In 1992, Jōvan was still coasting on revenue generated by its landmark sponsorship of the Rolling Stones' Tattoo You Tour, with old faithfuls Musk and Musk for Men comprising the flagship line, and Jōvan Sex Appeal fleshing out the brand portfolio. Founder Barry Shipp, a former Revlon rep turned entrepreneur, had repurchased Jōvan from Beecham in 1988 and renamed it Quintessence, which led to the
To clear up any lingering confusion: some bottles say "Versus Versace" while others just say "Versace." Both versions are identical. Neither version is indicative of a vintage, as the fragrance has waffled between the two monikers for decades. Since its release in 1994, Blue Jeans has been controversial. I think the main issue is it's cheap. It's always been cheap. Versus was the downmarket
Looks are Deceiving.Last year, Davidoff released an international travel exclusive fragrance called Indigo. I saw reviews for it in a few places, and a couple of YouTube reviews, but feedback on it is scarce, likely due to its limited distribution. Travel exclusives aren't rare, and in the past two decades there have been several fragrances that could only be found at major airports, including CK
My Quorum story is a unique one. I last owned a bottle of Quorum in 2011. I got through 75% of it and tossed it. It wasn't that I didn't like it; I really enjoyed it. The problem was the citrus. I don't know what the 2000s formula of Quorum was comprised of, but it smelled great, except for the citrus note. That older version used a grapefruit note, which I thought was an odd choice, because if I
Smells the Way Ella Langley SoundsIt's tempting to say that we're experiencing the "enshittification" of everything, from movies to fashion to music and yes, perfume, but I'm not so blackpilled. Are Christopher Nolan movies the new avant-garde? No, unless you consider a 3-hour movie in which you can't hear the dialogue groundbreaking. Is country music making a comeback? Yes, but Ella Langley is
I smell nods to Edmond Roudnitska's style in Remarkable People, Cécile Matton's 2015 creation for ELdO. I think it's the curry and champagne notes. The curry is slightly sweaty and smells more like cumin, which Roudnitska favored in several of his older creations, including Femme and Eau de Roche. Matton preceded Remarkable People five years earlier with a scent for the same brand called
With virtually no fanfare, Procter & Gamble quietly released three new eau de colognes in what it has loosely referred to as its "Signature" range, naming them Forbidden Woods, Midnight Moon, and Obscure Ocean, which is the one I have.The psychology here is difficult to figure out. With Old Spice enthusiasts openly yearning for P&G to reissue lost treasures like the original formula
When I ponder a brand like Lalique, I consider the bottles before their contents. How could I not? As a student of art history, I am well aware of René Lalique’s historically significant jewelry and glasswork. He was arguably the most versatile glass artist of the first half of the 20th century (he died in 1945), and his contributions included inkwells, hood ornaments, and the design and
Summer Fields of VetiverEncre Noire is often referred to as a "modern" vetiver, and few can get through a sentence about it without mentioning Iso E Super, so let's just get that out of the way first: there's quite a bit of Iso E Super in Encre Noire. There, I said it. Let's move on.Released in 2006 in a semi-opaque black cube bottle inspired by René Lalique's own 1913 "Biches" inkwell design,
Smelling Al-Rehab's Grape Raspberry fragrance is like experiencing my own version of Stephen King's The Langoliers. I've accidentally stepped through a time rip into a past that sits empty and devoid of life, with every molecule of this past world lingering in a forgotten state. It's November 12th, 1988. The week of my first flu. I spent the whole day in bed, and at 4:30 pm, mom entered my room
The house of Jacques Bogart was established by Jacques Konckier in 1975, many years before its acquisition of Balenciaga in 1986, and Ted Lapidus in 1998. Konckier's stated vision for the brand was "I create only for men." Bogart's 1975 eponymous debut had been, until recently, their flagship scent; it is apparently discontinued. Jacques Bogart has always been a European concern, with its main
Grapes, Gum, Orange Blossom, BacchusI've done my best to ascertain why they named it "Silver" Scent, but I've come up empty. I'd like to say that it was their "silver" anniversary, but 2006 is not 25 years after 1975, so that doesn't wash. There's nothing silvery about the smell of Silver Scent, so its name and the story behind it remains an impenetrable mystery.Methyl anthranilate is a naturally
