06/19/2014
jtd
484 Reviews
jtd
Helpful Review
2
lingering
I’ve sampled more than a dozen of the Bond no 9 perfumes, and I’ve smelled another 10 or so more in passing. There is a sameness to their mixed floral perfumes that concerns me. They smell the same, yes. That’s the subjective part. But I recognize that I dislike their sweetened-floral fragrances in general, and I must question how this colors my judgement. Dislike aside, to look at a prolific perfume line, patterns develop, and while Bond do make some traditional, innocuous mixed florals of no particular note (Chelsea Flowers, Park Avenue, Madison Soirée) they also have a stock style that they are apparently under a spell to release every third perfume or so. This style is the hazy, musky, boozy, lingering-sweet floral.
Examples: Fire Island, NY Musk, Bleecker St., Nuit de Noho, Lexington Ave, NY Amber,
Some of these perfumes are less ‘floral’ than others, but the floral screech is the seasoning that allows the pancake-syrupness to shine. These perfumes ride on an overwrought, thick, lingering sweetness that requires any other note to shriek at top-volume to be heard. Which brings us to the peony in Sad Harbor. The peony note in perfumery is famously uncouth and abrasive. When paired with a base that requires a shouting match in the first place, peony shows itself not to be a pleasant note.
The name works, though. Sad Harbor evokes the collapsed end of a Hamptoms-climber drinks party. Flotsam and wounded vanity strewn around cocktail tables scented with abandoned, spilt fruity cocktails. Hits of salt air and sick.
I take back everything I’ve said about perfume being a weak tool to evoke a complex narrative.
from scenthurdle.com
Examples: Fire Island, NY Musk, Bleecker St., Nuit de Noho, Lexington Ave, NY Amber,
Some of these perfumes are less ‘floral’ than others, but the floral screech is the seasoning that allows the pancake-syrupness to shine. These perfumes ride on an overwrought, thick, lingering sweetness that requires any other note to shriek at top-volume to be heard. Which brings us to the peony in Sad Harbor. The peony note in perfumery is famously uncouth and abrasive. When paired with a base that requires a shouting match in the first place, peony shows itself not to be a pleasant note.
The name works, though. Sad Harbor evokes the collapsed end of a Hamptoms-climber drinks party. Flotsam and wounded vanity strewn around cocktail tables scented with abandoned, spilt fruity cocktails. Hits of salt air and sick.
I take back everything I’ve said about perfume being a weak tool to evoke a complex narrative.
from scenthurdle.com