Aniseed
Heliotrope
White musk
Vanilla
Orchid
Magnolia06/03/2025
ClaireV
731 Reviews
ClaireV
1
Cloud-like anise
Sometimes I go chasing a specific colour as my version of a wearable mood board, and more often than not, this colour is white. Not a stark, opaque white - that is not at all what I want! Instead, I want a cloudy white tinged with blue, like a splash of water turning a glass of clear Pernod into something dreamily foggy. Here there is a foamy, half-egged vanilla thickened with the sweet, dollhead rubber of heliotrope, rinsed with a licorice root tea, kind of like Molinard's Vanille crossed with Reglisse Noire. And my God, is it charming.
People notice a resemblance to L'Heure Bleue, but the fact is that Osafume's anise + vanilla combination is just a footnote in L'Heure Bleue's over-blown thesis on spices, carnation, rooty iris, and orange blossom. This is an indie take on a minor facet, let's say, and far weirder, far less classical as a whole. At its midpoint, Osafume lurches far too much in the latex glove direction for this to be a Guerlain pastiche. Of course, whether this is a plus or a minus will depend on how much you like the smell of the inside of a latex glove. Me, I find the candied cigarette, the licorice root tea, the dollhead, the foamy-spacey anise-vanilla combination to be a total mood. The latex glove part, though, does give me pause.
People notice a resemblance to L'Heure Bleue, but the fact is that Osafume's anise + vanilla combination is just a footnote in L'Heure Bleue's over-blown thesis on spices, carnation, rooty iris, and orange blossom. This is an indie take on a minor facet, let's say, and far weirder, far less classical as a whole. At its midpoint, Osafume lurches far too much in the latex glove direction for this to be a Guerlain pastiche. Of course, whether this is a plus or a minus will depend on how much you like the smell of the inside of a latex glove. Me, I find the candied cigarette, the licorice root tea, the dollhead, the foamy-spacey anise-vanilla combination to be a total mood. The latex glove part, though, does give me pause.
