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05/17/2023
BrianBuchanan
355 Reviews
BrianBuchanan
2
Onslaught of Indole
Neroli, orange flower and jasmin. That sounds like a lovely combination of flowers, and it could be...
But this is no 'hello birds, hello sky, what a beautiful day' kind of scent.
The delicate neroli and petitgrain has barely time to settle in before it's brutally assaulted by an indolic orange flower, and - I would guess - jasmin sambac with their dominating crunchy undercurrents.
What could have been a gentle orange cologne becomes an onslaught of white flowers and indole, a rotting blast of tooth decay sharpened by tiny pricks of incense; these are flowers with attitude, and they bite!
Flora Nerolia is crude - yes; direct in its simplicity - undoubtedly; and it's daring - it doesn't give a damn about the rules.
It kicks over the floral traces by boosting what is often a polite modifier (that adds smoothness, or in larger quantities backbone to a pretty floral) until the it takes over and dominatinates like a thug. This indole overdose brutally mashes up the gender codes and demands we ignore them.
You can't wear something as challenging as this and remain a perfume innocent for long, you're obliged to abandon easy gender conventions and cross into unknown territory.
See it as a virago cologne, or an old fashioned dandified floral of the pre-gendered age, but you won't find this easy to wear; an ordinary cologne - it is not.
What's extraordinary though is that something as radical as this came from a conservative like Jean-Paul Guerlain.
It seems his sense of rigour went completely over the top this time, leading him to do something closer in spirit to that iconoclast Germain Cellier than the impressionism of his grandfather Jacques.
Hardly surprising then to see it's been culled since Jean-Paul left the helm, and that's a shame. Flora Nerolia would make a natural jumping off point from the spiky woods if it were still around, and if a young buck were to dare...
But this is no 'hello birds, hello sky, what a beautiful day' kind of scent.
The delicate neroli and petitgrain has barely time to settle in before it's brutally assaulted by an indolic orange flower, and - I would guess - jasmin sambac with their dominating crunchy undercurrents.
What could have been a gentle orange cologne becomes an onslaught of white flowers and indole, a rotting blast of tooth decay sharpened by tiny pricks of incense; these are flowers with attitude, and they bite!
Flora Nerolia is crude - yes; direct in its simplicity - undoubtedly; and it's daring - it doesn't give a damn about the rules.
It kicks over the floral traces by boosting what is often a polite modifier (that adds smoothness, or in larger quantities backbone to a pretty floral) until the it takes over and dominatinates like a thug. This indole overdose brutally mashes up the gender codes and demands we ignore them.
You can't wear something as challenging as this and remain a perfume innocent for long, you're obliged to abandon easy gender conventions and cross into unknown territory.
See it as a virago cologne, or an old fashioned dandified floral of the pre-gendered age, but you won't find this easy to wear; an ordinary cologne - it is not.
What's extraordinary though is that something as radical as this came from a conservative like Jean-Paul Guerlain.
It seems his sense of rigour went completely over the top this time, leading him to do something closer in spirit to that iconoclast Germain Cellier than the impressionism of his grandfather Jacques.
Hardly surprising then to see it's been culled since Jean-Paul left the helm, and that's a shame. Flora Nerolia would make a natural jumping off point from the spiky woods if it were still around, and if a young buck were to dare...
