves and only really knew the points of the sales pitch they were supposed to give customers rather than any general knowledge about perfume, but I find that is less true nowadays. (One humorous exception: I recently went into a fragrance shop at the mall near where I work and when the sales associate asked me what kind of scents I like I told her that I like vintage-smelling, classic fragrances and she immediately suggested Black Opium lol).

I usually don’t feel like talking to anyone so I try my best to seem as unapproachable as possible if I can be left to my own devices at a store (obviously this isn’t an option in a counter service situation). Since our goal here is exposure and surveying the olfactive landscape rather than finding one specific fragrance to buy, you don’t really need a plan of attack, you can just start sniffing. However, if you are the type of person who is easily overwhelmed or likes to undertake new experiences methodically, here are a couple different approaches you can take:

One approach: start at a department store and smell all the classics you can get your hands on. You might have a few names in your head just from ambient exposure: Chanel No. 5, Guerlain Shalimar, Mugler Angel, etc. You can save a list of classic fragrances ahead of your visit if you want something to ground your exploration in. A lot of classic/vintage fragrances might smell very similar or the same to you at first, with repeated exposure over time you’ll notice differences between them, sort of like how you need to try multiple wines or craft beers before they start to differentiate on your palate. It can be a fun challenge to pick out the differences between similar fragrances.

Another approach, one which requires talking to people: again, start at a department store. Ask the sales associates at each of the little branded fragrance kiosks if you can smell the brand’s oldest fragrance, their newest fragrance, and their most popular fragrance. This will hopefully give you an idea of the range within a brand so you can determine if you want to explore it more fully and expose you to lots of different brands without getting too overwhelmed trying to smell every single offering.

One more approach: pick a particular note or type of fragrance that you are interested in, say, “rose” or “woody” and head over to the fragrance store of your choice. Smell all the fragrances you can find that match your chosen criteria. Sephora has little labels by all their fragrances that give them a basic categorization which can help guide you. If there isn’t any signage describing fragrance notes at the store of your choice (or other obvious indicators like the word “rose” in the name of the fragrance), this is another instance where a sales associate can be of help. This approach is especially helpful if you want to learn to recognize how smells from your environment have been interpreted through perfumery.

Sephora used to be great for surveying perfume and had plenty of classics that would be of interest to a newcomer. They still have some of the stalwarts, but now their fragrance department has mostly been taken over by venture capital-backed faux niche influencer slop that I frankly don’t find very interesting or illuminating. And they don’t even give you free samples anymore. Maybe you’ll love ‘em but if I were you I would focus on the classics first.

Whatever your approach and wherever you start sniffing, remember to bring a pen with you so you can label your blotters and remember what they are when you smell them later. Fragrances often smell very different in a store vs. in the open air simply because a store is loaded with competing aromachemicals bouncing around interfering with your sense of smell. This is more apparent in smaller stores than larger ones, but it happens anytime you have a ton of people all spraying perfume at the same time in the same place. Even if you don’t want to keep your favorite blotters for long, at least bring them outside so you can smell them in fresh air. I think you should keep your blotters until they completely dry out so you can experience the full spectrum of a fragrance from its opening through the drydown to its base. Whenever I’m sampling a bunch of fragrances in a store I just throw all the blotters in my bag, which can muddle them a bit but they’re usually fine when I get home and separate them. You can also bring glassine envelopes with you so you can separate your blotters and prevent them from contaminating each other. This will also slow down the drying process, allowing you to revisit a scent for much longer than you would otherwise be able to.

Smelling new fragrances is fun, but make sure to revisit scents you’ve previously smelled. As you become more immersed in fragrance your tastes will change over time. Write down observations about what you’ve smelled and review them later with a fresh nose. Over time you’ll find you have more to add. Draw connections between the smells in your environment and those in the perfume aisle. Note: it’s just as important to learn what you don’t like as it is what you do. This is how you cultivate taste and, as described above, smelling unpleasant things can be just as evocative and interesting as smelling pleasant scents. This notion applies to commercial perfumery just as much as it does to environmental smells.

Go Forth and Smell

My point here is that appreciating your sense of smell opens up a whole new way of experiencing the world, creating a new avenue to interact with it in a way that is distinct from the visual, auditory, and tactile. However you decide to engage with it, in whatever degree, encountering and contemplating the olfactory will enrich and enhance your life.

A fragrance can “smell niche” and not fit the technical, real definition of the word (i.e. a brand that solely sells fragrances rather than a variety of other products). Something can “smell niche” within any fragrance category (mass, designer, indie, etc). Often you’ll read “this smells niche” on various fragrance forums and at face value it’s a nonsensical statement, but one that is used as a kind of short hand to mean a fragrance that is fairly linear and doesn’t smell like one of the fragrance families that traditionally dominates department stores such as a fruity-floral (for feminine fragrances) or a “blue” freshie (for masculine fragrances).

I assume most of the people making this statement are young and haven’t been into fragrance for very long, so I’m definitely not trying to dunk on them. Previously only exposed to department store fragrances, they lack the vocabulary for identifying specific families, notes, textures, materials, or other characteristics that would typically be used to describe a perfume. They will probably learn different ways of describing smells as they continue to engage with fragrance. Or maybe this phrase, like “grandma”/”old lady” before it will join the series of neologisms that change how we describe and classify fragrance! Maybe I am wrong and out of touch!

