Royal Mayfair

Windsor

Creed 2009

“Doesn't one always think of the past, in a garden?”
Eleanor in Kew Gardens by Virginia Woolf
It makes me strangely melancholic.
Strangely, because neither in the notes nor in the composition of this fragrance is there a melancholic undertone. Jamaican lime, Scottish highland pine, English rose. Canadian cedar, Australian eucalyptus, and oranges from the Bahamas.
Well, perhaps there is melancholy after all, the melancholy of a bygone era and a faded empire...
I perceive the fragrance notes almost in isolation at the beginning. Almost overripe lime, the mild fruit resin of juniper berries. The duality of camphor-sharpness and herb-sweet balm of fresh pine sap. Cool rose, candied with dew. Tuberose1) in camouflage mode, dazzling me with its mimesis of honeysuckle and wilting lily of the valley, luring me away from the heart of the rose.
Warm, subtle cedarwood and a mischievous eucalyptus, sometimes flirting florally and boldly with tuberose, sometimes baring chlorinated2) teeth. In between, surprisingly intimate musk.
No, this is not the fragrance picture of Royal Mayfair that I had naively sketched in my usual way.
No forest, no pine grove. No wild-romantic landscape, no untamed nature. And yet it makes me inhale deeper, as if I were stepping out of a smog-filled metropolis into an old park.
This breath brings my perspective into alignment.
It expands it, from that of the ant following pheromone trails in the crowd, to the central perspective of the flâneur in this venerable garden.
It is the string of the Royal Botanical Gardens in Kew that the fragrance strikes in my memory. Here, in this ‘oasis
in the desert of brick and mortar Greater London’ 3), in this piece of nature, albeit created by human hands, one can breathe deeply with all senses. Ancient Lebanon4)-cedars stand here, familiar and unfamiliar trees in great variety. There are representatives of pine from all continents. In one of the beautiful, temple-like greenhouses made of white-painted iron and sparkling glass, an impressive eucalyptus tree thrives, and if one is lucky, agave polianthes blooms alongside Humboldt lilies in the area of the dry tropics.
Countless plants and picturesque arrangements can be admired, and perhaps even the rose dedicated to the Duke of Windsor5) blooms in the rose garden, which is offered as a reference for the English rose in Royal Mayfair.
Enough of the dawdling in the autumn garden of my memory and back to the presence of the fragrance.
It takes further in-depth consideration until I finally manage the perspective shift and can integrate the fragments into an elegant painting.
Juniper, pine, and lime merge into the surprisingly pleasant tonic water with dry, herbaceous gin. Mossy-medical and, to my delight, only reflecting the ethereal top notes of the drink. 6)
The cedar carries an aromatic crown on a slender yet solid trunk, after a lovingly maintained, sparingly yet exquisitely filled humidor.
But what touches my heart is the same, floral pulsation of Royal Mayfair. Here, I am enveloped by the unique, intimate perfume of a kiss on the cool cheek of a dearly familiar person, fragrant with a hint of rose soap, kissed by wind and weather.
In addition, the eucalyptus meanders through the entire picture like a gurgling, sparkling stream, connecting the different layers, setting a metallic accent with the tuberose reminiscent of remnants of smog (after all, we are still in the city), contributing to a transparent spaciousness with the pine, and moistening the earth at the roots of the cedar.
The top notes are a sprightly, albeit quite like the drink that inspired them, rather short-lived pleasure, even if elements flash again throughout the fragrance and contribute to the clear, cool impression. The heart, to my delight, is also perceptible independently, whether on skin, feather, or fabric, while the base, although very close to the skin, impressively lingers as a hint of “cedarwood wardrobe” on fabric.
Royal Mayfair is not a fragrance for a forest dweller (generic masculine), but neither is it exclusively for the gentry (generic feminine).
Elegant, but best without urban chic. Subtle, yet with a tangible presence. By no means sexy, just immediately sensual. Wear it as you like.
However, it is a fragrance that I would prefer to enjoy on someone I am intimately familiar with rather than wear myself.

***** No comment containing relevant information for purchase or testing decisions, just my impression plus *earworm for Norleans
1) This may also be due to my simultaneous, rather fruitless engagement with another, very tuberose-heavy fragrance
2) checked again: I also find this chlorinated note here like in a eucalyptus globulus oil in my collection
3) A. R. Hope Moncrieff, Kew Gardens
4) with certainty, a few Canadian specimens can also be found with careful searching...
5) ironically, this is a tea hybrid bred in Germany
6) Alcohol notes are among my nemeses.