Torfdoen

It would be nonsense to say that 'Pure' resembled an atomic bomb, the most terrible instrument of war mankind has invented. Neither is the scent terrible or of monstrous radiance, nor do I share the aesthetic exaltation of the sight of a nuclear mushroom, although the spectacle from a safe distance from the screen does not lack a certain fascination. Nevertheless, I would like to briefly explain which chemical processes take place during a nuclear explosion in order to get back to the actual topic, perfume:

Split a lemon. Bitter vegetable, framed by unsweet creamy bergamot. To trigger a chain reaction, you must extract subatomic particles such as neutrons, protons or alpha particles from other atoms. Sometimes I feel a bit like a cleaner when the lemon (for my taste) is pushed too far to the top. The 'critical mass' is exactly the amount of fissionable material you need to keep the lemon particles reactive. Spicy juniper, herb moss and lovely flowers create an exciting contrast. Association: Leather, slightly rose soapy, a little bit smeared, but quite classically staged. Stupid only if the reaction rate increases so fast that no control is possible anymore. Then the whole thing flies around your ears. The well-known mushroom cloud develops. The shift in nuances that now occurs may be observed for hours. Herbaceous green, sour leathery, with elegant citric in many facets.

The Sillage of 'Pure' is for me the greatest character trait of the fragrance and plus point. He has something fragile, airy about him, you think he has already flown away, then he reports back and even likes to have gained strength. The image of a nuclear explosion therefore seems to be exaggerated and not only fundamentally drawn to the hairs. Rather a small mushroom cloud on the skin that rises inexorably into the atmosphere. The citric head note fireball remains as reserved as the herbs and flowers that mix in. Not a shock wave to kill you. The half-life, however, is above average. I recommend springlike, well-tempered. High summer, why not? It is not a succinct newbie, but a clearly structured lemon of noble quality that combines modern and classic elements.

Moreover, the initiation of an explosion by means of (lemon) nuclear energy is a public health offence. In the case of 'Pure' the thing is harmless.

I'm not paying attention for a moment and the bite with the vetiver poison tooth is already there. Patch shoots into the bloodstream, plastic tingles on the tongue. Lying on the ground, I stare into an orange blossom sky. The pepper in the eye blurs. Cocoa also eats rubber tissue. Can someone put out that fire on my skin? The spot is black and woody. Cramps start, I can't breathe. Gentle vanilla paralysis. When I open my eyes, the orange leaves sway in the wind.

Suddenly, all tidied up in Kouros-Aftermath. Sterile azure. Much, much less ordinary flower splendour, rather a small fig tree in front of the genital. The bite is gone. Breathing also works again, despite ozone impregnated air. The walls are smooth and soft like rubber, emitting poisonous green citrus haze into the atmosphere.

A huge tree in the middle of the cave. A bowl of cocoa powder. I cut a lime from a tree with a jackknife.

I'll cut them into individual pieces.

Now turn all the parts in the cocoa powder. I'll take a little bite. It's really very, very sour, a little chemical, cleansing. Does not necessarily receive you with open arms.

The cocoa is nice, even becomes superficial over the decades.

Otherwise, an undefined green cast dominates, rubbery-green woody. Pure nature.

Behind the big tree I discover a door at the back of the wall. I recognize a colorfully dressed African woman sitting at a table next to the door.

Is this the way out?

50 cents. It points to a small plate with different coins in it.

I have no money with me, madam.

50 cent.

Look, I just booked a package holiday, I gotta get out of here now. They're waiting for me. Please, make an exception.

50 cent.

When I turn around and think about sweeping her plate off the table and stealing my way through the door, I see a large number of Rhineland carnival movers marching towards me from behind. I can't think of anything else but loud: Helau! and to perish in the turmoil of pretransitory masses.

Then wake up.

Mister, mister! How do you feel? The vague notion of reanimation creeps up on me.

Where am I? Where am I?

You almost fell victim to a black mamba.

Oh, dear. And the African woman?

She gave you her special medicine: fig leaf, limes and healing cocoa powder.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

A beautiful country, Africa, I stammer.

Oud et Bois is a strange perfume: it shows me its full richness only in motion.
On the back of the hand remains a dull tobacco wood impression, which a real wood mahogany furniture perhaps
imitated, but remains incredibly one-sided.
Worn on my neck, suddenly completely different facets appear to me.

On the one hand there is the veil of moderately sweet amber, which is oily in the scent stratosphere
spreads out. The parachute is pulled and one lands skillfully on chocolate dust covered earth.
Very dry, the substrate, no liquid droplets. Ah, as soon as you move, it rains some Amber
from the upper scent layers. That doesn't necessarily refresh, but contrasts nicely with the powdery chocolate dust coating,
that gets stirred up every step of the way. The earth below is patchouliweich.
I dig something into it and come across a shiny, mahogany-coloured piece of wood. Like a root it leads through the earth.
Knock knock. Hardwood.

I continue my exploration, and discover silver, gray shapes rising out of the earth.
Carefully, I approach a smaller one. It describes a gas fountain with three arms, from a hole in the ground it comes up,
like a waterfall in permanent motion and at the same time standing still. Smallest gas particles radiate into the environment.
That's Cypriol. I'll have a mouthful. Refreshing, but also dry and nasty.