I think the first comment above is the closest to describing this “niche scent” profile that is emerging: warm, spicy, ambery, woody, vanillic—a type of amber fragrance that might have been a base decades ago but now is offered as a complete fragrance composition as tastes have turned away from the complexity of classically-structured fragrances towards a more linear scent profile. Ironically, many of the “this smells niche” comments specify that the fragrance in question shouldn’t smell “synthetic” but to my nose this scent profile smells extremely synthetic. “Amber” is a fantasy accord after all1, although it can certainly be constructed from natural ingredients, and the woods and vanilla in this type of fragrance are usually synthetic conceits as well. Obviously most fragrances contain a blend of synthetic and natural ingredients, but this specific type of ambery fragrance always smells particularly chemically to my nose.

These types of scents are not just spicy ambers; however. There are plenty of spicy ambers out there that don’t smell like this—there are subtle qualities that are present across the scents I’m speaking of. The texture is somewhat waxy or doughy, rather than powdery or sticky like classic ambers such as Youth-Dew can be. The vanilla sweetness has a burned sugar quality to it rather than the slight woody element a natural vanilla imparts with its pod. The spicy notes are always warm and sweet as well, with cinnamon being a common component as well as cardamom (which I think is technically classified as a fresh spice, but also has a warm aspect to it). Beyond the olfactory qualities there’s another defining quality that comes from their marketing—a fragrance that is perhaps a bit too “aware” of itself and its audience; a bit too in-tune with the zeitgeist of PerfumeTok and various influencers and trends.

This brings me to the new Creed releases, Centaurus and Delphinus, which I got my hands on through a friend who was mysteriously sent samples of them in the mail even though she hates perfume and has never even heard of Creed let alone purchased anything from them.

Both fragrances are centered around a “spice-amber-vanilla” synthetic chemical bomb. Both come off as rather plasticy to my nose and seem to contain a fuck-ton of heliotropin. Delphinus is supposed to smell like iris, incense, and vanilla, according to the notes listed on Fragrantica. The Creed website lists some additional notes as well. If it contains any real orris butter I will eat my shoe. I detect a cherry cough drop note in there along with the amber. Centaurus has some warm spices and tobacco along for the plastic amber ride. Overall, they’re both sweet, will last forever and barely change over the course of wear (thus appealing to the performance-obsessed crowd), avoid any divisive or controversial notes and are adjacent to recent trends (cherry, vanilla), and are familiar enough that they’ll appeal to a wide swath of consumers.

In short, the Creed release seems precisely engineered to appeal to the consumer who wants to “smell niche”. A perfect example of the thought contained behind the expression.

Fragrance conferences can be a bit of a mixed bag, in my limited experience (I’ve only been to one, the 2023 edition of ScentXplore). The good: you get to sniff a ton of new shit before it gets launched, which is exciting and special; you can talk directly with founders/creative directors/perfumers/other industry people, either as reps for specific brands or just hanging around at the event; there are samples galore—I am still going through samples I received at ScentXplore nine full months after the event; and perhaps best of all, a conference is an opportunity to hang out with other fragrance fans and yap about your favorite hobby without anyone’s eyes glazing over. The bad: these events can be overwhelming—I went nose-blind many times at ScentXplore; too much of a good thing can make you a bit cynical about the industry—I found myself growing despondent smelling a bajillion oud+rose and ambery vanilla gourmand fragrances one after another; the evidence of chasing trends rather than pursuing artistry is on full display when you’re in the presence of hundreds of fragrances in one place. There are also a bunch of influencers wandering around doing goofy things and sometimes getting in the way or monopolizing a booth, which can be a bad thing or a good thing depending on your perspective (it’s good people watching, at the very least).

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Why Fragranze?

Better-informed fragrance friends tell me that Fragranze is the fragrance conference. If you can only go to one, this is the one to hit up. The curation is apparently above and beyond other exhibitions, which certainly seems true based on the exhibitors list on their website. There are a ton of favorites on here: Tauer Perfumes, Jorum Studio, Headspace, etc. And plenty of new-to-me entrants I can’t wait to check out: Réserve en Afrique (from Senegal), Mendittorosa (I’m a sucker for a weird cap), Bienaimé (I love a historic revival), just to name a few.

The fragrance curation is certainly the top reason for attending Fragranze, but there are plenty of other draws calling one there. For example, the event is held in a cool old train station:

Way more gorgeous than any stateside event center. Also, Florence itself is a great city for a fragrance enthusiast—it’s where Santa Maria Novella hails from, after all.

See you there?

I applied for press credentials for Pitti Fragranze on a whim and to my surprise I was approved as a Member of the Press. The last step for obtaining them is submitting an application, which includes a link to an article about the exhibition, hence this post. I am hopeful that this time ten days from now I’ll be traipsing around Italy living out some sort of Dolce Vita fantasy.

If you’re going to Fragranze 24 please let me know! Let’s meet up and traipse together.

More soon <3

Anyway, since my intellectual writer is on strike I hired a dumb bitch scab to churn this out so I don’t end up going two whole months without publishing anything! Enjoy!

