Jean-Charles de Castelbajac Jean-Charles de Castelbajac 1982 Eau de Cologne
11
Top Review
The Ganoven Scent
J-C d C was my father's signature scent.
Thanks to the sample gifted to me by Inse, which made me incredibly happy and was the best welcome greeting at Parfumo ever, I can resurrect the memory of my father who passed away decades ago.
I take a whiff and I'm transported back 30 years. It’s as if the old times surround me again in the blink of an eye. A time travel initiated by something as small and inconspicuous as a bottle of liquid concocted by people.
My father standing confidently in his flared checkered trousers in front of our house. Lino Ventura on a gangster hunt in Paris with his olive green metallic Citroen DS 20 on television. My father's cousin entering in his black-and-white snakeskin ankle boots and dark blue blazer made of the finest fabric - an outfit that marked him as a representative of a milieu prevalent during the coal mining days in Saarland, but also gave him a somewhat eccentric aristocratic air (Lapo go home) -. My father's appearance on certain occasions, e.g. at the product fair in a suit and tie, at family celebrations like my cousins' communions in their best Sunday clothes, later years with a bow tie. I never saw him in jeans, only in dress pants. Him with a few employees on detours in the well-known, well-frequented, and universally popular bars, a parallel universe just for men with plenty of beer as a pleasure booster. My father with a silk handkerchief in the small upper side pocket of his jacket, sometimes red, sometimes blue patterned. Those French-looking male faces with dark hair and sometimes curls on their heads. My uncle with his sideburns. Us eating snails, frogs, moule farcie. Red wine and savoir vivre.
I love the scent incredibly. For me, it has something timeless, self-assuredly masculine, noble, but also a hint of a cheeky poker game for, and stealing of, spaces that one provocatively and shamelessly takes at the expense of women, children, and the weaker ones, and astonishingly finds oneself without sanctions. There’s the memory of my childhood and youth in an extremely male-dominated place in the middle of the coal ridge during a macho time that can only be mildly chuckled at by outsiders or from a distance, which was a real nightmare for anyone who didn’t belong to this group of arrogant and somewhat foolish roosters.
Mixed feelings aside...
Rightly considered, such a signature scent is also a kind of dowry, a particularly beautiful one, because it is sensual and conveys a sense of permanence that is no longer found today in an era of transitional, summer, and winter perfumes.
How I would love to have a signature scent as well, as a memory for my loved ones. In our mobile time, it would almost be a better, because more easily accessible, anchor of remembrance than a gravesite.
As I see it, I have ventured onto quite thin ice with this comment, as I lost a loyal follower this morning after over five years.
That makes me sad.
Thanks to the sample gifted to me by Inse, which made me incredibly happy and was the best welcome greeting at Parfumo ever, I can resurrect the memory of my father who passed away decades ago.
I take a whiff and I'm transported back 30 years. It’s as if the old times surround me again in the blink of an eye. A time travel initiated by something as small and inconspicuous as a bottle of liquid concocted by people.
My father standing confidently in his flared checkered trousers in front of our house. Lino Ventura on a gangster hunt in Paris with his olive green metallic Citroen DS 20 on television. My father's cousin entering in his black-and-white snakeskin ankle boots and dark blue blazer made of the finest fabric - an outfit that marked him as a representative of a milieu prevalent during the coal mining days in Saarland, but also gave him a somewhat eccentric aristocratic air (Lapo go home) -. My father's appearance on certain occasions, e.g. at the product fair in a suit and tie, at family celebrations like my cousins' communions in their best Sunday clothes, later years with a bow tie. I never saw him in jeans, only in dress pants. Him with a few employees on detours in the well-known, well-frequented, and universally popular bars, a parallel universe just for men with plenty of beer as a pleasure booster. My father with a silk handkerchief in the small upper side pocket of his jacket, sometimes red, sometimes blue patterned. Those French-looking male faces with dark hair and sometimes curls on their heads. My uncle with his sideburns. Us eating snails, frogs, moule farcie. Red wine and savoir vivre.
I love the scent incredibly. For me, it has something timeless, self-assuredly masculine, noble, but also a hint of a cheeky poker game for, and stealing of, spaces that one provocatively and shamelessly takes at the expense of women, children, and the weaker ones, and astonishingly finds oneself without sanctions. There’s the memory of my childhood and youth in an extremely male-dominated place in the middle of the coal ridge during a macho time that can only be mildly chuckled at by outsiders or from a distance, which was a real nightmare for anyone who didn’t belong to this group of arrogant and somewhat foolish roosters.
Mixed feelings aside...
Rightly considered, such a signature scent is also a kind of dowry, a particularly beautiful one, because it is sensual and conveys a sense of permanence that is no longer found today in an era of transitional, summer, and winter perfumes.
How I would love to have a signature scent as well, as a memory for my loved ones. In our mobile time, it would almost be a better, because more easily accessible, anchor of remembrance than a gravesite.
As I see it, I have ventured onto quite thin ice with this comment, as I lost a loyal follower this morning after over five years.
That makes me sad.
Translated · Show original
11 Comments
Und welch tiefsinnige Meditation über deinen Vater und die Vergangenheit!
Chapeau!