Mikadomann

I believe it is the beginning of a journey…

The scent ticket that has allowed me the first stage of this journey is thanks to the generosity and expertise of a wonderful Parfumo. Therefore, this comment is dedicated to Can, with respect and deep gratitude.

Those who read my reviews and statements know that I often approach scents through images. The associations help me to understand fragrances better and to work through them.

With this special scent, images immediately arose within me. But this time it was different.
In the first second, a film scene came to mind. And more than the scene, which I only remember superficially, the image of the character and the actress playing her emerged before me. This scene and the image of this actress revealed the scent to me.

The film I am referring to is "Carol," and the actress is the beautiful Cate Blanchett. In a scene at the beginning of this film, she enters the toy department of a department store.
She radiates an incredible elegance. She wears a long, brown fur coat, underneath black, a red scarf, and on her blonde, styled hair, a red cap. And she holds leather gloves in her hand. In a close-up showing how she places these gloves on the glass sales counter, it quickly becomes clear that this accessory will play a significant role.
And perhaps it is even these gloves that first came to my mind when I smelled the fragrance for the first time.
A few minutes later, Carol will turn around once more before leaving the sales area to give the saleswoman and the viewers a breathtaking moment of feminine elegance and distinguished nobility.

And that is exactly what Tabac blond means to me: Elegant, distinguished, noble.

To make one thing clear:
The scent is not a scent for ladies. It is not androgynous either. It is what the person wearing it is.
I briefly considered whether I wanted to juxtapose the female character with a male counterpart. They would be men from literature: Forsyte, Gatsby, Swann.
But Cate Blanchett needs no counterpart…


I keep the scene, which can certainly also be found in a trailer online, in my mind and thus return to the scent.

The leather gloves, the fur. In many scenes of the film, the main characters smoke, both women.

Indeed, the scent is smoky.
But it is not smoke in the classical sense, no blue haze in a smoky room. It is also not the pleasantly fragrant pipe tobacco.
It is the smoke in a spacious and dignified hotel lobby, which appears in a beam of sunlight streaming through the large window, curling in it. White, shimmering and not from nicotine, but carried by tobacco.
This smoke, this note of tobacco is present from the very beginning in the fragrance and remains almost entirely the prominent note until the end.

The leather, which I find indescribably beautiful in this scent, is the soft leather of frequently worn gloves. They are soft suede gloves, perhaps deer leather.
And even though there are very delicate, barely perceptible hints of animal notes (I could not decipher which component in the pyramid is responsible for that), the leather is primarily underscored by a clean, beautiful creaminess. Vanilla and amber are responsible for this creaminess.
For me, this is the key to the art of this Eau de Parfum.
It is as if the composition has captured exactly the moment when the lady slips the glove off her well-creamed hand. It is precisely that moment, and I have the impression that I perceive this scene not with my eyes, but with my nose. It is as if a director is guiding my nose very close to this hand. And in that moment, smoke, softly creamed skin, and the last hint of soft leather merge into a wonderful accord.
Thus, it is not the scent of the gloves, which are made of leather. It is the scent of the skin that has shed a leather glove and on which a trace of this fragrance remains.
What I have described as slightly animalistic is the skin, the human, physical aspect of the scent, perhaps mixed with the small pearls on the wrist of a clean body on a warm day. In that moment, Tabac blond succeeds in translating a fragrance experience into the experience of intimacy and sensuality.

That the garden carnation is rated so prominently here surprised me at first. But I believe it is precisely this note that is responsible for the fine, noble quality.
For indeed, the scent is floral in the background - and towards the end, almost in the very last minutes, increasingly so. However, I never perceive the carnation as strong.
It introduces the scent and concludes it. It always accompanies in the background, never stepping into the foreground for me. I would never think of describing this scent as floral. It would always be smoky for me. But regardless of the moment: At the beginning, when the scent is smoky, or at the end, when it becomes creamy: The carnation always emphasizes the best of it. Perhaps that is what leads some people to categorize the scent as a ladies' perfume.

This is my first truly classic scent from this traditional house. With the first spray, I knew I had found a fragrance that would accompany me for a long time. It has ignited a passion in me and made me curious about the truly classic scents.
A few days after I tried the fragrance, I contacted the house in Paris.
I ordered the Eau de Parfum and simultaneously inquired about the perfume.
The somewhat clumsy explanation unfortunately did not help me further.
However, with the Eau de Parfum, I received a sample of the perfume. Today I know that my question apparently arrived just a few days before the release of the new formulation of the perfume.
In the meantime, I have compared both formats. I do not wish to open a category of better or worse here. That is not in my nature. Both are wonderful and unique scents. Furthermore, I also lack the knowledge, the history, the comparison, the olfactory education that would allow me to make a wise comparison.
Perhaps the floral note in the new formulation is stronger towards the end. The fragrance pyramid would suggest that and support the thought. At first, I only had a very faint, associative memory of the floral quality of Xerjoff's "Opera" with the new perfume, but later also with the older Eau de Parfum. Of course, never as loud and overwhelming. Perhaps readers can support me and delve into this idea.