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Swaps Are Having A Moment

Ahead of the latest installment of Emma Vernon of Perfume Room Pod’s summer fragrance swap on Thursday night, HighSnobiety published an article hailing the rise of fragrance swapping. I also previously published an article describing the joy of connection and discovery that fragrance swaps facilitate. In the time since publishing my previous article, I’ve attended several in-person fragrance swaps and they’ve all been a delight.

Swaps are having a moment because fragrance is surging in the market and will likely continue to. We need to keep producing more and more stuff and everyone needs to buy more and more of it or else the whole thing collapses; fragrance is just one of the latest categories to be captured by this dynamic. This is sad, yes, but it also means that there is a wide world of gems to be found on secondary markets after the shine wears off and one must move on to the next new thing. We’re living in a fabulous garbage dump. The swap is a non- (or at least semi-) consumerist outlet for what is essentially a consumerist hobby and that fact cheers me.

As abundant fragrance consumption continues, swaps will likely proliferate and evolve. The last couple swaps I participated in, including the one hosted by Emma et al. on Thursday, already had a bit of a different character than the first one I went to: they had multiple co-hosts, a wine company sponsored free drinks, and the participants, once solely relegated to fragrance enthusiasts, also included industry people and independent perfumers. It was a capital E Event rather than just an event.

The swap was co-hosted by Vernon, the aforementioned photographer Liz Renstrom, and beauty editors Jen G. Sullivan and Alexandra Pauly. It was already in full swing when I arrived wearing my Britney Spears Midnight Fantasy tee shirt, which was a huge hit.

The swap was held at the LES Susan Alexandra boutique, a cute space that is unfortunately pretty narrow. Participants crowded around the table housing all the swappable fragrances, eager to sniff everything available. As I mentioned in my previous article, a swap is an opportunity to show off your impeccable taste and that certainly held true at Thursday’s event. There were some absolutely astounding frags up for grabs: an original bottle of D.S. & Durga’s Cowboy Grass (a future collector’s item for sure!), a full bottle of Initio’s just-released Oud for Greatness Neo (someone definitely got this at the press event last month lol), niche houses Masque Milano, LilaNur, Ffern, Borntostandout, Boy Smells, Obvious Parfums, Andrea Maack, Parfums de Marly, and Juliet Has A Gun were all represented, along with designer frags from Miu Miu, Dior, Ferragamo, YSL, Calvin Klein, and more. Someone brought a comically-large bottle of Tom Ford’s Beau de Jour. At least two perfume professionals added their brands to the mix: Brianna Lipovsky from the equestrian-inspired niche darling Maison D’Etto distributed full bottles of her current lineup to select guests, samples of Noisette to everyone, and spritzes of an upcoming release that hasn’t been announced yet. Noah Virgile also offered up two releases from his up-and-coming indie label Amphora Parfum: Primal Yell and Sublimate.

If I was better at my job as an intrepid fragrance reporter I would have taken pictures of all of these, but I’m not so you will have to use your imagination. The swarm around the table was a bit chaotic but somehow it all worked out.

I offered up a bottle of Chris Collins’s African Rooibos. I actually picked it up at a previous swap hosted by my friend Rachel Ann Reading, a fragrance tour guide and collector with incredibly encyclopedic perfume knowledge, who is quoted in the HighSnobiety article. The aforementioned Noah Virgile was the bottle’s previous owner. When he saw the bottle, he remarked that he brought African Rooibos to a previous swap and I had to sheepishly tell him that it was, in fact, his bottle of African Rooibos and made a joke about the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. African Rooibos is a fragrance that I like, but after wearing it a couple times I realized that I don’t want a full bottle of it. I already had a sample of it from Luckyscent that is about two years old and was still half full, so I filled the sample up and decided to pass the bottle on to someone else. We shall see if the new owner decides to keep it or if it will make an appearance at the next swap event.

I picked up a bottle of Bond No. 9’s Chinatown, which was on my full-bottle-worthy list for a while. Bond No. 9 is a brand that I generally kind of ignore because they have, like, 200 fragrances and I have no idea where to even start with them. Also their bottles are ugly. But! Luca Turin gave Chinatown five stars in The Guide, it’s a tuberose frag, and the perfumer is Aurelien Guichard, so it made it onto my list of fragrances to seek out.

Chinatown is a gorgeous floral perfume that has a spiciness to it that is both warm and fresh. I’ve heard it described as smelling like a “lacquered medicine cabinet” and that description sort of fits, but the florals in it add a delicacy (peony and orange blossom) and a carnality (tuberose and gardenia) that transform it into something wholly different from other fragrances of the spicy-medicinal genre such as the original Comme des Garçons fragrance or Diptyque’s L’Eau. The floral notes bring something both botanical and human to the composition and the dry-down has a skin-like peachy muskiness to it that gives it a lived-in feel. It’s the kind of thing you should wear to have sex in the middle of a humid summer afternoon, lazing about afterward by an open window as a light breeze wafts the saltiness of your sweaty skin into the spices of the perfume.

At the swap, I was talking to Emma about the fragrance I had picked up and she remarked, “you always go for the discontinued fragrances.” To which I exclaimed, “Chinatown is discontinued!?!?” It’s not (thankfully) and she meant that I tend to gravitate towards older releases at these events, which is true. As I wrote previously, at her first swap I picked up the EDP version of Chanel No. 5, which has become one of my default fragrances when I’m going to a party—it’s assertive enough to cut through throngs of people and unusual enough in a sea of cool niche-wearing 20 and 30-somethings that it feels distinct even though in another context it might be boring or expected. It also mixes well with cigarette smoke.

