Konsalik

Several reviewers on these pages have contributed with their descriptions to the fact that Bel Ami presents himself to me in my mind as a slightly frivolous, but heart-felt, tobacco-tanned wrinkled face from the beat of a Lino Ieluzzi or Peter Heinrich. What could be more obvious than to make a comparison with Davidoff's Zino (which is also not far-fetched in view of the year of publication), at least as a heuristic and frame of reference?

But while the light-steamy, walk-in humidor at Zino houses not only decent longfillers but also a whole battery of simple economic miracle herb wraps like "trade gold", Bel Ami's is rounder, more select and of higher quality. The tobacco association is rather comparable with very dark, slowly fermented leaves, dark chocolate and oily shiny. But, wait: what are the white speckles on the leaf? Mildew? No! Sugar crystals, as they can also form on the leaves of pipe tobacco that have been stored for a long time (so-called "geageten"). For despite all the serious, dark green-brown roundness, the entire fragrance is accompanied by a very natural sweetness, which - in view of the listed notes - does not give off a particularly vanilla-like note. After the soft, citric top note had faded away, I was instead accompanied deep into the base by a reminder of a freshly opened bag of sultanas, which with their specific, withdrawn fruit sweetness provide an excellent accompaniment for heavy tobaccos. Like, what, rum? Yeah, it's kind of available here too, but without a hint of molasses. But something ethereal, almost alcoholic is still found. I guess the oakmoss in connection with the listed coconut, but my analytical apparatus fails at this point.

A slightly melancholic gentlemen's evening in Caracas, in which the ceiling fan hums slowly, half-closed blinds shut out the sharpest rays of the already low sun and the friends present are offered pleasures that must seem strange and provocative to our Jochen Schweizer society.
Let us hope, with all our sympathy for the friendly gentlemen, that in the fields behind the house only tobacco is actually cultivated.

If I had to define a single scent or chord as "ore masculine", this could of course only be the one that was most obvious to me when many men came together in childhood days, such as birthdays, weddings, etc. The milieu was a petty bourgeois one: Rainer in the Manta, Wolfram in the Golf, Achim in the bronze cadet, Grandpa Paul proudly in the well-groomed, night-blue Mercedes. The region is the border area between the Lower Rhine and the western Ruhr area, the formative period being the late eighties and early to mid-nineties. The basic male chord, which was omnipresent, was (drum roll!): The pungent, dusty light green of cloves on oak moss.

And gee, I find it hard to tolerate perfumes with this note on me (kitchen psychologists to the front!) Sometimes they even tie up my neck - this is what happened with "Le 3e Homme" by Caron, although I would like everything by Caron so much... In short: carnation and moss have to be strongly contained and toned down if they want to compete together, if I am to enjoy them. Capucci pour Homme solves this task quite well by pressing long-lasting, tough-wax citrus fruit peels onto the bed of cloves and moss from above and rinsing it from below with fluffy, foamy, incense-containing soap. Thus moistened and drenched, nothing dusts or scratches anymore; Capucci pour Homme, despite all its self-confident masculinity, on the contrary, even appears quite "polished" and balanced, which will certainly also be due to the other components of the heart and base notes.

In addition, the favourable sales price - perfectly happy, Mr. Konsalik? Not quite! I'd still like a shaving soap from Capucci. I would even prefer it to the EdT, if I did not only feel well-groomed - I would be too!

Since Parfumo has recently made a very meaningful-sounding adjustment to the rating system and also made the top scents in each category more visible through small banners, I thought, why not take a look at these top scents in the community? And why not start with the unisexers... Maybe I have something at home? Well, besides a few drops of Cuir Beluga (Jawollo!) there are about two milliliters of "Layton" in the bathroom, which were part of a great package win.

Sigh. Parfums de Marly, huh? That will surely give a review. On the one hand, I'm so not the target group (I was "launched" over 30 years ago, most of the perfumes in my collection were launched more than 70 years ago on average), on the other hand, I don't like the brand as a whole any more than Creed - yes, that's possible. A cursory glance through the reviews so far also shows that this is a parallel world of perfumery. I don't know any of the authors - and by that I don't even mean the punctuation refusing coitulators (brand: "He shines so hard ey he projects the Fon your SchAlter!!!!11!1"), but also the (quite to be found) respectable writers. So I can only try to do justice to this public favourite for better earners or disputants from my perspective and describe as objectively as possible what is happening here. Since the elite of PdM friends are certainly much more trained than I am, I'll go even further and formulate unpleasant things in a strictly positive way. The following stands out:

1. Layton stands as stable and reliable as the two rising stallions above the crest of the Scuderia de Marly *cough*. He begins and ends essentially on the same note and thus spares you from unpleasant surprises. Whoever tests this scent and appreciates it right away, may take it: It stays like that

2. Thankfully, Firmenich has broken down the difficult-to-overlook multitude of scents listed into a candied apple-on-wood-stick chord. This chord, surrounded by freshly spun cotton candy, is very vivid and realistic. I am very serious: I feel like I am at a fairground! Huiiii!!

3. It also has the durability and sillage of a fairground booth, which in turn might relativize the - at first glance perhaps questionable - price-performance ratio: A quarter sprayer for the interview, a half for the tinderdate and the whole thing for a wild weekend: That's where you come in! Well done, Parfums de Marly!

