Lancaster Lancaster 1987 Eau de Toilette Concentrée

At the end of the 80s, there was a turning point in the world of fragrances. The era of aquatics and unisex scents began, and the orientals and fougères that had dominated for almost two decades gradually disappeared from the shelves or faded into pale shadows of their former selves. Only a few of them survived unscathed into the present, and there are virtually no new perfumes of this kind anymore. Many younger fragrance users consider them - factually, this is not wrong, although it sounds ugly - as old. Yet, as much as one might scoff at many trends from those culturally idiosyncratic years today, some of the scents from those decades are more precious than ever and can be worn surprisingly modern.

The packaging of Lancaster Eau de Toilette Concentrée is unmatched in its humility and understatement. If one were to place the bottle or the outer box aside from the perfumes, one would easily mistake both for a mid-priced body care product - perhaps a facial toner or a tonic. (I really like the bottle - precisely because it is what it is.) And inside is one of the perhaps most underrepresented and underestimated fragrance jewels - not only, but especially for fans of that bygone fragrance world of the 70s and 80s. It thrives on a melancholic, rough green herbaceousness - old-school chypre and hipper than an airbrushed wolf head T-shirt on the chestnut avenue - which is followed by a foundation of soft wood and gentle animal notes. It is robust, but not cumbersome - quite the opposite. Tamed, but neither subdued nor broken. Oriental. Balsamic without sweetness. A bit smoky. Soft. Incredibly exciting for a nose accustomed to contemporary scents. And full of longing.

It somewhat resembles Clinique's Aromatics Elixir, which is significantly older - both are full-bodied and hefty, both angular and unique. And both, despite their feminine label, are undeniably unisex in my nose. As if one were - pardon: a woman - wearing a high-gloss, brass-colored blouse with fabric-covered buttons, shoulder pads, a stand-up collar, and bell sleeves from 1987 paired with black skinny jeans from 2017. Retro-modern, self-assured, and cool. A grand perfume cinema in the second row.

Conclusion: the 80s were the decade in which the once highly popular singer Juliane Werding transformed from the 'cheeky girl with the guitar' she had been in the 70s ('If you think you think, then you only think you think') into the mystically contemplative housewife problem-solver. In one of her major hits from those years, it says:
'She never wanted to accept a no, she never wanted to lose her curiosity.
And still, she saw herself driving in a convertible with the wind in her open hair.
Uh uh - longing is incurable.'
I just watched it on YouTube. Fog machines. Really bad hairstyle. In contrast to Lancaster Eau de Toilette Concentrée, almost cool again.