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Serenissima
Top Review
20
second: because it was so beautiful!
That's probably what my father thought when, a year after he gave my mom "Soir de Paris" for Christmas, he toyed with the idea of making his mother happy with it too.
The success did not fail: it cracked quite properly in this marriage!
Who wants to smell like mother-in-law, especially considering the strained relationship of the two women in one house.
My mom was made out to be petty: but grandma did not get this fragrance!
Yet she loved violets, lilacs and carnations all her life.
This story was told to me over and over again and I can imagine that "Soir de Paris" in its cobalt blue flacon certainly also visually well suited to the dark blue velvet dress of my mom.
At that time, one still had a "good dress" and my Mutti had this midnight blue dress, in which she had married, shortened accordingly.
I still remember the enchanting heart-shaped neckline that gave it a romantic touch.
The contents of this flacon enchanted even then with its wonderful bouquet.
Not only violets and cyclamen meet at the beginning; they also bring bergamot and as a crowning touch tarragon.
Tarragon, like these two flowers, is a pure spring herb; I think of my tarragon sauce with asparagus and new potatoes - a fine thing!
This combination was a bit daring for the time.
It also continues with early summer bloomers: the heady scent of linden blossom - whole streets still smell of it in May and June. Especially in the side streets of the Kurfürstendamm are still many linden trees to find; much to the "delight" of the motorists parked there! The sweet sticky flower juice they always get very badly again from the Wägelchen.
A large bouquet contains heavy lilac umbels, iris - noble as always -, the spicy garden carnations and beautiful roses: what a fragrance develops here and combines harmoniously with the aromatic prelude!
Lily of the valley and jasmine, both in their own fragrance yes also not entirely uncontroversial in this community, deliver the charm of white-flowered flowers, before clover adds a certain "green" spice.
Older fragrance descriptions according to were also still peonies in the heart note: must have been an indulgence in floral fragrances!
The base note finally contains with styrax and heliotrope two heavy vanilla-heavy nuances; these again fit very well with the clove!
A touch of vetiver grounds this fragrance composition before the spicy-resinous climax unfolds:
Benzoin and incense prepare the way for ambergris - opulent, smoky and erotic! -before musk in a very refined way completes this enchanting fragrance structure!
The original fragrance was still a touch of sandalwood added: just the combination of clove and sandalwood should have been at that time in fact an event. (I can imagine that very well.)
The documents of the house of Bourjois provide information: just about this great fragrance, which first came on the market in America at the end of the twenties.
This company has an original history. It was founded in 1863 in Paris by Alexandre Napoleón Bourjois as a store for stage make-up.
It quickly gained an excellent international reputation with its great palettes of various powders and makeup materials in pastel colors.
It was only after a store was also opened in New York in 1925, where competition for stage makeup was soon quite fierce, that the company tried its hand "in perfume."
For in America at that time there was no perfume industry and thus no competition; so the idea was obvious to offer the Americans a typical French fragrance.
A perfume reminiscent of lively parties and also got a correspondingly poetic name: "Evening in Paris"!
The current name "Soir de Paris" got the fragrance only later, namely to its introduction on the French market.
A cobalt blue flacon, a silver label with stars and crescent moon and a romantic name:
with the help of these attributes "Soir de Paris" could only become a success.
A success became this fragrance after the war then also for the middle class. Because only in such a way my father could order it at that time with the soap trade over coworker discount, which supplied the chemical factory in Berlin Tempelhof, with which he was employed.
And also in such a way is to be explained probably this Schnapsidee, the gift, with which he had scored with my Mutti, one year later for its nut/mother also only to consider.
So would have been quite quickly doubled his personal success!
But as is known, nothing came of it!
Through this bit of family history, which came back to my memory through a small fragrance sample, I also dealt with the history of the company Bourjois.
I did not know at all what I would find there and had more or less expected the usual perfume development: but this little research has really paid off.
And whoever still has the opportunity to get a vintage flacon today, should just grab it and cherish this jewel: "Soir de Paris" brings a very special luxury to life.
And who wants to do without a little luxury?
Blkbrd
