#american perfume

[pocketvenuslux]

Rihanna's Fenty came as a bit of a surprize to me. I'm not at all a fan of celebrity culture but I found Fenty to be a cut above the average celebuscent. Granted, at CA$185/75ml, it's also a fair bit more expensive than most celebuscents - but still more affordable than the luxury tier. Notably, the nose for Fenty is Jacques Cavallier, the Maître Parfumeur at Louis Vuitton whose past hits include L'Eau d'Issey, Classique (Gaultier), Noir de Noir (Ford), and a number of the Replicas (Margiela).

Fenty is fairly linear, so this opening of a candied, fruity floral rose with a hit of juicy tangerine, patchouli base and clean musks is pretty much what you'll get through the entire wear. However, this is not the saccharine, cliched fruity floral that one might expect. The sultry musk and depth of patchouli tempers the sweetness of the scent a great deal - there are no edges to take off. As well, the drydown does not degrade into a mess of suffocating laundry musks like so many designer scents do these days.

Fenty isn't a particularly daring wear, and despite the musk, it still skews young in my opinion. However, it's not harsh and brash like a lot of offerings I'm coming across these days that are being marketed to the same consumer segment. In terms of quality, it is better than a lot of what you'll find out there being released through more prestigious designer and niche houses. A surprizingly solid offering from Fenty that's worth testing if you are a fan of the genre.

[dollyangel1]

[nuveau-deco]

Favrile Glass Vinaigrette (Scent Bottle). Designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany, dated ca. 1900, made in Corona, New York, United States.

(Source: collection.artbma.org)

[peaceinthestorm]

Charles Courtney Curran (1861-1942, American) ~ The Perfume of Roses, 1902

[Source: americanart.si.edu]

[newwavesylviaplath]

just to add perspective

[future-crab]

It is actually so vital that any good playlist have a “I’m gonna die in this fucking town” interlude.

[ID: a screenshot of part of a playlist, showing Letterbomb by Green Day, followed by Kill All Your Friends by My Chemical Romance, followed by Drugstore Perfume by Gerard Way. End ID.]

[the-cricket-chirps]

Andy Warhol

Chanel N°5

ca. 1979-80

[maraschino-girl]

➳❥ Patrick Bateman Misc. Headcanons !!

✘ content warning: patrick being patrick !! ✘ 𖦹 had a morbidly obsessive interest in the human skin bound book, Des destinées de l'âme, in the Harvard University library. he couldn't read it, of course, but that didn't stop him from admiring it. 𖦹 he's extremely pissed he never had the chance to get into Studio 54 during its heyday. he tries for the successors, although they're not as iconic and void of all the genuine debauchery of the OG. 𖦹 adding onto the 'Kimball reflects light in his eyes' test theory, he also doesn't yawn when others do. slightly backed up by the novel only ever having him yawn first and never in response to others. 𖦹 he doesn't mention it, huge shocker, but we all know he loves the song 'Psycho Killer' by Talking Heads. 𖦹 watching Evil Dead 2 gave him some mighty fine inspiration for what to do with decapitated heads! 𖦹 movies he would adore: Slumber Party Massacre (1982), Videodrome (1983), Re-Animator (1985), Sorority House Massacre (1986), Prom Night (1980), Faces of Death (1978), Hud (1963), & Scarface (1983). 𖦹 he's the type to call a hue 'blood orange', 'evian blue', 'royal gold'--- you get the picture. 𖦹 favorite perfumes are fruity floral ones; especially cherry scents that have a sickening sweet aroma! akin to the high sweet scent of formaldehyde and rot! 𖦹 ate $2 pizza at a hole-in-the-wall during one of his 'episodes' and wanted to puke! just kidding, he did. nothing should ever have that much grease and marinara, goddammit! 𖦹 considering he's canonically a microwave cook, I'm sure he's destroyed any attempts of a romantic dinner in. a 'water caught on fire' kind of cook. 𖦹 his Aiwa stereo does have a turntable so I imagine he has a vast collection of vinyl records of not only his favourite albums but of classical music, film and musical soundtracks. 𖦹 had an incident at a drive-in theatre when he was in college. luckily it wasn't his car, and luckily it was some bookish bitch who wouldn't be missed! let's just say, she too, was gone with the wind. 𖦹 we already knew, but he's a massive voyeur. but expanding on that, I don't think he would mind watching certain men coughPrice bump uglies with a woman of his choice. this all due to his reactions and thoughts when watching his 'best friend' nearly have foreplay with his girlfriend right in the bedroom with him. 𖦹 y'know that porno that people joked about? the one where a woman calls out "Oh God! Oh God!" and the dude's like "There are no Gods here"? yeah, that's him.

𖦹 there's contradicting comments about how he was a child-- his mother states he was a nice boy, but that's a biased POV. regarding his confession about what he did to a maid on Christmas Eve at age 14, he definitely seemed like a creepy kid. y'know, those rich boys with the too gelled hair, big ol' eyes that stare right through you, and their lil pastel cardigan tied around their shoulders. he was like an oil painting whose eyes follow you everywhere you went. I don't see him as a 'I stuck the neighbours' dog's head on a stick' type, more of a 'I watch you sleep and shit talk you so everyone hates you' type !