I'm going to sit on a soft rise.
So, what do we have here? In summary: Silky amber outer shell, chocolate earth covered with dust, hardwood and
refreshing, not too strong cypriolush. Still pretty barren, but I like this desolation,
that doesn't even feel like one to me. Change is there, but at a different time scale.
Unfinished? I might. But some planets are.
Especially the gentle amber rain and the cypriol fountains know how to please in their simplicity.
Chocolate anyway, if not too sweet. But I can understand who doesn't want to live here. A little terraforming
will have to be for one or the other.
Maybe a thick lemon in the sky a few times a year.
Herbs and flowers should be tried. And off with the icky grey gas formations that kill every mood.

I can find out in the neighbouring Nobile 1942 system whether this is the next development stage of a fragrance body,
if I continue my reconnaissance tour on Patchouli Nobile.

Assuming I get picked up from here someday.

The only fragrance my father ever used was Brut by Fabergé, a kind of men's classic that has been on the market since 1973, available in many variations and more in the American area. Actually, he doesn't like perfume at all, but he probably smelled it on someone once and was quite bewitched. Meanwhile he has quit smoking, is running around and lets his bottle of brood get dusty in his closet.

I came up with it again today (I should take it with me, he said) to do a little comparison test.
And first of all, I am regularly mistaken about comparisons and this time it is no different when memory meets momentary, especially since two scents of different time and production cannot smell the same.

Sartorial of Penhaligon resembles Brut just in the first half to good hour in certain points, I was downright shocked how known to me the smell seemed. Sometime after the third test of the recently acquired sample it had clicked and I had my father in my mind's eye.

It has the same heavy ozonic shaving water vapour cloud as the brood, but buries the sweet accents under scratchy dryness for the time being, where others immediately throw everything into the scales and come across as directly aromatic and more accessible.
It's hard for me to spot individual grades.
Herbaceous green of the brood, rather smoky crystal blue at the Sartorial. I'm thinking caraway and pepper. A wiry brushwood. The brood is slightly citrus, which is completely absent from the Sartorial. Lavender could be a common denominator, largely buried in dense aldehyde haze. Musk would certainly also be mentioned on both sides.

The scents then drift more and more apart. Where the brood is small after one hour (it is anyway at home in another weight class), the Penhaligon sorts itself again, gets the honey age mild, remains however tart, rather strictly in its clean soapiness, underlaid with pleasant herbal spice. He got it back from the brood. Mild tobacco and the one or other lovely blossom join in and fake a little lightness and cosiness. Lavender metal was called.

Fresh is that only conditionally or evenly a special definition of it. One should already have a weakness for classic racial waters, then one gets noble offered. A bit old-fashioned for my taste, which is certainly due to my personal association. Sartorial and Brut are related and leave me with similar scent impressions with different complexity and refinement.

My father would never spend much money on a perfume, even if Sartorial is quite moderately priced for my terms. He has always valued value for money far more than just smelling good, according to the motto: good things don't have to be expensive, or vice versa, what costs a lot isn't immediately better. This means spending as little as possible on the things that matter to you. Savers mentality. Anything else would be a waste.
But he is generous towards his loved ones and his family.

Who knows where I'd be if my father had a different relationship with money. And if he hadn't worn the cheap men's classic for a while and awakened my curiosity for scents, the door to the world of scents might have remained closed to me.

One thing I do know, though: I prefer it that way. And the brood, it's standing around with me for now. I guess the dust layer will keep growing here, too. Maybe I'll put the Sartorial rehearsal in my parents' bathroom. Does my father see it the same way with the relationship to his favourite water?

I don't like the scent because it's so expensive.

For much less money you get perfume that comes across more compelling and sympathetic.

But for 150 Euro less it would already be a candidate to buy?

I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. He won't win an innovation prize. Smoke, pine needles. A little honey. Wood. And something ethereal that tends toward healing ointment. I had completely different expectations.

Oh, healing ointment! You still only smell healing ointment!

That's not true!

But it's a favor

Probably that bothers me the most.

Maybe I just don't understand.

You can't separate the exaggerated price from the fragrance itself in your evaluation.

Maybe I'm wrong about the scent.

Ok, ok, get over yourself.

What's the matter with me?

No need for a nervous breakdown.

All right, breathe out, breathe in. Not that hard.

Be cool.

Ok.

Do you like what you smell?

Well done is that already.

Would you want to walk around with it?

He's got a little bit of something annoying about him

Healing ointment?

Nah, something's bothering you.

What's your problem anyway? A minute ago you said it was pleasing.

That wasn't me!

Ah, now all of a sudden.

I've got it now! It's too green!

But you like green scents. The greener the better.

Well, tastes change fast.

Don't you see how you lie to yourself?

I have Krizia Uomo when I want to go out into the woods. And I don't want that so often.

It's the most natural forest scent you've ever smelled. Without Krizia silk fur and herbal liqueur.

Well, don't exaggerate.

And it's very portable. People will envy you for your character strength and your taste.

Price is the problem.

Yeah, he's already steep.

Absolutely unjustified.

It stops somewhere.

I bet if you're just looking for something, you'll find an undiscovered pearl that does something similar.
And much cheaper.

It's so generically wooded, there's a lot of stuff.

Right now I don't feel like going to the woods anyway.

That leaves me pretty cold.

Me too.

...

Fancy a hazelnut schnapps?

Och...