At a previous swap hosted by Emma and Liz this winter I did pick up two fragrances that are actually discontinued: Shalimar Eau de Cologne and Tubereuse Organique. 

Shalimar Eau de Cologne is discontinued but it is available from some fragrance discounters online. It’s Shalimar for summer—the leather and powdery incense notes are toned down a bit but still present and the lower concentration gives it room to breathe so it works well in heat. Apparently the eau de cologne was made specifically for the American market and wasn’t available in other countries. Note that Shalimar EDC is NOT the same as Shalimar Cologne, which is also discontinued and has a significantly different scent profile compared to Shalimar in any concentration.

Christophe Laudumiel’s Tubereuse Organique, from his brilliant line The Zoo unfortunately ceased production last year. Tubereuse Organique is a fresh green-white floral that captures the light, snappy, slightly vegetal scent of tuberose in the air as though you are walking past a field of it in full bloom. The name is a cheeky little joke, as the twist of the fragrance is that it is meant to evoke the real smell of tuberose but does not contain any tuberose absolute—the scent profile for the flower is entirely deconstructed and then reconstructed to produce a fantasy of the reality of experiencing the flower in nature. This is often the case in perfumery (the majority of notes that are called out in fragrance descriptions are reconstructions to varying degree), but Laudumiel explicitly highlights that it is a simulacrum. He is a genius and I will greedily snatch up anything from The Zoo whenever I can get my hands on it (I have several eBay alerts set up).

As the swap on Thursday wound down and everyone had drunk their fill of complementary natural wine and had chosen a fragrance from the table, the hosts declared the rest of the fragrances fair game—anything left was up for grabs. Almost everything found a home and the table cleared quickly. I grabbed the bottle of Primal Yell by Amphora Parfum when I realized it was still on the table, thereby proving that I am also interested in collecting new shit too. I want to write a full post about Primal Yell because I have a lot of ideas about it, but for now I will say it is a metallic woody cherry labdanum delight over a purring animalic base and it exemplifies how electrifying and exciting indie perfumery can and should be.

The swap was a huge success. As Susan Alexandra closed up shop, guests lingered on the sidewalk out front, exclaiming over each other’s finds, exchanging contact info, already palpably excited for the next meet-up.

Incidentally, fragrance isn’t the only thing up on the swapping block this summer. Tonight I’m going to a book swap (it’s a private event so it will be somewhat different than most of the fragrance swaps I’ve attended). The swap is a category ripe for exploitation: scent swaps, book swaps, clothing swaps, swapping spit: let’s all do the swap. I’m here for all of it. Summer of swaps!

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Upcoming Events for NYC Fragheads

The Summer Swap marked the opening of a robust month of events in the NYC fragrance community:

Everyone’s new favorite store, Stéle in Williamsburg, is hosting an evening with the co-founders of Icelandic perfume brand Fischersund. The last time the Icelanders visited the US they incorporated poetry readings and performances alongside their fragrances, and I suspect there will be more of that at this event. Also free schnapps! Wednesday, August 7th from 6-8PM. Sign up for Stéle’s mailing list to RSVP.

Pioneering fragrance enthusiast group Sniffapalooza is hosting a virtual “master class” introducing NYC’s Fragrance Alliance Network on Tuesday, August 13th at 7PM. The event is free but signups are limited. The Fragrance Alliance is a new organization dedicated to fragrance education (sort of like the East Coast version of the Institute for Art and Olfaction).

Speaking of: The Fragrance Alliance Network has multiple upcoming classes in August, including fragrance creation workshops, digital strategy and content creation for fragrance brands and creators, candlemaking, and a series of aromatherapy classes. Check their calendar for details.

Leonora Zoninsein returns to Olfactory Art Keller on August 18th for her advanced scent composition workshop. The workshop is an extension of Zoninsein’s scent composition foundation workshop, so prior experience may be required to participate.

Marissa Zappas will host an evening of sensorial readings at the Salmagundi Club on August 21st. Featured writers and performers include: Ruby McCollister, Deborah Eisenberg, Ariana Reines, Bobbi Salvör Menuez, and Mackenzie Thomas. Drinks at 5:30, readings begin at 6:30. Get there early.

Arabelle Sicardi will host a virtual book club for Tom Robbin’s wild 1984 novel Jitterbug Perfume on August 24th. The event is open to paying subscribers of their Substack You’ve Got Lipstick On Your Chin and participants in their Perfume Pages writing group.

I will be at most of these events awkwardly handing out business cards with my Substack URL printed on them. Say hi if you see me!

There isn’t any scent that will make your hangover go away, but there are certainly scents that will make it worse (see every fragrance on this previous post). What we’re aiming for here is something that will not tax your senses any further and won’t turn your post-party headache into a full-blown migraine. Specific categories of fragrance you might want to avoid include:

• Big stinky classic chypres: Once I woke up with the tiniest headache from drinking a couple glasses of red wine with dinner. I put on about four sprays of Paloma Picasso and that tiny headache bloomed into a migraine by noon. J’ai regretté !

