The First Photographs of Smells

The First Photograph of a Smell, blog of John Ptak

Smell me, Kiss me

'Their (Egyptians) words for 'kiss' and 'smell' are the same' . Encyclopaedia of relationships across the lifespan, Jeffrey S. Turner

In The Book of General Ignorance, John Lloyd and John Mitchinson say that some Eskimos**** have same word for 'smell' and 'kiss'.

And 'In some tribal cultures the "equivalent for our 'kiss me' is 'smell me.'' Wikipedia, Kiss

I just love that!

And further. But there have been already many online talks about pheromones, smell and love so I won't bring this again. (a short report on some scientific research here)

****I use the word Eskimos to name the 'indigenous peoples who have traditionally inhabited the circumpolar region from eastern Siberia (Russia), across Alaska (United States), Canada, and Greenland.' There is no pejorative conotations. I know that in North America is preffered instead Inuit. Specifically, Inuits are only a group of the Eskimos population, so I chose to use Eskimos since I do not have clear knowledge of what group of Eskimo use same word for smell and kiss.

Philosykos by Diptyque - finding the right woman for a great perfume

Once you get into perfumes, you realize that there are perfumes bigger than life that you love but they don't fit you. And anyway, there are quite some and you can't be all these women and men they talk about. Because every perfume talks about a certain kind of woman or man, tells a stroy. Take Fracas. Can I be that Fracas woman and her story? I wish so but I can not.

So for long I'm hunting people for perfumes. I try to figure out who would be good for certain perfume, who could wear that and be ok with it. But you tell me who can be efortessly Dzing, Musk Koublai Khan but also Joy or Fabourg 24. Not easy.

I had Philosykos of Diptyque for a while, this perfect perfume fig. I would try it time to time and love it but everytime I know it doesn't tell my story. It is a fig perfume, and I say that because though it might seem only a fig scent, in the end it is a perfume, it is made of fig and woods and wears easy but unmistakable. You smell of Philosykos and nothing else. So for me it was a tricky one.

But she came. A quiet intelligent beautiful blonde, expressing herself rather through what she does than what she says, she doesn't like loud and obvious, she rather goes for subtle, she likes to notice rather than to be noticed. She likes nature and art and she is good at technical stuff and numbers. She talks with care and you want to hear what she has to say because she doesn't talk too much. We went together through my collection while asking her what she enjoys generally and after a while she got stuck with Philosykos. And you know what? it goes with her, it is like it was made for her.

Philosykos found its woman.

Tango - quotation of the day

'Tango is for men the dream in which they release their inner macho. I met few who dance with humitlity. Most of them dance like they drive their cars.
On the other hand, women look like finally they found a pool to bathe their lost feminity.'

Lifestyle Dufte! (Lifestyle Perfumes)

Today I had a shock to see that the biggest perfume store chain arranged all the countless celebrity perfumes in a big department under the name 'Lifestyle Dufte'. Not talking about the language mess, isn't fantastic? You a lifestyle person? go to the Lifestyle corner. Just forget about the other 80 percent of the perfume in the store, they don't count for lifestyle.


Brilliant!

Marry Me! Lanvin

The big window shop shows a young woman (It's a window dummy, ok?), sitting on a chair in a dress which rather shows a lot of her body, sexy shoes aside, some jewellery on a small table next to her, she is rather laying in the chair than sitting and she looks something between a prostitute and a bride to be.

And in front of all this a huge bottle of Marry Me! of Lanvin.

Well, just a matter of taste. It goes with these albums of also brides to be, they go to a professional photographer before their wedding and let themselves taken shots in sexy underwear. sexy positions. It seems to be very successful, the future brides explain they want to keep something about themselves before they marry. Like once they marry the sexiness will disappear and they will miss it. Might be. Or the ingénue beauty of a unmarried woman has to be immortalized.
Sinister.

I involuntary  kept the image of Marry Me! Lanvin for few weeks now. It popped in front of me in all perfume shops on a big place and somehow I always refused to think at all about it, just avoid it as you avoid an embarrassing relative.

But the grotesque and hilarity was to overwhelm me. No, it's too much. How the hell a perfume of Lanvin could be called Marry Me! and who the hell would want to buy a perfume named Marry Me!? That was the first thought.
Then, thinking it over, I realized that's nothing wrong with it, it just stands for our times. Octavian Coifan at 1000fragrances makes a short remark about how marriage is not important anymore nowadays. Is it not? It was not 20 years ago but we are in a big recession, the conservationist and purist feelings are stronger and stranger. The gothic girls, the alternative and the hippie ones all want to marry. All the famous public figures are married or to be married and have children and be good people. Sexual freedom is an old story, 20 years of fear of AIDS taught us to rather maintain same partner and infidelity makes big titles in newspaper. Yes, the girls want to marry and have a white gown (for so long I keep being fascinated by so many wedding shops, all these terrible white dresses but it seems to exist a big market). And feminism is old fashioned and a bit embarrassing. Yes, with all the information freedom, between twitter and last Ipods, we grew more and more in some comeback of traditionalist moral, there is too little to fight for anymore and we are in a plain era of putting limits to our own freedom. Sadly, end and beginning of centuries are often like that.

What else can I say, I'm sure Lanvin had a good market report when it launched this new smell and they knew what they do. They knew there will be a big public for it. It's just normal in a perfume world where Donna Karan went from Black Cashmere and Chaos to Be Delicious, Love from NY and Pure DKNY, a world where Pink Princess of Vera Wang is so well sold.

