Sweater Stories Gather Perfume 2022

The old, rough wool sweater tells stories from the times back in the autumn forest. From the view through the sparse treetops up to the cloud-covered moon. How we sat by the fire. How we roasted chestnuts and drank the black coffee grounds from tin cups. Gathering firewood in the twilight, winterizing the cabin.
Outside, it became cold, damp, and uncomfortable, while at the same time slower and calmer. Warmed from within, enveloped in coarse but soft fibers.
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Sweater Stories definitely feels demanding to me: the scent begins briefly dissonant. With blackened coffee chestnuts, embers, and "Gather-Animalic" in contrast to an initially cool breeze, damp leaves, and mulchy autumn forest earth, the uncomfortable side of the anthracite-gray-brown season is suggested at first. Then, as it warms through the wearer's skin, the scent rises dark-furry, malty-ambered, and soft from the collar, becoming increasingly cozy. Now it feels protective and calm.
I find it particularly exciting that the mulchy-earthy note apparently manages without patchouli. It is soft and also warms on the skin. In Ananda's poem, diffuse images from childhood memories appear, and the character of the scent is reflected in the wear of the sweater... somewhere under the arm, a hole. A constant companion that wears down and becomes more beautiful in the process.
I have an old cardigan that is like this. One could call it ugly, but precisely because of the memories, the fragments of images I associate with it, it is one of the most precious pieces of clothing I own. A true piece of life history, always there, thoughtful and warm when it matters. One must engage with Sweater Stories - then, after wearing it a few times, it becomes less harsh, but familiar and present in its own quiet way.

I am truly not an expert on natural scents here on Parfumo - I occasionally have the pleasure of testing some, but no other (Indie) label has touched me as much as the creations of Ananda Wilson.
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The incense of October
crocheted
into my old wool sweater I refuse
to give up. It's hooded and
so warm despite the whole hole
at the armpit seam I don't
know how to mend.
It's not grey
or brown,
or black, but just the color of wet bark on a
furrowed locust.
Its hug, a lap of stories.
--
(Excerpt from: sweater stories, ananda wilson. '22)