First

Three and a half years ago, I wrote a blog article about my search for a dragee fragrance. The article became increasingly confusing after I received recommendations, which I then tested on occasion. At some point, I gave up the search. I had found a lot that went in the right direction, but there still wasn't really what I was looking for.
So yesterday, when I received a Nectar Olfactif travel pack of fragrances and more or less by chance tested Suprême Nectar first, I remembered my search: could this, quite unexpectedly, be my dragee fragrance?

At first, Suprême Nectar is very clearly woody in my nose, too woody for a dragee. But then - then comes a mild, gentle, dry sweetness that has very clear echoes of what I would call a dragee. Behind this powdery, pleasant sweetness, the wood recedes into the background and only now do I smell it as sandalwood. The fragrance then remains powdery sweet for many hours and yet so mild, light and restrained that I can't help but think of dragées.
Suprême Nectar does not change significantly until the end, the sweetness slowly recedes, but the other notes soon follow, and at the end, as at the beginning, there is predominantly wood, which I no longer perceive as sandalwood, but as an artificial woody fragrance. Fortunately, it is still sufficiently subtle. Contrary to what it says in the pyramid, I do not find Suprême Nectar creamy at any time or in any way. I can't smell patchouli either, and of vanilla - dragee vanilla! - i only smell a tiny hint of dragee vanilla.

Have I found my dragee fragrance now? I am wavering. It's still a little too woody for that, but otherwise no other fragrance has ever come so close to my imagination. Especially in the middle hours, this is a wonderful sandal tea for me!

I had a so-called "club jacket" as a child. A "club jacket", I learned, was dark blue, had a collar similar to a jacket that could be folded over and two breast pockets that were round at the bottom and square at the top. The breast pockets, the cuffs and the jacket itself could be fastened with shiny metal buttons. My "club jacket" was hip-length and was only worn on festive occasions. It also had an embroidered crest in red, blue and gold on a white background. At the time, I asked what kind of "club" it was, because I thought of a club as an association of people who had something official in common, e.g. a sports club. To my disappointment, I found out that my jacket didn't belong to a real club, but was only modeled on jackets from clubs. In the course of this, I also learned about the English gentlemen's clubs of the last century.
Later, I was to get an impression of such gentlemen's clubs in several books, films and series. This probably didn't give me a realistic picture of club life at that time, but it didn't stop me from imagining it vividly, even to the point of imagining what it would be like to belong to such a club. I knew that only men could be accepted into such a club, but I didn't understand it. And so my idea of what it would be like to belong to such a club was automatically linked to the idea of what it would be like to be a man.

The scent of Source takes me back to this old idea of being a member of an English club:
Light, tart and smoky, Source is not mine at first. To me, it seems like the most pleasant kind of incense, although I don't actually like incense that much, plus the peaty, sour taste of whiskey. I don't like whiskey that much either. Nevertheless, the top note is quite wearable and okay for me, which is more than I can say for many similar top notes. The reason is that everything here is natural.
After just a few minutes, I can understand the library feel of Moincha: Yes, this is what old, dusty tomes can smell like, their leather bindings beginning to disintegrate sourly-selflessly from the many hands that have touched them. But the image of the library only lasts for a very short time, because now the scent becomes sweet. A sweet and smoky mélange gradually develops, which is neither too smoky nor sweet in the sense of edible, but rather like I imagine an old, soft leather armchair in my British club of the last century. Along with the whiskey, I now also see ancient, cracked leather armchairs and dark furniture in shiny wood, with the odd tome on side tables.
People do smoke, but not excessively, and the cigarettes and cigarillos are of high quality. Whiskey is drunk, but not excessively, and of course the whiskey is also of good quality. Perhaps this club association is the reason why the scent radiates such a friendly calm, a slowing down in the best sense, a concentration on the essentials in times when letters still had to be written by hand, perhaps even driven to the harbor in carriages to be brought to their destination by ship. This slowness, this down-to-earth calm, takes me away from the hectic pace of everyday life. I sink deep into my club chair.
A few hours later, the smoke is almost gone and the acidity is completely gone. What remains is sweetness and a hint of powder begins to set in.

At the end, Source fades away pleasantly mild and slightly nutty, continuing to soothe with some musk on wood.

Welcome to the club!

The color of the bottle already gives it away: Here it is aquatic, here we have a summer fragrance!
I spray and - whoosh! Freshness! Wow, great: aromatic, aquatic, citrusy, yet light and transparent. At first, the fragrance reminds me of a fine aftershave that is herbaceous in a positive way, which for me means that there is definitely no verbena in it.
I've been looking for a saltwater aquatic that suits me for years and I can tell you in advance that I haven't found one here either. But Dscvr Me! is going in the right direction. I smell water, fresh water, seawater, because it lacks the typical soft and sometimes stale, even musty smell of fresh water.
I've always wondered how to translate salt as a smell, because salt itself doesn't smell, but salted aromas smell different than when they are unsalted. Again, I don't smell salt, but my association is salt water, not fresh water. It smells fresh and clean and like wind, wind from the sea, not wind from the harbor, or even a fishing port or a beach with seaweed sniffing away.

