09 Friday Nov 2018
Posted in Perfume Reviews
My latest post on Now Smell This is a review of Acide, a new perfume from Éditions M.R. I’ve paired this fragrance review with a review of C.O. Bigelow Body Lotion.
You can read the review here.
Image: Édouard Manet, Lemon, 1880. Musée d’Orsay.
06 Tuesday Nov 2018
Posted in Books and Scent
When a reporter named Greta Moran contacted me for an interview about perfume back in June, she asked how I came to be so passionate and involved in this subject. I constructed a short timeline of my fragrance obsession for her, partly just for my own entertainment. This week, as I’m preparing to take part in a panel discussion about fragrance and writing, I’m thinking again about early influences on my work.
Some of these influences, I’ve realized, have nothing to do with perfume per se but much to do with other memorable sensory experiences—or reading about sensory experiences. One example: a much-loved scene from Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited (1945)…
31 Wednesday Oct 2018
Posted in Perfume Bottles
Here’s an image of an antique German-made perfume bottle ornamented with a witch riding a crescent moon. (It was recently auctioned by Antiquefreak on Ruby Lane.)
Have a spell-binding Halloween!
30 Tuesday Oct 2018
Posted in Art and Scent
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“I am my own muse. I am the subject I know best.”
I’m currently reading Frida Kahlo: Making Myself Up, edited by Claire Wilcox and Circe Henstrosa and published by the Victoria & Albert in 2018. It’s the companion publication for the exhibition of the same name, open at the V&A through November 4, 2018.
This exhibition includes art by Kahlo and photographs of Kahlo taken by an international roster of photographers, some of whom were personal friends of the artist. Its main theme is Kahlo’s keen sense of self-presentation and her symbolically (and literally) layered self-fashioning, exemplified by rarely seen objects from Kahlo’s home in Mexico City—intimate possessions like clothing, accessories, jewelry, and cosmetics.
25 Thursday Oct 2018
Posted in Classes and Lectures
On Thursday, November 29, I’ll be teaching a class called “Show and Smell: Five Moments of Art and Fragrance” through the Brooklyn Brainery.
For more information, please see the Brainery website!
Image: Chen Jiayan (Chinese, 1539-1623 or later). Detail of One Hundred Flowers, dated 1629. Color on silk, 10 x 10 3/8in. (25.4 x 26.4cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the C. C. Wang Family Collection, 1997.185.18 (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)
24 Wednesday Oct 2018
Posted in Classes and Lectures
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Upcoming event: I’ll be participating in a panel discussion and workshop on fragrance writing, organized by The Perfumed Plume. It will take place in New York on November 7, 2018.
You can view the official invitation and a link to purchase tickets on the Perfumed Plume website. Many thanks to Lyn and Mary Ellen for inviting me to join this event!
22 Monday Oct 2018
Posted in Perfume Reviews
My latest post for Now Smell This is a review of Parfums de Nicolaï Neroli Intense Eau de Parfum and Thymes Neroli Sol Body Lotion. You can read it here.
17 Wednesday Oct 2018
Posted in Passing Fancies
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Reading: Catching up on my New Yorkers, and just starting Ali and Nino by Kurban Said.
Audio: The soundtrack from “A Star is Born” (with Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper) on Spotify. No shame.
Art: “It’s Alive! Frankenstein at 200“ at the Morgan Library
Video: Inspired by the above, planning to re-watch Ken Russell’s Gothic (1986)
Eats & Treats: Everything pumpkin spice!!!! Yes, I’m kidding. I’m not really a fan.
15 Monday Oct 2018
Posted in Advertising and Scent
“Discover JOY by Dior. Finally, joy is captured in a fragrance marked by enveloping softness and energy, all at once. An ode to pleasure, to life.” (via Dior website)
I smelled this fragrance in Sephora and couldn’t be bothered to request a sample. I don’t even think we’ve reviewed it on Now Smell This; apparently, none of the blog’s four writers could be bothered. That gives you a pretty good idea of the fragrance’s “energy.”
However, the print ads for Joy, featuring Jennifer Lawrence, have brought me back for a second look. Here’s Ms. Lawrence, damp hair pushed back and neck glistening with drops of water, emerging from some aquamarine ripples (a swimming pool? tropical sea?).
She could be a contemporary interpretation of the goddess Aphrodite, born from the ocean. She could be an evocation of an mermaid—oh, the whole seemingly never-ending mermaid trend!
Or she could be styled and photographed to evoke an older set of images of another celebrity…
