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02/06/2021
Parfümlein
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Parfümlein
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Kensington: the best place for lemon greenhouses
A lemon has moved into the apartment of my nephew and his not-wife. It lives with them now. A small round lemon, at least for the moment, which in the next few months will at least grow to the size of a honeydew melon, hopefully not reach the weight of a watermelon, and then eventually shed its lemon identity as a good-smelling, soft, delicate little something and become a real Londoner or a real Londoner (?). Until then, it's still a few months away. The little lemon will have four citizenships: her father's German and English, and her mother's American and Caribbean. That's how blatant it is with the British. Lemons, once they make it to the surface of the fruit salad, get ALL the citizenships available right away. And because the lemon dad works for a posh law firm and the lemon mum has just done her weather doctor, they will then give up their cool lemon dorm in the hipest part of town (ok, I'm not mentioning that one for anonymity's sake, but what do you think is the hipest in London? ) and move to Kensington. Because Kensington is the lemon hothouse of London, so to speak: there are little gardens and garden fences, Laura Ashley sofas and nannies. It's just beautiful here. But not in a silly, stuffy way. It's fine, English. It's a place where you can make a home for the little fruit. And if you're ever house-hunting in Kensington, you should definitely do it now, in winter: That's when you can wear Penhaligon's Kensington Amber. This dream of cinnamon and amber. This wonderfully soft, unobtrusive, understated semi-gourmand. Semi, because:
Kensington Amber is not a true gourmand, heaven forbid. Upon spraying on, a light citrusy radiant cloud of cinnamon escapes the gorgeous bottle, which after a few minutes is soft and round, not sharp and pungent, spicy but gentle, and hardly sweet at all. No rice pudding associations, no roasted almonds. This is pure spice, the same as used in Indian curry, and no one thinks of rice pudding. It's a magical cinnamon, I love this prelude that lulls me into a spicy winter dream. Perfectly suited to the chill of this time of year, I use it first thing in the morning - just so I have the opportunity to enjoy its fantastic progression throughout the day. Because the radiant cinnamon opens up to other notes after a while: the resinous, soft, woody, and sweet ones.
The finest suits the cinnamon is the amber note caused by the labdanum, and surely that is why the fragrance bears this name: This Amberton namely carries the cinnamon in the truest sense of the word; he joins after about twenty minutes and then no longer leaves the cinnamon out of sight. It takes the childishness out of the cinnamon, and what the cinnamon pleasantly lacked in gourmand sweetness is now added by a light base sweetness of vanilla and tonka - you can already feel it: not a flat sugar sweetness, but a deep, many-facetted spicy sweetness. Everything fits together perfectly. It's simply an extraordinary and yet, I must clearly emphasize, very, very understated and unobtrusive fragrance: British understatement incarnate. And come to think of it, the minimal tangy-citrusy opening is caused by a cute little bergamot, I think to myself that this little citrus would probably get along perfectly with my nephew's little lemon. I'm seriously considering having Penhaligon's send Kensington Amber directly to them as a gift. That would close the Kensington lemon circle beautifully, wouldn't it?
Kensington Amber is not a true gourmand, heaven forbid. Upon spraying on, a light citrusy radiant cloud of cinnamon escapes the gorgeous bottle, which after a few minutes is soft and round, not sharp and pungent, spicy but gentle, and hardly sweet at all. No rice pudding associations, no roasted almonds. This is pure spice, the same as used in Indian curry, and no one thinks of rice pudding. It's a magical cinnamon, I love this prelude that lulls me into a spicy winter dream. Perfectly suited to the chill of this time of year, I use it first thing in the morning - just so I have the opportunity to enjoy its fantastic progression throughout the day. Because the radiant cinnamon opens up to other notes after a while: the resinous, soft, woody, and sweet ones.
The finest suits the cinnamon is the amber note caused by the labdanum, and surely that is why the fragrance bears this name: This Amberton namely carries the cinnamon in the truest sense of the word; he joins after about twenty minutes and then no longer leaves the cinnamon out of sight. It takes the childishness out of the cinnamon, and what the cinnamon pleasantly lacked in gourmand sweetness is now added by a light base sweetness of vanilla and tonka - you can already feel it: not a flat sugar sweetness, but a deep, many-facetted spicy sweetness. Everything fits together perfectly. It's simply an extraordinary and yet, I must clearly emphasize, very, very understated and unobtrusive fragrance: British understatement incarnate. And come to think of it, the minimal tangy-citrusy opening is caused by a cute little bergamot, I think to myself that this little citrus would probably get along perfectly with my nephew's little lemon. I'm seriously considering having Penhaligon's send Kensington Amber directly to them as a gift. That would close the Kensington lemon circle beautifully, wouldn't it?
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