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The warmth of the Moroccan desert
About the sensation
In the world of perfume, a breeze (or wind) is usually associated with a sensation that cools and refreshes. Think: ocean, cloudless sky and beach. So important on summer days. Almost every brand - to name a few: Calvin Klein, Davidoff, Givenchy, Tommy Hilfiger, Jean Paul Gaultier, Issey Miyake - has been launching these summery variants for the past decade or so. And every year they manage to give a slightly different, summer-fresh interpretation to a popular fragrance.
But a breeze that makes the sun feel like a warm and intensely sensual caress on your skin is a rare thing. A scent that warms you and makes you wander through the deserts of Arabia near an oasis. And then came Chergui in 2001.
This fragrance takes the desert heat one step further. Chergui captures you from the start - no cooling oasis nearby. The fragrance is named after the 'famous' wind that blows across the inhospitable Moroccan mountains and deserts.
No fresh pleasure, just warmth: fragrant, hot grains of sand scattered on the skin by the balmy wind.
It's another typical Lutens', that is: lightly candied and with a deep layer of spices and milky resins.
Only, and this is the first time I've said this about a Lutens fragrance: the intensity of Chergui could have been a bit stronger for me, precisely because the scent is so good.
But still: Meanwhile, I'm reminded of the final scene of the movie Morocco (1930), where Marlene Dietrich decides to leave her comfortable life behind and go into the desert to follow her legionnaire lover (Gary Cooper)... that a fragrance can evoke all this.
About the scent
A soft and sultry breeze that actually has all the ingredients caressing the skin at once. But first, a slight frisson of something candied that is sweet, combined with something resembling a hay note (coumarin?) that leads into a black tea-like sensation sweetened by honey. I write 'something' twice because it's all so pleasantly indefinable. Do I smell cinnamon or not, do I smell finely grated sugar or not? Then a whirlwind of rose petals surrounded by powdery iris and milky sandalwood. Beautiful. All of this is made "firmer", more animalic and sensual in the base of Chergui by tobacco, leather and amber, each mixed with musk. Don't think that tobacco and leather make Chergui 'masculine', because the sweet notes make it 'feminine', i.e. androgynous - something typical of all Serge Lutens fragrances.
In the world of perfume, a breeze (or wind) is usually associated with a sensation that cools and refreshes. Think: ocean, cloudless sky and beach. So important on summer days. Almost every brand - to name a few: Calvin Klein, Davidoff, Givenchy, Tommy Hilfiger, Jean Paul Gaultier, Issey Miyake - has been launching these summery variants for the past decade or so. And every year they manage to give a slightly different, summer-fresh interpretation to a popular fragrance.
But a breeze that makes the sun feel like a warm and intensely sensual caress on your skin is a rare thing. A scent that warms you and makes you wander through the deserts of Arabia near an oasis. And then came Chergui in 2001.
This fragrance takes the desert heat one step further. Chergui captures you from the start - no cooling oasis nearby. The fragrance is named after the 'famous' wind that blows across the inhospitable Moroccan mountains and deserts.
No fresh pleasure, just warmth: fragrant, hot grains of sand scattered on the skin by the balmy wind.
It's another typical Lutens', that is: lightly candied and with a deep layer of spices and milky resins.
Only, and this is the first time I've said this about a Lutens fragrance: the intensity of Chergui could have been a bit stronger for me, precisely because the scent is so good.
But still: Meanwhile, I'm reminded of the final scene of the movie Morocco (1930), where Marlene Dietrich decides to leave her comfortable life behind and go into the desert to follow her legionnaire lover (Gary Cooper)... that a fragrance can evoke all this.
About the scent
A soft and sultry breeze that actually has all the ingredients caressing the skin at once. But first, a slight frisson of something candied that is sweet, combined with something resembling a hay note (coumarin?) that leads into a black tea-like sensation sweetened by honey. I write 'something' twice because it's all so pleasantly indefinable. Do I smell cinnamon or not, do I smell finely grated sugar or not? Then a whirlwind of rose petals surrounded by powdery iris and milky sandalwood. Beautiful. All of this is made "firmer", more animalic and sensual in the base of Chergui by tobacco, leather and amber, each mixed with musk. Don't think that tobacco and leather make Chergui 'masculine', because the sweet notes make it 'feminine', i.e. androgynous - something typical of all Serge Lutens fragrances.
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MrLawman
