12/05/2023
Intersport
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də ʒwa / də bwa (At night at the crossroads II)
As a non-native speaker, it's easy for me to claim that Fils de Joie [fis də ʒwa] and Miel de Bois [mjɛl də bwa] (2005) have some phonetic similarities, and 'bois' or 'de bois' has been Lutens' basic vocabulary since the beginning, but with Fils de Joie, the now discontinued Miel de Bois kept coming to mind.
At first glance, everything is different: Fils de Joie is all about the so-called night-flowering jasmine (Cestrum nocturnum). also often, if not exclusively, called 'Lady of the Night' (which in turn may allude to other things that could also be understood under Fils de Joie), a plant that from a few meters away also visually resembles jasmine species, and also has a similarly beguiling scent, which then comes across a little more powerful, sweeter - at least so with the perennials I am familiar with.
With this perceived jasmine relationship, Fils de Joie ties in internally with À la nuit (2000) and Sarrasins (2007), Lutens often worked in groups of three (such as Encens et Lavande (1996), Gris Clair (2006/2019), Fourreau noir (2009) with lavender, or Santal de Mysore (1997), Santal Blanc (2001), Santal majuscule (2012) with sandalwood and many more). À la nuit's specialty was its jasmine cuvée: a blend of three extracts of different varieties, from Moroccan, Egyptian and Indian, plus greens, spices and light honey: even if the Lutens company has for some time - apparently to simplify things - only spoken of jasmine here; until recently, these details were also noted in the database, which has been updated here sometimes too obsessively obediently and too short-sightedly.
On closer inspection, however, Fils de Joie seems to be more of a cross between in-house species than the formal completion of a trilogy: minimal shades of indolic jasmine are confronted here with the sour, animalic honey note from Miel de Bois. The opening could be accused of a short-lived camphor-clove nuance, another Sheldrake specialty as played out in Tuberose Criminelle (1998), for example, but this has to give way more or less immediately to a quite realistic night-blooming jasmine note, which will successively wrestle with a honey accord. The combination may sound almost too much - and it probably is, but it is somehow coherent. The good old Miel de Bois seems almost restrained, formal, even decent in comparison - newer honey/wax fragrances such as Bois Lumière (2014) or Bee (2019) certainly have much more oomph, but Miel de Bois remains a fragrance that appealed to me because of its duality of minimally suggestive honey and accurate, dry woody notes.
The actual transformation of this nocturnal honey construction is due to the musk notes, which are maximally functional here - certainly no longer laundry room but not quite bold either - the small but potent flowers of Cestrum nocturnum are multiplied kaleidoscopically, there seems to be no end in sight, the honey note is overflowing, pleasure multiplication or excess, the musk puffs up these facets, and even if Fils de Joie has changed after hours into something more close to the skin - the fragrance is never really close to the skin - the persistence is terrifying - in other words: i can get by with one spritz for a very long time...
The bushy À la nuit or the dry, sweet and sour Miel de Bois remain the more interesting fragrances - especially in the context/time of their respective release; the nocturnal crossover, də ʒw / də bwa is nevertheless a successful pile-up.
At first glance, everything is different: Fils de Joie is all about the so-called night-flowering jasmine (Cestrum nocturnum). also often, if not exclusively, called 'Lady of the Night' (which in turn may allude to other things that could also be understood under Fils de Joie), a plant that from a few meters away also visually resembles jasmine species, and also has a similarly beguiling scent, which then comes across a little more powerful, sweeter - at least so with the perennials I am familiar with.
With this perceived jasmine relationship, Fils de Joie ties in internally with À la nuit (2000) and Sarrasins (2007), Lutens often worked in groups of three (such as Encens et Lavande (1996), Gris Clair (2006/2019), Fourreau noir (2009) with lavender, or Santal de Mysore (1997), Santal Blanc (2001), Santal majuscule (2012) with sandalwood and many more). À la nuit's specialty was its jasmine cuvée: a blend of three extracts of different varieties, from Moroccan, Egyptian and Indian, plus greens, spices and light honey: even if the Lutens company has for some time - apparently to simplify things - only spoken of jasmine here; until recently, these details were also noted in the database, which has been updated here sometimes too obsessively obediently and too short-sightedly.
On closer inspection, however, Fils de Joie seems to be more of a cross between in-house species than the formal completion of a trilogy: minimal shades of indolic jasmine are confronted here with the sour, animalic honey note from Miel de Bois. The opening could be accused of a short-lived camphor-clove nuance, another Sheldrake specialty as played out in Tuberose Criminelle (1998), for example, but this has to give way more or less immediately to a quite realistic night-blooming jasmine note, which will successively wrestle with a honey accord. The combination may sound almost too much - and it probably is, but it is somehow coherent. The good old Miel de Bois seems almost restrained, formal, even decent in comparison - newer honey/wax fragrances such as Bois Lumière (2014) or Bee (2019) certainly have much more oomph, but Miel de Bois remains a fragrance that appealed to me because of its duality of minimally suggestive honey and accurate, dry woody notes.
The actual transformation of this nocturnal honey construction is due to the musk notes, which are maximally functional here - certainly no longer laundry room but not quite bold either - the small but potent flowers of Cestrum nocturnum are multiplied kaleidoscopically, there seems to be no end in sight, the honey note is overflowing, pleasure multiplication or excess, the musk puffs up these facets, and even if Fils de Joie has changed after hours into something more close to the skin - the fragrance is never really close to the skin - the persistence is terrifying - in other words: i can get by with one spritz for a very long time...
The bushy À la nuit or the dry, sweet and sour Miel de Bois remain the more interesting fragrances - especially in the context/time of their respective release; the nocturnal crossover, də ʒw / də bwa is nevertheless a successful pile-up.
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