[vintagedollrina]

🌺🥥🍓🛍️

[newvegasdyke]

American Girl Doll inspired fake perfumes, Part 1

Molly- reading a long awaited letter in a sun warmed victory garden— but no turnips here! Dandelion and strawberry flowers, tomato vine, clean laundry drying on the line. Raspberry bush flowers and ripe raspberries make a juicy and rosey base with hints of greenery. 

Samantha- pink roses on white satin ribbon, thick icing on petit fours, an accord of creamy vanilla bean ice cream with a hint of salt and gingerbread. Base notes of gentle white musk and tonka bean. 

Marie Grace— A delicate china plate of sugar dusted beignets and rhubarb rose jam. A heart of medicinal lavender and a straw basket filled with magnolia flowers from the market. 

Cécile: apricot blossoms and thinly iced almond cakes. Airy violets and sparkling peonies play over a base of berry custard and velvet ribbons.  Felicity— A sugar cube on a slice of tart apple, the wind against your face as you ride your horse through a flowering meadow. A base of black tea and beeswax candles. 

[trashycherubx]

my room

[pocketvenuslux]

I don’t believe I’ve reviewed any Tom Fords even though it was Black Orchid and the Private Blends scents that lured me into the world of fragrance so many years ago. This is probably because the house is not even a shadow of its former self; it is unrecognizable.

Launched in 2007, a year following the release of Black Orchid, Tom Ford’s Private Blends was the vanguard in the fragrance industry. Beginning with Purple Patchouli, this early, exciting era of the house saw offerings like Tuscan Leather, Jasmin Rouge and others, many of which have been long discontinued. Among a sea of celebuscents, saccharine fruity florals and predictable gourmands that had so dominated the industry since the 90s, the Private Blends did not only seem singular, they were like revelations to someone like me who was not old enough to have been familiar with the greats of the 1980s and earlier. This era saw Ford at the forefront, with releases like Oud Wood (2007) that would be followed by what would become a tidal wave of Westernized ouds, starting with the likes of Kilian’s Pure Oud (2009) and Byredo’s Ouds (2010). I’d say this period ended in 2013 which saw the release of the Atelier d'Orient line - one of the last stand out lines of the house. 2013 was also the year the Oud line was expanded in an attempt to ride on the coat tails of Oud Wood’s success. Perhaps a suggestion the kind of commodification of the house that was to come.

The house changed with the rise of niche luxury fragrance houses in the 2014. It was around this time Estée Lauder began snapping up houses like Kilian and Frédéric Malle in a move that would transform the industry. As the niche market began to establish itself, Ford was no longer the only widely-distributed house pushing boundaries. Private Blends were still exciting in this period but were slowly shifting away from its innovate roots. Perhaps the last quality line from the house during this middle period was the Les Extraits Vert line, released in 2016, which wasn’t innovative so much as a retreat into 70s nostalgia. At this point, the fragrance market was also growing increasingly crowded. A new Tom Ford release (or release from other houses like Serge Lutens) just didn’t seem so special anymore.

For me, the nail in the Private Blends coffin and our current trash era began with the release of Fucking Fabulous in 2017. FF kicked off a cynical trend of crasser names paired with grossly inflated prices. Rather than an attempt to create a beautiful scent, FF seemed more like a product designed to see how far Lauder could push the price point for luxury fragrance.

Which brings us to the present day - Cherry Smoke, an opportunistic attempt to cash in on the success of Lost Cherry. What is there to say about it? The opening is pleasant enough. Syrupy macerated dark cherries and expensive leather drying down in a linear fashion to an abstract sweetness and synthetic oud smoke before finishing on banal white musks. It’s not horrific, it’s never scratchy or densely flat - but this is damning praise for a house that once released Noir de Noir. And I’m sorry to say that compared with Electric Cherry, a painfully generic fruity floral, Cherry Smoke is the better scent. Yours for an eye-watering CA$480/50 ml.

RIP Tom Ford Private Blends 2007-2017. After FF, I should have realized what I know now: you are dead to me. I’m sorry the house that initiated me into the world of fragrance has become so pathetic. Someone at Lauder, I beg of you, when the executives and accountants aren’t looking, please pull the plug.

[nugothrhythms]

2024 single "Flores, Perfume" by Quetzaltenango, Guatemala-based post-punk act Guerra Fría

[haveusmelledthisperfume]

Have you smelled this perfume?

Sharing a name and a scent with the popular hair conditioner, American Cream is a smooth, sweet lactonic (milky) scent perfect for sweater weather. Read more at Fragrantica.

[justinefrischmanngf]

i'd kind of like to write something horrible like i would like to write a piece of fiction that is just extreme and awful and visceral

[celluloidrainbow]

O PERFUME DA MEMÓRIA (2016) dir. Oswaldo Montenegro The love story between Ana and Laura, two women of different affinities having to deal with irreconcilable differences. Ana has a mysterious secret that can create a conflict between reason and desire, either pushing the two apart or bringing them together over the course of a single night. (link in title)