Only the question of the F, which "the" projects onto the Sch, does not really want to be solved. When asked, the lady of the house expresses it like this: "He is never unisex. This scent attracts penises, not vaginas."

Hm, not for me then. But as a clientele fragrance, it's definitely better than current Davidoffs or Armanis and thus, according to my calculations, clearly above average.

No, this arch-british person - so rich in antiquity - should not have much in common with his original recipe. Unless, of course, the perfumer in charge had incidentally anticipated the invention of the fougère chord by about fifty years in 1837, without a Frenchman (or anyone else outside the Empire!) getting wind of it.
On the contrary, on the occasion of the "relaunch" of 1910, the fougère trend, which was already in full swing, must have been heavily cross-eyed, since the Proto-Fern of Houbigant, which gave its name to the fern, was only on the market for a tender 28 years (at that time, trends often outlasted one and a half generations). Penhaligon's also followed suit a few years later with "English Fern".

How English did he stay, this Lavender? Does he speak a little French? Does the lavender even go the flowery soft direction of continental European cultivation? Oh, not at all! The pampered Monsieur Fougère was mercilessly naturalized, fed with mint sauce, porridge and dark beer and in this condition he was put into a comfortable cottage in the country.
Still true to its name, the weighting of the Fougère pyramid has been decisively shifted towards a rather tart, less flowery lavender. The warm, herbaceous, hay-like components of a classic fougère only really appear on the skin after a few minutes (on paper almost not at all); but the lavender remains dominant for the longest time. And it makes you happy: On the occasion of the first test on a cloudy day (both literally and figuratively), the sun broke through the clouds while the first sniffers on the back of their hands and, broken by the bathroom window, painted warm rainbow colours on the white plastered wall. Wordless serenity, a mild smile on the reviewer's lips. I knew immediately: This is good

But "English Lavender" is not as British and reserved as one might think; in the first lesson he even projects quite clearly. So the mother-in-law shouted in the hallway over one and a half floors(!) full of ecstasy "What smells so good here? Well, in view of the favourable price the 430ml-canister should stay in the budget for Mother's Day...

"English Lavender" paints modest English country life in pastel tones with a noble attitude. Landed Gentry in a cottage. Mr Darcy should be riding by any moment to break the news to young Mrs Bennett. Meanwhile, I sit in the mild spring sunshine of an already warm March afternoon and enjoy a first stout.

Do you know this feeling of finding one of these large pebbles, perfectly polished over decades and centuries, on the banks of a river; one of those types that leave you no choice but to bend down and feel the specimen, feel its weight in your hand and enjoy its "natural ergonomics" and naked gravity alone? How nice when this haptic temptation also comes from man-made objects - and Floid has been calling me regularly and silently to the bathroom shelf since he arrived about a week ago, just so that I can handle the bottle for a few seconds, also silently, and enjoy its perfect presentation. Not only the shape and the thickness of the glass wall are right, no: also the slightly conical, bakelite-like screw cap conveys down-to-earth quality, the rich orange-brown colour (somewhere between Fanta Mandarin and strawberry) almost tempts you to sip on the splash opening... Oh yes, and this aftershave does smell so proud and stately on top of it. Very well indeed. But first a very brief digression

I love men's floral scents. Not that I wanted to try my hand at the modern business of gender relativism (indeed, part of me even thinks that the dazzling Otto Weininger immortalized essential elements of this subject as early as 1903 and since then we have only rarely seen progress and much more often extremist regressions in this field, but that is only incidentally), not at all, no, it is more about the following: The Floral Herbal has always had the possibility to harmoniously and temperately unite those primary olfactory expressions that, especially in contemporary men's fragrances, are often taken to brutal, caricature-like extremes: The beguiling sweetness and the fresh acrid. Floid combines both as artfully as casually.

While cinnamon in particular was highlighted in many of the other speeches on fragrance, Floid for me is primarily a floral scent - and a rose scent at that. This rose, which is clearly standing in the room, must now be mastered, otherwise it could turn into an opulent femininity (whether madamish or lascivious). Here, cinnamon and the menthol promised on the outer packaging (valuable, thick cardboard box, hach! Pardon...) jump in at practically the same time and do their work: the menthol splits the waxy swelling in a cooling manner and roasts it, the cinnamon gives it a spicy, stabilizing character and supports the rose chevaleresque, which has been so badly affected by the methol. This simple castling gives rise to an unmistakable fragrance that is remarkable for two reasons:

1. He is for an aftershave (the user Yatagan is right: "After Shave" does not do justice to this specimen) extremely persistent and present, without wanting to play eau de toilette like a wolf in sheep's clothing - which would be annoying with time.

2. Menthol, which in many other shaving products is simply a means to an end, is not just a "coolant" that prevents skin irritation and closes the pores, but is also taken seriously as a fragrance and is included in the composition.

It is hard to imagine a European society in the 20th century that rested so naturally in its sexual archetypes as the (otherwise extremely restless) Spain of the 1930s. And Floid is just as naturally masculine - without any pompous mackerel, which in the end is only meant to cover up deep-seated insecurities.
Charmed!