PetraA

Épices opens very zesty, like if I have just grated lemon zest or opened a jar of candied lemon. I imagine that I go to my spice cupboard and I look for some spices to cook with later. I open several containers and smell them - coriander seeds, cardamom, saffron, bay leaf. I get a whiff of mint or eucalyptus perhaps. Jar of sweet cocoa is ajar at the back. Scent of cooling as well as warming spices are mixing in the air. Cooking does not take place in Épices, spices remain powdery dry. Drydown is my favorite part. The scent moves into a soapy musk, which smells like an old fashioned laundry soap, the kind my grandma used when boiling the bed sheets. Later it sweetens and at the same time gets dirtier, too. Perhaps some animalic musks join the soapy ones. Very sexy. Épices is an eau de toilette which after the initial stage moves into a skin scent that last all day, easily 12 hours.

Malia opens with fruits and florals with a distinct marjoram flower note. Marjoram here smells like the fresh flower not the dried leaves you tend to buy for cooking. It immediately takes me to a herb garden. Fruits are a mix of flavours reminding me of fruit mix sweets called bon pari. Perhaps there is more of the zesty green, yellow and orange ones and less of the red berry ones. There is light spiciness from pink pepper which intensifies later when black pepper joins in. Flowers join in, again well blended and hard to distinguish each one. Chypre base comes last, again well blended. On my skin it projects well for 6 hours and then settles in a skin scent, rubbed on clothes it lasts ages. I slightly prefer it in summer because of the marjoram and zesty fruits but it is not a typical summer scent and I can easily wear it in winter during the day. It is different enough not to be a boring perfumery scent but not too artisan and pretty safe for most. I would say it is feminine leaning, but there might be men brave enough to pull this one off.

This is masterfully blended concoction by Dorothée Piot. None of the notes jumps out but all dance perfectly together. At first it feels very simple but on wear you will know that this is a complicated formula very carefully created. Different from anything out there.
It opens with a blend of warm spices smelling like a chai. Later I get sweetness probably from labdanum, fine leather and gentle musks.
Very intimate, close to skin, sexy and perfect for a date.

Right at the beginning I get white chocolaty boozy patchouli with a hint of lemon. Lemon is not too zesty. I imagine myself sitting with a friend in a bar drinking old barrel rum or cognac. Booziness, however does not last for more then few minutes and I get pepper - Cambodian white pepper, the sort that makes you nearly sneeze when you put nose close to it. Patchouli stays in the background and is just lovely. Later I get vanilla like sweetness and forest floor full of moss - moss here is dry, not wet like it would be in the forest. There is tobacco, too.

This must be the best fig fragrance I have smelled. One of those perfumes that take me on a scent journey.
‘I roast figs with orange rind and juice, drizzled with honey. I look forward to having them later with some vanilla ice-cream. The scent of the roasted figs fills the rooms. Frankinsence is burning in the corner…’