• Super sweet gourmands or gourmand-adjacents: Just the thought of wearing Pink Sugar or some marshmallow-rose concoction like Delina while hungover is making me nauseous.

•  Florals: even lighter florals tend to sharpen and feel more severe when you’re hung. Jasmine, rose, or other bold florals can be overbearing and headache-inducing. Anything indolic turns into a nauseating poop bomb.

• Powdery or musky notes: a rooty iris is borderline acceptable but a super powdery one? Blech, no.

Honestly, this is a scenario where almost all of my favorite perfumes are off the table. So what’s on the table (aside from those sticky wine glasses you couldn’t bother to clean up at the end of the night)? Woods. Particularly soft woods. This is the time to bring out your calming, creamy sandalwoods. Also, cooling, aromatic herbs like mint and rosemary and maybe a little citrusy pick-me-up if you’re not too far gone.

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I’ve been partying a bit more than usual recently and I’ve been quite lucky to somehow avoid hangovers despite doing everything completely wrong. The other day I met up with some friends in the early evening and proceeded to drink like 6 beers outside in the sun after not eating anything but a large popcorn and Diet Coke at a movie theater several hours earlier. I didn’t even drink any water when I got home. I just fell asleep and miraculously awoke the next day completely fine aside from a bit of rebound anxiety (wondering if everyone liked my karaoke rendition of Patsy Cline’s Walking After Midnight). God has smiled upon me and I am truly blessed.

So, in hope of maintaining my good party karma, I present to you my favorite hangover fragrance choices. I’ve grouped them by hangover intensity, so the first fragrances are appropriate for when you are mildly hung, and the later are for when you are essentially incapacitated. Any fragrance in the later categories is appropriate for the former, but use caution working the other way around—fragrances containing citrusy notes like those found in the first category can seem piercing and shrieky if you are in the thralls of a more intense hangover.

Hangover Intensity: Level 1

Slightly Hungover, basically fully-functional aside from some lethargy and mild ickiness

Eau de Cologne - Roger et Gallet

If you’re not too hungover, a fresh, bracing, citrusy traditional cologne can be just the thing to get you going the morning after a night of drinking. This type of fragrance is inherently ephemeral as well, usually only lasting a couple hours at most due to its low concentration of fragrance oils (around 2-5%) and the type of materials it typically contains, which have lower molecular weights meaning they will evaporate relatively quickly. The Roger et Gallet Eau de Cologne has a zippy citrus opening that is refreshing and light, which is helpful when you wake up and feel lethargic and slightly headache-y and need a little motivation to get out of bed. It also contains notes of rosemary and lavender, which are calming and reassuring. Since this type of fragrance is so ephemeral, you can move on to a more typical option (whatever that is for you) later in the day once you’ve fully recovered.

Other options: 4711 or Eau de Cologne Imperiale by Guerlain. There are many fragrances of this type (it’s a very old style of perfume, dating from the 18th century), and most of them are relatively similar.

Green Tea - Elizabeth Arden

Green Tea starts out citrusy and bright, which makes it a good “wake up” fragrance similar to a traditional Eau de Cologne. It also contains refreshing herbaceous mint and fennel notes and, of course, a soothing green tea accord for which the fragrance is named. It’s optimistic without being cloying or too bright. The Arden 90s-style “clean living” feeling is also a good psychological counter to any unsavory activities you may have participated in the night before, such as smoking cigs or doing bumps of ketamine on someone’s living room floor. It’s the perfect motivator to get you to your morning yoga class when you’re fence-sitting on whether or not you can make it. 

Another option: For a calming mint-green tea scent without the citrusy opening, try Roasted Green Tea by J-Scent. This one is actually more versatile than EA Green Tea since the citrusy notes are absent, so if you’re more-than-slightly hungover it will still work. It has a strong 90s vibe as well; I recall my older sister had a fragrance very similar to Roasted Green tea in the mid/late 90s but I have no idea what it was (maybe something from The Gap?). If you have any idea what it could be, please let me know in the comments!

Hangover Intensity: Level 2

Typically hungover, a moderate headache, dehydrated, mildly nauseous and anxious

Wonderwood - Comme des Garçons

This is my ideal hangover scent and the one I probably go to the most. It has never once given me a headache or made an existing one worse. Wonderwood is a grounding symphony of woody notes that are perfectly buoyant against a burgeoning hangover. The woods are bolstered by peppery spices that add interest and zing without going sharp or cloying the way citruses or florals can when you’re in a post-party state. The spices also add freshness and open up the composition, keeping it from feeling dense and claustrophobic, which I think makes it easy on the nose and your hungover brain. The incense-y base is also soothing and a good backdrop for reflecting on your late night shenanigans.

Another option: For a dark, moody wood scent that ups the incense, try Ebene Fume from Tom Ford. It is a wood extravaganza similar to Wonderwood, but the overall effect is somewhat more spiritual; perfect for reflecting upon What You Did Last Night and resolving to do better/never drink again. Wear it when you totally meant to go to church on Sunday but you’re just not gonna make it.