Whenever I stop at Burlington, I try to find a 75 mL bottle of 78 Vintage Green (I once saw a 5 oz bottle and passed on it, years ago), and I've had no luck. I suspect the original Icon line of Banana Republic fragrances is quietly being discontinued, as grey market stock on several of them has dried up considerably since their first appearance in 2017. There are a handful of 30 mL bottles
No release date. No promo copy. No promo, period. A perfume that was nonexistent one day, and everywhere online the next. No reviews. No conversations. No mention of it anywhere. Until now: I own a bottle of Pino Silvestre Black Forest so you don't have to, and I'm here to tell you about it.Except there isn't a ton for me to say. Do you remember Green Generation Him ♂ with the opaque
Using Forbidden WordsIf you were to ask the folks at Estée Lauder, I think they'd say "jungle" is not politically correct enough to include in a fragrance name. Synthetic Nature was once called Synthetic Jungle, but a decade after Lauder's acquisition of Frédéric Malle, one might suppose that a combo of market testing, possible trademark infringement (Kenzo Jungle), and distaste for the
Ithaque is a Greek mythological isle said to be the home of Odysseus. Well, Ithaca is the reference name for it, and Ithaque is the French translation. Memo is interested in French flourishes, and contrasts the name with stylized ancient Grecian imagery on the bottle of their 2023 fragrance, luring in the fat wallets with an admittedly striking package. You'd be forgiven for assuming this
Molinard is a house whose name echoes my own; I find the "Miller" of Italy to be quite the interesting fragrance house. Fragonard, Molinard, and Galimard are all Grasse firms whose lineage stretches back into the 18th and 19th centuries, with Molinard citing 1849 on the purple boxes of its "Les Fleurs" range. As a violet fan, I've always wanted to own the now-discontinued Violette EDT, and
April Violets is getting reviewed in June. Sue me. I wanted the vintage version of this one, but Yardley is plagued by a downmarket vibe that makes spending $100 on a bottle feel wrong enough to not want to do it, so I shaved a zero off and grabbed the "Modern/Contemporary Classics" version instead. My bottle is the "90% Naturally Derived Ingredients" formula. On Yardley's website, the
I'll make this brief; I'm no longer using GoDaddy as my web hosting servicer, and am cancelling frompyrgos.com in that iteration. Rather than go on a long ramble about my problems with them, I'll make it as short and sweet as possible. The reason I'm cancelling my deal with them is simple: GoDaddy broke my trust. I spent months trying to configure their absolutely pathetic blog features to
"The 1960s Called and Wants its Catherine Deneuve Back . . ."I'm told there's a bit of a backstory as to how this fragrance was created, something about Quentin Bisch winning so much with Ex Nihilo's Fleur Narcotique (2014) that Parfums de Marly asked him to self-flatter in the original Valaya (2023). But how Imran Fazlani's 2024 creation fits into that situation is beyond me. I've gleaned that
Park Your Carcass, Kid. I'd Like A Word.Olivier Creed died about a week ago from an undisclosed cause, and this hit me. My first thought upon learning of his passing was, do people realize what he gave us? I'd like to take a moment to cut through the bullshit that has surrounded Olivier Creed and his brand for decades now. It kind of started after Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez published The
One of the neat things about being a collector is finding "rare" items, and perfume collectors are especially driven by scarcity. I've been on the lookout for One Man Show Emerald Edition since its release 8 years ago, but for whatever reason it's always been tough to source. Apparently Emerald was initially a Dubai exclusive, then trickled into Europe, and eventually got swept into the grey
This fragrance was a bit of a "hypebeast" phenom for the Reddit and YouTube crowd when it was released in 2024, and continues to enjoy massive popularity with the under-thirty set particularly. Lattafa is a reputable Dubai-based concern known for their florid packaging and commercial success in duping designer and niche brands, and yet Angham is a Lattafa oddity, in that it seems to be its own
Let's talk about Jicky. Here's the thing.Jicky's reputation precedes it, and there have been approximately 889,000 internet reviews of Jicky written in the past 26 years. I don't need to get into how Aimé Guerlain created the world's first abstract perfume in 1889 using more than one entirely synthetic material (De Laire's coumarin and vanillin). I don't need to mention that up until very
Basic Victorian BitchThere's fine perfumery, and then there's Basic Bitch Juice. Let me make the distinction: fine perfumery entails the complex and abstract blending of accords that, when conjoined a certain way, create something moving on both a sexual and intellectual level. Think Catherine Deneuve, who mainly wore Mitsouko, and picture her nude in a bathtub in Pola X (1999). Mitsouko =