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Notes01/29/2021
Marieposa
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Marieposa
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Out of the darkness into the light
In the deepest, darkest winter, when the days are still grey and harsh and the ground is frozen, some years there is that very special moment when you can suddenly smell spring. Biting cold, snow and frost can no longer hide the fact that the days are getting longer again and the greenery is becoming richer. And if you look for the first green shoots among the snow, you won't be disappointed: the first leaf tips of snowdrops, elf crocuses and grape hyacinths have already bravely fought their way out of the frosty depths and into the light.
The sight of these delicate little plants braving the season, the elements, and even the darkness, gives me weak knees every time. This optimism, which only a plant knows, whose nature it is to grow towards the sun, is as touching as it is harrowing - and this is precisely the feeling that Serge Lutens' wonderful De Profundis triggers in me.
"Memento mori" I read here, "graveyard scent" and "candied melancholy" - and that's exactly how Serge Lutens wants the perfume to be understood. But my nose, the headstrong one, smells something else. And the heart, the stubborn, feels anyway, what it wants.
Cool and green. That's the first impression of what I sprayed on my wrist. Plant juice. Elixir of life. The scent conjures up images of woods full of dewy bluebells and purple hyacinths. Young, lush greenery in all its glorious bitterness.
Is Vent Vert being paid a reference here? Yes and no. Perhaps rather L'Air du Temps, for as the fragrance continues to unfold, garden carnations and violets join the floral roundup. Red-gold morning sun warms the ground, and as the sun rises higher, the scent becomes more confident.
Embedded is the essential green floral magic in a spicy-woody oriental base structure with incense and Iso E Super. This may sound like a bit much of a good thing, but works quite excellently and gives the fragrance complexity without painting over the abstract, shimmering delicacy.
Now it so happens that "De Profundis" is not only the name of this fragrance and a psalm, but also the title of an open letter written by the brilliant Oscar Wilde at the nadir of his life, while imprisoned for fornication between 1895 and 1897. The text is a bitter self-accusation, but leads into an almost defiant attempt to pull himself out of that dark hole by his own hair. From the depths and darkness into the light. With an unshakable faith in oneself and the world. Almost like a small, helpless bulbous plant in January.
For this reason, I would like to end this commentary on a fragrance that radiates so much hope for me with a quote from Oscar Wilde from kinder times: "Everything is going to be fine in the end. And if it's not fine it's not the end."
The sight of these delicate little plants braving the season, the elements, and even the darkness, gives me weak knees every time. This optimism, which only a plant knows, whose nature it is to grow towards the sun, is as touching as it is harrowing - and this is precisely the feeling that Serge Lutens' wonderful De Profundis triggers in me.
"Memento mori" I read here, "graveyard scent" and "candied melancholy" - and that's exactly how Serge Lutens wants the perfume to be understood. But my nose, the headstrong one, smells something else. And the heart, the stubborn, feels anyway, what it wants.
Cool and green. That's the first impression of what I sprayed on my wrist. Plant juice. Elixir of life. The scent conjures up images of woods full of dewy bluebells and purple hyacinths. Young, lush greenery in all its glorious bitterness.
Is Vent Vert being paid a reference here? Yes and no. Perhaps rather L'Air du Temps, for as the fragrance continues to unfold, garden carnations and violets join the floral roundup. Red-gold morning sun warms the ground, and as the sun rises higher, the scent becomes more confident.
Embedded is the essential green floral magic in a spicy-woody oriental base structure with incense and Iso E Super. This may sound like a bit much of a good thing, but works quite excellently and gives the fragrance complexity without painting over the abstract, shimmering delicacy.
Now it so happens that "De Profundis" is not only the name of this fragrance and a psalm, but also the title of an open letter written by the brilliant Oscar Wilde at the nadir of his life, while imprisoned for fornication between 1895 and 1897. The text is a bitter self-accusation, but leads into an almost defiant attempt to pull himself out of that dark hole by his own hair. From the depths and darkness into the light. With an unshakable faith in oneself and the world. Almost like a small, helpless bulbous plant in January.
For this reason, I would like to end this commentary on a fragrance that radiates so much hope for me with a quote from Oscar Wilde from kinder times: "Everything is going to be fine in the end. And if it's not fine it's not the end."
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