I think possibly now I'm beginning to °get° what osmanthus is. I have not intraspired of osmanthus in native form; but interpolating between 'fumes that have it as a note, it's beginning to °emerge° & °take shape° in my consciousness, much the way orris did; but this is yet subtler. Would it be fair to say that it's aroma is something like that of a freshly-opened packet of loose-leaf Ceylon tea, with a similar very subtle oranginess? It's ^that^ certain quality - that quality that those other osmanthusy 'fumes have. Oh, and indeed it is really quite lovely! I'm getting a strong ^in a garden amongst exotic herbeage^ gestalt from it. Is it like ambergris & orris in that it is more of a °stealthy° aroma, unspectacular superficially, but gently seducing the smellsense with a whispered mystery? Yes, it's that kind of note, isn't it. Right teasing me with its mystery, it is. That's what I'm getting fræ this 'fume, anyway; and from the other °osmanthusy° 'fumes I have intraspired of. And in this one it's showcased admirably, in a 'fume that is transparent & yet somewhat earthy simultaneously, as I find OJ fragrances tend to be. And yet there are those telltale signs of a robustitude beyond what it's detailed content would seem to indicate - also a characteristic of them. They can sometimes seem to do a disappearing act; but then you realise they were there all along; and then they are still perceptible on your garments days later: yes, they are still there, no need to worry if they do their little disappearing act. Balmain's ~Ivoire~ could well have been one of these, I would say - plenty of that superficially paradoxical robustitude there as here. I'm getting used to these °lighter° sorts of 'fume now. A 'fume doesn't have to be a °stonker° to be robust, and these °light° OJ fragrances show that. I think this one is going to maintain that score.
Much as I tend to appreciate ~Sherapop's disquisitions, I cannot agree in detail here: I ^do^ think this is a very ^characterful^ fragrance. If by any chance you are reading this, I would put it to you that you always did have a concept of osmanthus: but, it being more of a ^potential^ aroma than an ^outright^ one, in that it's one if those that continually ^hints^ that it is on the point of breaking-forth into a flagrantly gorgeous aroma, but never actually does so, & is actually the better precisely for its ^not^ doing so, your explicit mind denied it. I do now strongly incline to deeming it the subtle aroma par-excellence, perhaps displacing even orris in that rôle, which in comparison to this osmanthus stuff is now beginning to seem outright flagrant! And not actually ^overpowered^ by any other note in the sense of being °blocked° or °hidden° by it, but on the contrary very much there and no less by reason of the sheer °gewalt° of that other note, like a piccolo playing amidst drums & thundrous brass. I understand how someone can perceive this OJ fragrance as a bit generic, not-quite-cloyingly-sweet, green + floral + citrusy + vetivery etc fragrance; but, after a lot of consideration - and zen-like abstinence-from-consideration, I cannot but come to the conclusion that this 'fume has a ^very^ great deal of ^character^. I keep thinking of Chanel's ~Sycomore~: I think it's quite a lot like that one.
All this may seem an excess of circumspection; but if a perfumier is going to use these ultra-subtle, ultra-delicate notes in the perfume, precisely for the °intriguing° of the smellsense, then, of course, people are going to respond in that sort of way! I'll bet, where this stuff grows, people have for millenia been struggling just like this to °bottle° this aroma verbally. And reviewers do tend to struggle similarly when they review osmanthusy 'fumes, as one may see, casting round a bit.
It's delightfully tantalising: is it green, is it floral, is it ... whatever! It seems to occupy a space between categories - a space where you never hitherto realised there was a space, suspended there. Makes me want to keep talking about it, trying to pin it down; but I don't think I'm going to. Perhaps I ought to leave it for now. I'll say somewhat about its longevity whensoever I can.
Oh! BtW, I haven't forgotten, in all my musing about osmanthus, that there's other stuff in this 'fume; and moreover that osmanthus is not even the chief note (honey pomelo is, at least according to the contributors here). So I do realise I might have gotten it wrong, and that the qualities in this 'fume I fondly imagine imparted by it are infact imparted elsewise. But I am as I said, interpolating; and I now quite strongly feel I have discerned what °osmanthus° 'fumes have in common; and also it is consistent with what I have read of osmanthus, both in terms of explicit descriptions of it, and in terms of observing the difficulty many have framing such description. But I have as yet have an awfully long way to go, note-analysis-wise.
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