Petrichor - Marissa Zappas

Meditative and earthy with a dry, clay-like vetiver that wears relatively close to the skin. It’s the smell of baked earth after the rain when the ground has dried, with an ozonic, mineral freshness that will help settle your anxious brain and stomach. Perfect for a gray day of lazing in bed while you recover from too much fun the night before, nursing a tea and being doted on by your partner. You may be a degenerate party girl, but for a little while you can visit a serene pastoral landscape and soak into the earth.

Another option: For a grassy vetiver scent that’s a bit more woody and less earthy, try Mississippi Medicine by DS and Durga.

Escentric 01 - Escentric Molecules

Escentric 01 maintains the Zen-like vibe of the soft woody fragrances in the next category, but offers a bit more interest through some fresh-spicy notes. It opens with a pink pepper note that’s a little zingy and metallic, and gradually matures into an iris-tinged wood that stays nice and soft without going powdery. This is a close-wearing skin scent that won’t radiate too far from your skin, which is ideal when your nervous system is overwhelmed by a hangover. 

Another option: Try Juniper Sling by Penhaligon’s for a similar aromatic skin scent that keeps the fresh spiciness of Escentric 01’s opening but forgoes the woody ISO-e Super base and adds a smidge of sweetness to round out the composition. It’s also very short-lived so it’s a good choice if you’re unsure if you can handle an all-day fragrance.

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Hangover Intensity: Level 3

Puking in the bathroom, head in a vice-like grip, extreme hangxiety, actively wishing for a lobotomy/death

Santal du Pacifique - Perris Monte Carlo

The olfactory equivalent of someone petting your hair and whispering, “shh, shh, it’s going to be okay.” Santal du Pacifique is the softest, most comforting sandalwood scent. Perfectly balanced between dry and creamy with a light touch of salty savoriness that keeps the composition from becoming too powdery. The wood here is the star—all other notes just bring out different facets of the sandalwood. The overall effect is neutral and buoyant, perfect as an antidote to the anxiety that often accompanies the morning after a night of drinking.

Another option: For a sandalwood showcase that leans creamier, try Santal Complet by Fragrance du Bois. A small caveat applies if you’re particularly sensitive to vanilla or amber notes, as this fragrance contains both and as such might veer a little too sweet for hangover territory, depending on your own perception of such scents. If you can get into a coconut-sandalwood vibe without the sunscreen connotations or overt tropicality, this might be for you.

Papyrus Oud 71 - Parle Moi de Parfum

Don’t let the name fool you, this contains zero oud or oud-adjacent notes. It is a light, calming, spa-like papery wood fragrance. A perfectly sedate rendering of an empty sauna room or sweat lodge. It is absent of anything that could become cloying, intense, or challenging. Balanced and serene—an environment of support and recovery. Parle Moi de Parfum was founded by the perfumer Michel Almairac’s large adult son, and apparently this is essentially a recreation of Almairac’s Gucci Pour Homme from 2003, which is now discontinued and commands a hefty sum on eBay.

Another option: Try Universal Flowering’s Daddy for a similar savory, airy wood scent to Papyrus Oud 71 that leans a little more “antique store” than “spa”. Daddy is a beautiful soft Hinoki wood supported by a subtle earthiness that gives it a bit of mystery.

Drink some water, take some ibuprofen, and let me know what you wear when you’re hungover.

More soon <3

Though I didn’t choose them for their looks, lilies are rather striking. They have a primordial look to them, with their big fleshy blooms and stamen and pistils reaching out like antennae. The interiors of their petals are streaked with a watercolor swath of magenta and have rows of crenelations like teeth deep within the flower. They look like something out of the Jurassic era.

I bring the bundle of flowers home and chop off the bottoms of their stems so they’ll fit into my vase. I wonder if I should keep the stems as part of the bouquet—they have a kind of artichoke or fresh asparagus smell to them: bitter, green, and vegetal. The stems don’t fit in the vase so I toss them in the trash. The lilies are in various states of bloom: a few are fully open, a couple are on their way to blooming, and several are still fully closed. The closed blooms look like little alien pods. Like if I lean in too close they will burst open, spitting a corrosive acid that will dissolve my face. The smell of the blossoms is heady, green, and damp, a humid echo of the flowers’ native environment, as if they are calling back to their home. It’s sweet and rich mixed with something that smells a bit indolic and bathroom-y.

The smell of the bouquet doesn’t change much over the course of the week. At times it becomes stronger, sweeter and more redolent. As the flowers wilt they lose some of their scent but they don’t seem to produce any novel fragrances over the course of their decay, perhaps because the wilted flowers are quickly replaced with new blooms that dutifully open one after another every few days.

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Throughout the week I become more aware of the scents around me. Living in a tiny, ancient apartment building means that space is always shared. Any sense of true privacy is illusory. The air around me is not my own and there are constant reminders of the neighbors, creating a bouquet of intermingled olfactions that continuously shift over the course of the day. Cooking smells are the most prevalent: simmering garlic and herbs, sautéing onions, savory meats, but mostly the comforting, nutty aroma of steamed rice. It snakes through my apartment at regular intervals throughout the day, mingling with my own scents.

