Mlleghoul

A long time ago I wrote a review in which I referred to Aquolina’s Pink Sugar as the bark of the cotton candy tree. Well, that was a confectionary botanical specimen in its sapling stage. A Whiff of Waffle cone is that tree a millennia later, after the rise and fall of civilization, the obsolescence of any number of gods, and you know, after it's seen some shit. It’s still rich and redolent of carmelized burnt sugar and toasted marshmallow, along with a luscious velvety smoked vanilla custard and something like marzipan syrup incense…but imagine all of that with a jaded attitude and wearing a beautiful old leather jacket and puffing away on a pipe with warm nuances of dried sweet grass and balsamic woods in the chamber. Why is this tree smoking? Man, it’s a million years old, it can do whatever it wants. It’s earned that right.

Autumn Rhythm from Chris Collins is everything I wanted Autumn Vibes from Maison Martin Margiela to be, but which it miserably failed at delivering. I said what I said about it in my previous review at the time but instead today I am going to compare that scent to a dream I had last night where I crashed Reba McIntyre’s Thanksgiving dinner and she was aggressively pushing an excess of pumpkin pie on her boozy, belligerent guests. Autumn Rhythm, on the other hand is a far cry from that cornucopia of autumnal resentment and lesson in exquisite restraint. THIS is the Ray Bradbury Autumn People fragrance I was hoping for. It’s the scent of a cool, smoky wind that clings to your hair and scarf after a walk in the waning light of a fall afternoon. Though a tussle of leaves have tumbled to the acorn specked soil, most remain a soft serenade of green and pale, glowing yellow. Rhythm is a perfume of promise and patience as the trees slowly shed what no longer serves them, the dead and dying detritus of leaves, bark, needles, cones, and twigs, earthy, leathery, and woody and bitter. A strange melancholic verdancy, not crisp, but the tender, mossy dream of it. All of these notes, captured in a warm woolen halo of cashmere stitches and sweet musky skin. This is autumnal perfection.

Briny saltwater seaweed and shiny, earthy tarry leather and two craggy stones rubbing against each other in a vaguely suggestive way over the course of a thousand years; alternately, a slew of Aquaman x Tom of Finland mashup fanart interpreted as a cult-favorite Chuck Tingle title that was written in a twitter thread.

There is a lovely painting by Gaston Bussiere of a pair of frolicsome nymphs bathing in a pool of purple iris. If you could bottle that scene and its cool, playful atmosphere of ephemeral spring florals, the greenest violet leaf, and some sort of woody-musky-powdery mystical fairy soap flakes, you'd have L'Iris.

This version of Burberry Hero begins with the fleeting season of apricots and musing on how easily they bruise, how you’ll never again know the childhood euphoria of that pretty smocked easter dress the color of rice powder and coconut with ruffles and lace and three pearly buttons but you will never forget the unabashed joyful flavor of a mouth crammed full of jelly beans. What Hero where and who is it that smells like the sour cream powdered sugar sweetness of picnic ambrosia salad, all pools of Cool Whip, and marshmallows soaked in the juice of tiny mandarin oranges and pineapple syrup, but not that really–rather the phantom of that atomic summer fruit confection, the faint lingering fragrance of it, at the bottom of a polished cedar bowl.