L'Eau de Parfumo N°1 Parfumo 2008

Fragrance Review for L'Eau de Parfumo N°1
Parfumo

Top Notes
Strawberry Banana Raspberry Blackberry

Middle Notes
Blueberry Black currant Dewberry

Base Notes
Musk Amber Sandalwood

Vintage Eau de Parfum (2009)
A Fruity Drink On A Deck Of A Cruise Ship

This was the first perfume released by the German brand in 2009. It was discontinued once but re-released as an Eau de Cologne which is selling on Amazon.com now, so look on ebay where you can still get the original vintage EDP. The EDC is not bad but it's softer and more soapy with uninteresting qualities compared to the vintage original parfum in the rectangular bottle with the logo in the middle as shown on the picture on this page. The EDP is very hard to find but thanks to my Fritz in Berlin and Masha in St.Petersburg, I was lucky enough to get my hands on the EDP splash bottle in 3.4 ounces. I found this in the bathroom of my male Ph.D. lawyer friend's appartment in Berlin during Festival Week where he performs as a retired hobby opera singer. He is a transgender bender&wears fragrances for men and women, as well as unisex, and he was sharing this perfume with his mother who is a world traveler, writer and a former principal. I asked them to let me borrow this fragrance for the whole summer.
I also found it stashed away in a girlfriend Masha's fridge in a villa outside St.Petersburg during Moscow Fashion Week. Masha is a happily married proudly Southern Russian model living in New York, a dancer on the Universal Studio cruise ships&self-employed entrepreneur with a Stanford MBA. I asked her what she was keeping in her fridge, and she told me in her cute Russian accent.

"????? ? ????? ? ????? (Cyrillic: Ambra i banan). Her name is Parfumo N°1. L'Eau de Parfumo she is a delicious fruity perfume. Smell of berries and banana smoothie very nice. My husband Stan buy it for me for my birthday. Everyone love it on me. The parfum when she is dry, smell so good of sexy clean amber. She is not girly for mature woman and man. On me last very long for whole day. I wear her with mini cocktail dresses cute sundresses with dots evening suits when I go out to parties with my family on summer nights. I also wear her as a Pixar Princess when I perform for little children they love it on me. My mother my father my grandfather and his friends in Russia all wear her. N°1 is popular parfum in Russia. Love it. I am sorry my English is no so good."
I asked her if she could please sell me this perfume!

Let me start by saying that there are many berries in this but it is by no means a 'cheap' little fruity perfume like a Paris Hilton (i.e. Siren, Heiress) or most of the modern Victoria Secrets. It's very classy and sexy for a mature woman or a guy. I don't give a damn about the gender label or for whom it is marketed. Fragrances and berries have no labels or gender. This is a really gorgeous if simple dark pink fragrance which can indeed smell amazing on both men and women. I hate dropping names but it has been compared to other berry-centric perfumes like Lalique Amethyst or Taylor Swift's Wonderstruck however I've never smelled Wonderstruck or Amethyst. Another aromatic berry based perfume is Vagabond Prince Enchanted Wood which was created three years after this fragrance. However the former is darker in a sinister way with definitely something more going on behind the curtains and the backstage. It seems to wear like a fragrance for The Evil Queen in Snow White, who covers her ugly heart with a false smile. Ultimately it smells like hallucinating in the deep forest or in the bush.

This fragrance on the other hand does not have any shady facets. It feels like truer to it's nature and It's more openly straightforward but it does not lose it's complexity&depth. It's an enchanting&musky mature scent that is nothing typical of today's modern sweet girly girl perfumes. This smells natural&lacking in aromatic synthetic chemicals like some of today's fruit scented sugary modern fruity florals. Unlike today's fruity florals it has incredible longevity sillage and a lot of punch to make a long lasting impression. The banana is the dominant accord and because it's rare to find banana notes in fragrances I appreciate it. But here it's leafy and more like putting your nose up to banana trees and the leaves. It has a green aromatic air like that of a jungle. Although vetiver is not listed on Parfumo, I can totally smell it. It's clearly there in the dry down&gives it a very clean grassy scent and a unisex vibe. There is strawberry which is very sweet and juicy like a freshly squeezed strawberry drink. I can also smell raspberry and blackberry, they are delicious like freshly picked from the bush. Then there is black currant, but it's clearly a cassia/cassis scent. Blueberry is also present&it's well paired with the dewberry.

The dry down is musky&spiced up with sandalwood. The heady amber provides this scent with clean almost soapy warm tones. This is a like a refreshing cocktail of delicious berries with a sweet sexiness and maturity and to quote a guy who smelt it on me: smells like a beautiful classy woman. The green banana gives it a very happy vibe. Great for wearing in spring and summer but it has also a warm winter vibe courtesy of it's musk along with sandalwood in the dry down so this perfume is basically an all year all season scent. The sexy amber makes it a formal fragrance to be worn on a night out at the opera, theater, or a symphony or at the gala. This would have adorned the dresser tables of such women as First Lady Jackie Kennedy Hollywood actresses like Grace Kelly Audrey Hepburn Elizabeth Taylor and Deborah Kerr. Picture Jackie Kennedy wearing this at dinner parties in the White House. It matches up with elegant dark suits and ties, and beautiful evening gowns. But it can also be a casual scent perfectly suited for every day to collect your kids from soccer or just run to the grocery. It matches up with white T shirts&jeans&Birkenstocks. A totally casual and formal flexible perfume.

I must emphasize that the fruited scents to me are not at all feminine but simply fruit scents. The musk gives it a masculine touch. It's totally unisex. If you're a smart guy try this fragrance. You can still find her on ebay. Lastly, I want to thank God for giving me a nose.

Thank you God, ebay&Parfumo.

SOUNDTRACK
Banana Boat Song sung by Harry Belafonte
Apr 1 2008
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Disclaimer/Disclosure: I just realised that someone must have borrowed my account to post this text under a false identity. Since this someone seems to have put a lot of thoughts and efforts into this and no monetary incentive involved, I will not remove this 'review'. Due to the nature of the Internet and the technologies involved, I accept no liability for the accuracy, validity and veracity of the content. The views and opinions expressed in the text above are those of the imaginary reviewer's and do not necessarily reflect my own.