Other shared scents are sporadic rather than quotidian. The smell of temple incense permeates the building throughout the year on special occasions that are foreign to me but familiar to the neighbors. One day, while the lilies are still in bloom, the scent of frankincense and benzoin floats through the kitchen window and into my living room, adding a rich, resinous base to the lilies’ floral fragrance. I google “holidays today” and I am directed to the website www.nationaltoday.com, which tells me every holiday that is currently happening. Scrolling through the list, I find BUDDHA DAY announced alongside Straw Hat Day, International Break the Glass Ceiling Day, National Senior Fraud Awareness Day, and Turn Beauty Inside Out Day—a day dedicated to “putting an end to the media’s self esteem breakers.” The website suggests I celebrate Buddha Day, also known as Vesak, by attending a Vesak ceremony at a Buddhist temple, committing to the five precepts of Buddhism, and/or giving to charity. I smile and wave when I pass a neighbor’s open door in the hallway, as little trails of incense curl from her entryway. Nationaltoday.com does not say whether or not it is polite to wish someone a happy Vesak so I decline to acknowledge the holiday.

Other smells can feel dangerous or alarming. Sometimes the scent of burning Joss paper floats through the halls, setting off smoke detectors. I emerge from my apartment and the neighbors greet me and assure me everything is alright as flames lick the side of a stainless steel bowl they use to contain the burning paper. Several buildings in the neighborhood have burnt down over the last few years, so being on high alert for fire does not feel overly cautious.

The intermingled smells are a mostly-pleasant reminder of our intertwined lives, of how we are all doing the same or similar things separately but together. At night, when I’m unable to sleep, I often picture everyone in the building nestled down in their beds, separated by walls and floors but safe and warm, comfortably drowsing together. I think of the neighbors on my floor, then the one below, all the way down to the ground floor, then to the buildings to the left and to the right, spreading out further and further across the whole city, a nest of sleeping people.

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Part of the workshop agenda included a couple quick writing exercises, using samples of fragrances Arabelle sent to each of us ahead of the first meeting. One of the exercises was a 15-minute free write articulating the notes of one of our sample fragrances as they appeared to us, describing the story the fragrance is trying to tell. I decided to write about Liis Floating, a fragrance I sampled previously and hated, as a challenge.

I started the exercise by thinking through what someone might like about Floating:

Why would someone like this?

It’s soft, comforting, easy, unchallenging, so light that it’s barely perceptible. It has an ease to it that feels familiar and comforting. It’s the smell of the functional fragrances that make up the heart of one’s daily scent experience, but that no one thinks about much, like laundry detergent and shampoo. It’s the smell of the background of everyday life—skin musk with a touch of fruity floralcy. It’s a perfume for someone who doesn’t want to smell like perfume.

Ok, that last line is a little salty. Also someone called out my description of it as “unchallenging” as a drag, and they’re not wrong even though I didn’t mean it that way in the moment and I don’t think a fragrance needs to be challenging to be good. Elizabeth Arden Green Tea is unchallenging and it’s a good fragrance, for example.

I will also note that I had severe skin allergies as a child and my family was relegated washing everything in unscented detergents so I wouldn’t break out in a full body rash, so perhaps I never personally made the positive associations between laundry musk and comfort that other people have, predisposing me to writing off these types of scents.

Next, I moved on to describing the notes of the fragrance through a little story:

You lean into the neck of your beloved to smell her sunwarmed, still-sleepy skin as you slowly wake up on a Sunday morning. It’s ten AM and you have the whole day to laze about. The scent of the previous day’s shampoo in her hair is comforting and familiar. It’s the embodiment of the smell of a person as home. You cocoon yourselves into your freshly laundered duvet, into a cloud of warmth, a little pod of just the two of you, too cozy to get out of bed just yet.

Real notes: linen, peach, bergamot, wild orchid, sequoia

For contrast, here is the original review I wrote of Floating when I first tried it in February of last year:

An anemic whisper of grapefruit and dryer sheets. Hard pass.

It’s funny that the fruity notes in Floating read as “grapefruit” to me last year when I definitely got peach from it this time around. I will say this fragrance definitely needs the warmth of skin to bloom. On a blotter it has a dense, sour muskiness to it that’s almost reminiscent of unwashed bed sheets, and I think this sourness might have skewed my perception towards grapefruit rather than peach. On skin the fragrance develops a warm, airy, sunny fruity freshness that’s not unpleasant.

Anyway, both reviews are essentially two perspectives of the same experience. One through the eyes of a cozy-pilled optimist, the other through the eyes of a cold-hearted hater. It was an enlightening challenge to write positively about something that I don’t personally like, and if I gain nothing else from it, this technique will allow me to produce even stronger haterade in the future. “Know thy enemy” and so forth.

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A Smell Report from Frieze New York

A friend of mine worked the press admissions desk at Frieze this weekend and graciously put me on the list so I could get in for free. Since this Substack was the rationale for my tenuous classification as a member of the press, I figured a little write up of the event would be appropriate, even though there was no fragrance-related art at the show.

What does Frieze smell like? According to a party report from The Cut, it maybe smells like Byredo Mojave Ghost, the 10th anniversary of which was celebrated at a party at an exclusive bar just ahead of the art event. It is still unclear to me whether or not this event was officially connected with Frieze or merely attracted the same audience. Either way, Byredo’s arty-yet-corporate persona matches nicely with the vibe of Frieze, so it would not be out of place.