As we progress, the herbs become more prominent, so now we have more and more land in sight. Dry land, where plants release their aromas into the shimmering air, which are carried out to sea. Immortelle, which often seems too shaggy and harsh to me on its own, is very well balanced here and harmonizes with the other nuances in an interesting way, the jasmine is so soft that it is hardly recognizable as such for me and the resin component is also very soft and balanced with the other notes
I like this fragrance!

I like it for about 4 hours and then the usual musky base creeps in increasingly and inexorably. Here it is comically paired with a slight plastic undertone and minimal, lappy sweetness. It is precisely this disappointing mainstream base that has spoiled many a fragrance for me.

It's a shame that the beautiful herbs and the successful representation of salt water can't hold their own for me.

So my search will continue.

Some other place, somewhere, some other time....

I had to think of this line from the album I Robot (Alan Parsons Project) when I tested I Am.

Because if it wasn't winter now, if the situation I'm currently in wasn't the one it is... then I might be more excited about this fragrance, because I Am is impressively floral and by no means run-of-the-mill:

What an opening of lush blossoms, white, very white-flowered and - yes, I have to say, it does make me flinch briefly - indolic. But I only flinch briefly. Because there is something else. And that makes me smell the spray again and again, where I have only sprayed sparingly because it is a sample from a travel pack. After all, the sample should continue its journey and more people should get to know this fragrance.
So, despite sparingly spraying, one spray on the wrist, not all the way through, very intense white flowers.
I primarily recognize indolic jasmine.
But what else is there? I try to block out the jasmine in order to grasp what lies behind it, what I sense, what I like more than the jasmine - it's hard to put my finger on it. It's a different flower, warmer, milder, softer, friendlier, yet paired with spice, but it too is mild and soft and not indolic.
Maybe I'll get to that later, maybe the indolic will fade into the background as it develops. The background reminds me a little of what I have learned to call magnolia in fragrances. I like it very much, I find this note extremely friendly, almost uplifting, a note that I like to wear in any mood.

I wait to be able to better describe what is behind it and I wait for about two to two and a half hours, during which nothing changes.

But then it turns out just as I thought: the jasmine recedes and behind it? Well, the "magnolia" has also withdrawn, so it remains behind the jasmine, which is no longer in first place.
What is now in first place?

A delicate spiciness emerges, slightly nutty, very slightly sweet and with something that could be tonka, but only very subtly. There is also something minimally woody-green (cedar?). The mixture makes this second part of the heart note, as I would like to call this phase, a wonderfully mild, now powdery, feel-good fragrance that still offers enough interesting and floral undertones to not be boring at the same time.

As the fragrance progresses, it gradually transforms into a soft, powdery-woody musk base and the florals recede further and further into the background. Fortunately, this is a musky scent that I quite like because it has been used discreetly and because it is powdery, not creamy.

I wrote this review without reading Pyramid beforehand. However, I had read it briefly once weeks ago to decide whether I should sign up for the touring package. Only then I had looked at the pyramids of all the fragrances sent on the journey one after the other and that was a total of 3 packages.

When I look at the pyramid of I Am now, I have to say that I definitely didn't smell any citrus. I love the scent of freesia, but they are not indolic to my nose. I didn't notice any pink pepper, although it bothers me in many other fragrances.
Magnolia It was always "behind", yet it was recognizable to me! That surprises me.
What I called tonka is probably benzoin. I perceive benzoin in many other fragrances as old, old-fashioned, vintage. I Am, however, has a consistently modern effect on me.

Well, musk and cedar - that's a bit of a shame - for me it's the boring basic combination of the current mainstream par excellence and that alone makes it easily recognizable here. Fortunately, however, the combination in I Am doesn't have the plastic appeal that it has for me in many other fragrances.

It's winter and I'm more worried than usual at the moment for several reasons.

This lively, cheerful, young floral scent, carefree and uninhibitedly floral - it doesn't quite fit my mood at the moment. But who knows? The next spring is sure to come and

...some other place, somewhere, some other time....

We've all been there: not wanting to do anything. Not even wanting to do anything, because that would also be doing something. It's good if you're in such a mood and have a weekend in summer and a garden to go to, lie down on a lounger or a blanket, close your eyes and switch off.
I thought of such a mood when I tested La Pluie. I thought about the fact that when you close your eyes and calm down, you notice things that you normally ignore, delicate things, quiet things. Everything that would be lost in the bold foreground of the hustle and bustle of everyday life.
I sprayed La Pluie, closed my eyes and it was as if I was lying in a garden of delicate scents, with the mild certainty that I didn't want to do anything except trace the various nuances that my nose perceived.
First the bright, minimally herbaceous top note. What is that I can sense? Bergamot? Lemon balm? A hint of lemon thyme? Light, bright, fleeting, dry, just like summer, a summer with a light breeze that sometimes carries one thing, sometimes something else, and lets it move on. Is there a hint of jasmine? Roses? Everything comes and goes with the wind. It soon becomes apparent that some flowering plants seem to be present in greater numbers or in close proximity: Irises, but also others that I don't know and therefore can't name. My friend said she smelled geraniums. I have only rarely smelled geraniums and would not recognize their scent. But there is something tart about it that I assume could be attributed to geraniums. The mild, warm summer air makes all the nuances seem transparent, delicate and natural. I want to doze off in this aromatic, moving scent. As the fragrance progresses, the previously iridescent scent firms up somewhat. What remains is powdery but transparent iris, something tart (geranium?) and a hint of vanilla.