Pilled up to all this absurdity is the history of Lanvin house. Somehow Octavian Coifan chooses to forget about it. A perfume Marry Me! stays in a Lanvin tradition of perfumes named
- My Sin (1925)
- L'âme perdue (The lost soul) (1928),
- Le sillon (forrow, groove, line),
- J'en raffole (I'm crazy about it),
- Rumeur (1934),
- Pretexte (1938)
- and Scandal (1934)!!!

I didn't and I shall not smell this fragrance. From the light pink (yes, pink) juice a take it is a flowery fruity fragrance able to offer the air of purity which transcends the time and space in order to give to somebody the feeling of wanting a woman so much for the rest of the life. Horrible! And it is even more awful since this is the story.

I would have worn with pleasure a perfume Marry Me! if it was a harsh leather, or a strong cumin or lily of the valley soacked in incense. Bit of contrast to save such a pathetic name would have been the story of the century. But as it is, I imagine it will make good cash for Lanvin and no history. It is the niche's perfumery burden to make fragrances with names like Vamp a NY, which I would buy anytime with closed eyes, only for the comforting feeling of owning something named properly.

Guerlain will lose a shop. And I love Guet Apens\Attrape Coeur

Guerlain loves me, more exactly Jacques Guerlain. So it was a enormous luck to be able to try quite easy the Guerlain exclusives. In Dusseldorf there is a Guerlain shop (now I know the story of this exclusive Guerlain perfumerie in Dusseldorf, the owner is the sister of former Guerlain manager in Germany)


The big event was last winter, right before Christmas. I was in heaven. They have there all old Jaques Guerlain and there I smelled first time Attrape Coeur. The lady in the shop tried to get me into the new series of Elixirs and Art et Matiere like Angelique Noire, she insisted with it. All I wanted, except the extrait of Jacques Guerlains (Mitsoko, L'Heuere Bleue and Shalimar) was Attrape Coeur (and I am so sad I didn't try Vega, too, so sad). For some reasons I never got into Jean Paul Guerlain fragrances (now that he is in disgrace I can say this little dirty secret of mine). Mathilde Laurent feels for me much closer to Jacques, I love Pampelune and Shalimar Eau Legere. So I had Attrape Coeur on my hand for half a day in a frozen Dusseldorf, it smelled of honey and spices and I felt like a lady. Which it is not easy in Dusseldorf, two thirds of the women there wear fur coats and come out of luxury cars. the day was over soon and didn't purchase my bottle of Attrape Coeur but I knew I shall go back one day soon.

Two days ago I was on my way to buy fruits, didn't have any in the house. On the way I stopped at my friend around the corner, he has this little perfumery shop, carrying niche and special perfumes. I need to renew my L'Heure Bleue stocks, I finished my Eau de Toilette which I use for my daily wear, the Eau de Parfum is for winter and evenings out and the extrait de parfum when I want to go high. I looked a bit around in the shop, you never know what you can discover in this shop (last time I bought all the last bottles of Yohji Yamamoto men). So I always have to look attentively. I tried some Etro, some Caron, some Annick Goutal, the Lalique Pour Femme. I didn't see any L'Heure Bleue anymore (tried Nahema again, which I don't own) so I asked when it will come. He said it won't come anymore, he is done with Guerlain, they ask for a minimum purchase which means a lot of money and includes other stuff then perfumery which are not so well sold. So he doesn't want anymore. Which is so sad, he always offered the special Guerlains, not one of the new ones (Idylle or Insolence etc) and some of Aqua Allegoria line.

We mourned together the new LVHM policy, they don't care about perfumes anymore, it's only market and money etc. That is really sad, Guerlain will lose a really good point of selling. But my very nice old friend looked a bit around may be he finds for me a lost bottle of L'Heure Bleue, he checked behind the counter and he took one of this golden Guerlain bottle and put it back, it was not L'HB. Then in some drawers and it was so nice to find a vintage Vol de Nuit. He just gave it to me. Then again at the counter he took the golden bottle which was hidden behind some add poster. I took it in my hands, too, to check what it is. And there, in my hands I was having a 93 ml full bottle of………………..Guet Apens. I yelled, couldn’t help it. If an asteroid has fallen in my garden I wouldn't have been more astonished. For the last three weeks I was looking for Attrape Coeur around, thinking if I shouldn't call in Dusseldorf and order a bottle. A day before I found a Vol de Nuit Evasion on ebay Austria and thought of buying it (it is supposedly the Eau de Toilette from Attrape Coeur). I knew I could have Attrape Coeur at some point but Guet Apens was something as untouchable as moon for the rest of my life. And now it was there in my hands.

Needless to say, I have it. My friend would have given it to me for nothing. I told him that's gold and has fantastic prices on ebay. He asked me to tell him how much I offer for it and that's it. It was so hard, I blushed first time after long. I knew I had a miracle in my hands and I wanted him to be as happy as I was. I told him I would pay as much as he asks for, he insisted I give him a price. I thought he, as a nice guy, won't sell it for much more he sells Shalimar or Chamade. After an hour of conversation I offered him 150 euro. He said is too much and he made it 100 euro. And it's mine.

I still can't believe my luck. I'm not a lucky person, never won any draw prize, even if it was me and another person. If it was me and me I would lose for some technical reasons. So I don't understand how that comes. At few hundreds away from my house existed for ten years a Guet Apens bottle. And even more, it waited for me. My old friend told me he put it aside for an old rich lady who used to love Guerlain. But the old lady didn't appear for an year. He didn't know what happened to her. I am so grateful to my old friend and that old special lady. I hope she is well, too.