The actual art show itself has a scent profile common in gallery spaces—the crisp smell of paint, sawdust, and floor polish, the smell of construction, the blank slate that is created ahead of every show. It’s a scent that conjures creativity in its own right, and of the gallery as a vessel for the creativity of others as a temporary home for individual works of art. The smell of paint asserts itself as an industrial product in the space while olfactively supporting and reflecting the use of paint as a fine art medium in the works hung on the gallery walls (which we likely don’t smell any trace of). Maybe this is nonsense and I’m high on paint fumes right now.

I caught whiffs of other people’s perfume as I wandered through the galleries as well, adding little jolts of extra fragrance to the persistent olfactory backdrop. The people of Frieze smell like: tuberose, cardamom, leather, sandalwood, and black pepper.

I wore The Zoo’s Carré Blanc as an homage to the white box of the gallery space (the name literally translates to “white square” in English). Unfortunately this fragrance is discontinued, along with the rest of the line. The perfumer Christophe Laudumiel describes Carré Blanc as, “Whatever rocks your boat: green foliage, grapefruit, rhubarb, blond woods, hay, orris, tonka … Trust and confidence on the outside, calm and peace on the inside. By courteous etiquette, do not wear this on a plane, at the theater or anywhere where you might sit next to someone who doesn’t like you.” The warning is a courtesy—this is an exceptionally strong and tenacious fragrance. You cannot wash it off and it typically takes over a day to fade, even with a light application. It’s also one of the strangest fragrances I own: a shifting, totally synthetic symphony that’s so sharp you can feel it in your teeth, like melted plastic grapefruits on a bed of lipstick and hay, with a texture somewhere between TV static and oil slick, a contemporary work of fragrance art in and of itself.

I have a homework assignment to complete ahead of the next Perfumed Pages meeting, which should yield some interesting olfactory writing. I look forward to sharing it with you.

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Laura Pientka is the latest artist featured at the unique, fragrance-centric LES gallery Olfactory Art Keller. Pientka is a ceramicist; her installation consists of a gilded ceramic fountain in the shape of a large intestine, which continuously drizzles liquid chocolate into a bowl where it circulates in a pool that is viscerally off-putting yet tempting. The cloying smell of melted chocolate fills the small space of the gallery, its decadence both tantalizing and nauseating. On opening night, the artist provided a variety of cut fruits for visitors to skewer with toothpicks and dip in the chocolate fountain, a ritual familiar to anyone whose family received a fondue set in the 70s and dusted it off once a year to enjoy a messy chocolate feast. This nostalgic ritual lends an element of camp to the work and furthers the humorous push and pull between disgust and delight it elicits in the viewer. A sign near the fountain warns participants to eat the chocolate at their own risk. Later in the evening, someone tacked an addendum to the initial warning: “the chocolate is good and I feel fine”.

I did not eat the chocolate.

The gilding on the colon fountain and the pink shag carpet pedestal it’s placed on further the campy elements of the performance. The carpet came from the gallery’s previous exhibition, by photographer Elizabeth Renstrom entitled Basenote Bitch, which nostalgically celebrated late 90s teenage bedrooms and the fragrances found within them. It’s a happy coincidence that they could reuse the carpet for this work as it adds to both the bodily element of the sculpture (echoing our gooey pink innards) and the pastiche of a retro fondue party setting.

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A fragrance by Rachel Barfield titled “SHAME” accompanies the sculpture. The fragrance is designed to use bodily notes to explore a similar disgust/delight dichotomy as Pientka’s work. The opening of SHAME was so stomach-churning I had trouble initially identifying the notes I was smelling because I could scarcely sniff it before gagging and I did not want to make the gallerist, Andreas, mop up my puke. At first, I thought the olfactory effect might be something like dick cheese or sweaty ballsack, but when I thought about it later I realized that it’s the smell of infection and decay. It smells like the time my childhood dog rolled on a dead groundhog in the middle of the night then wandered around the house spreading tiny pieces of rotting flesh everywhere in her wake.

I will admit, I might be particularly susceptible to “bad smell” claims in marketing. I am one of those weak-willed pussies who can’t sniff the opening of Secretions Magnifiques without gagging, though once the blood and adrenaline accord dissipates I do find the remaining lactonic/aquatic floral pleasant.

The same disgust-to-delight pipeline found in Secretions Magnifiques is present in SHAME. Once the initial vile notes evaporate, the rest of the concoction is a lovely light musky floral. I get a bit of hyacinth, rose, something a bit stemmy and fresh. It's a bit like Cacharel’s Anaïs Anaïs crossed with Bruno Fazzolari’s Room 237.

The two works in the show complement each other nicely as an exploration of bodily excretions and the taboos that surround them. If you are in the neighborhood this weekend I highly recommend checking out the show.

Hopefully you’re braver than me and you’ll try the chocolate.

“Royal Flush” is on view at Olfactory Art Keller this weekend, from noon until 6:00pm daily through April 21st.

Post-script: I returned on the evening of Friday, April 19th to snap a couple photos for this review and was alone in the gallery with the artist. She encouraged me to try a piece of fruit with the chocolate and I felt like I couldn’t refuse, so I had a single chocolate-dipped grape. I apologized for touching the grapes with my hands when I couldn’t extract one from the bunch using only a toothpick, which in hindsight is quite funny.

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