Our latest article (mostly the work of the first two authors, postdoc Alex Gaitainidis and grad student Efi Drimyli) showing that flies can tell isotopes apart regardless of whether the enzymes that degrade odorants are working or not. Also that various species of Drosophila that diverged 40 million years ago are all able to smell the presence of deuterium in an odorant molecule. All evidence in favor of the fact that discrimination […]
I asked Trudon for samples and this came back. Dear Luca, thank you so much for your interest. Unfortunatly [sic], I am really sorry but we can’t send you some samples because your website does not correspond to our editorial line. Hope you will understand, best regards, Laure Meyers Lifestyle Press Officer Editorial line? Next time I’m in Paris I’ll visit the shop, and report back. Update: A director of Favori PR agency, Laure Meyers’ boss, just […]
Today I did some blind testing, unusual and always interesting: three numbered samples sent by Women’s Wear Daily for their Smell Test, the only such thing out there in the press, trade or otherwise. I can report that one sucked, a 2/3 scale and half-budget Amarige that had no reason to exist. Another was very nice but a bit boring. The third, assuming it is a mainstream fragrance, shows that the […]
Last night I discovered the existence of Vilde Frang, a young Norwegian violinist of mind-blowing brilliance and musicianship. Her Korngold (yes, yes, I know, more korn than gold ) Concerto is the best on record. For those old enough to remember, in the second movement her sound in the upper register reminds me of the heavenly heights of Henryk Szeryng and Nathan Milstein. If she ever comes to Athens I’ll be there, in […]
Mendittorosa was founded four years ago by event organiser Stefania Squeglia to fulfill a childhood dream of making perfumes. Se wrote me some time back that it was not easy to find perfumers to translate her artistic direction into smell, but in the meantime she clearly succeeded. The Paris-based composition house Flair appears to have done the entire collection of samples she sent. Insofar as one can ever talk of “schools” of […]
Many years ago I was standing in line with my girlfriend in a dismal Chinese takeaway in South London, well past midnight, when a young, pudgy, pale-faced young man behind us caught sight of my companion’s face. He put his hand to his mouth, took two steps back and in a shaky voice said “Blanche….. you’ve come back!” He explained that he had an obsession with a Victorian murderess, rummaged through his […]
Rouge Bunny Rouge is a beauty products and fragrance outfit started in 2005 by Yugoslav-born Alexandra de Montfort. It is based in the UK but launches its products in Russia. This is an odd bird among niche companies: it clearly has an intense and focused visual art direction in a mock-baroque style, but the fragrance art direction seems a bit more random, not least because RBR went to the big oil houses for […]
There’s a lot that appeals to me about Nishane’s emergence in the niche perfumery world. For one, I always get a thrill when I see an unusual top-level country domain like .tr on a company URL. The world is a big place, and a combination of Web and FedEx means that everyone in perfumery gets a bite at the apple. No point in pretending to have a PoBox in Grasse […]
There is a tendency among arty niche houses to insist on simultaneously being about less and more than mere perfume. The less part has to do with minimalism, that sterile hybrid of classic modern and germophobia. The more part has to do with adding a fragrance angle to the great adventure of navel-gazing. Two examples among many: “scent as an open-ended adventure in self-expression […] opens a window on a new horizon of human […]
NG s an Australian-born fashion designer and milliner who started a niche fragrance line four years ago. There are four fragrances to date: Or du Sérail (Bertrand Duchaufour), a pleasant candied fruit and coumarin composition; Bois d’Ascèse (Julien Rasquinet), a tarry cedarwood; Cuir Velours (also JR), very much in the manner of Kenzo Jungle Homme (Olivier Cresp, 1998). By far the best is Iris Cendré (JR again), which occupies the space first discovered and then vacated […]
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