I believe it is the beginning of a journey…
A journey that leads me to the classics. In the meantime, I have tried "Pour un Homme de Caron," "Yatagan," but also "Jicky" and "L'heure bleue." I have the impression that I am rediscovering my passion for fragrances.

This journey has only just begun.
I look forward to readers of this article supporting me with hints on worthwhile waypoints.

“Ganymede […] is the third and largest of the four Galilean moons […]” (Wikipedia)

“Ganymede, also known as Ganymedes, is in Greek mythology a son of the Trojan king Tros and Kallirrhoë […] and the ‘most beautiful of all mortals’. He was loved by Zeus.” (ibid.)

This must be how this fragrance was created:

On the rock lies, half awake, half asleep, Ganymede.
Through heavy eyelids, he sees how the midday sun, in playful complicity with the silver leaves of the olive tree, paints patterns on his skin, as if its rays were light brushes and the shadow of the leaves the color that they dab and throw and swirl.
His smile, which just moments ago was directed at his own beauty, falls dull from his lips, and in the midday heat, sleep overtakes him.
On his skin, at his forehead and chest, sparkling beads trickle; left behind, drying in the warmth, white traces. If he were to taste them, they would be salty - and sweet.

In his dream, he sees himself standing on the white beach. The view of the sea and into the distance. Far and far beyond that. He sees what lies behind all of this. What is to be discovered, what to fight for, to conquer, what to love, and his feet stand firmer now in the sand.
Then he hears a rustling and a blowing in the distance.
A hundred storms seem to merge into one.
Then the clouds gather, pile up, and form a dark heavy cloth. They surround him. They waft around him. They lay over him.

Then it becomes quiet.
Then he wakes up.
Then he lifts his eyelids.

On the stone, very close, the eagle. Its wings still spread from the mighty flight and the last gust of wind still sounds rustling in the feathers.
Neither of the two is startled. There is no need for that.
He is. And he is. Beautiful. Both.
The youthful masculinity of one. God-royal power of the other.
Deep are the eyes of the bird, and its gaze rests on the man.
The man supports himself on one arm, immerses his gaze in that of the bird, and with a careless movement, he rises from the stone on which he has rested and dreamed.
Then he stands there.

And as if the movements of the two were one, the bird opens its wings and encloses the man, wraps around him, embraces him. And holds him. And time. And time. And time passes.

Then he opens his wings.
“Why do you weep, Ganymede?”
“Because from now on I am a man.”
…
“And why do you weep, Zeus?”
“Because from now on I no longer want to be a god.”

And both tears mix on the ground.

This must be how this fragrance was created.

Nuit de Bakelite

I have been fascinated by this fragrance for months.
For months, I have been trying to write a comment about this scent.
For months, I have been trying to put my associations into words.
For months, I have been collecting keywords.
For months, they have slipped away from me.
To hell!

Well, so be it!
Just take this and do what you want with it!

I would never have thought that this scent could smell like Bakelite.
Of course not. Because Bakelite is a fully synthetic plastic that is manufactured industrially. It is odorless.

Maybe it’s not so difficult to depict nature in a fragrance. Everyone knows how a forest smells. Many know how a cat smells. But how do you translate something that doesn’t smell at all?

There are two things that significantly shape my perception of the fragrance I want to describe. They are
1. the comments and statements of other forum members and
2. the name of the perfume that the artist who created it has chosen.

I have never described a fragrance first here. I have never tested a fragrance blindly and without knowing its name.

“A fragrance for ladies and gentlemen” ... For all three genders.

The descriptions of others impress me. They influence my own impression of a fragrance. They till the ground on which my associations fall and prepare it for my own images. It’s the same with the name of a fragrance.

I feel incredibly comfortable with this scent. It allows me to be so much more.

I often wonder if the theme hidden in the name of a perfume was there first and whether the artist tried to translate this theme into a fragrance.
Or is it the other way around? Did the artist create a work of art to which they now give a name that best captures their olfactory impression?

Odorless things cannot be made to smell.

Rarely, I think, has a name matched a fragrance so perfectly as with this one.
Nuit de Bakélite. Bakelite Night...

When I describe an object, I often start with the description of its surface. When I translate an object into scent, I may be translating its surface.

When I wear this fragrance, it feels like my shell is hard. I am not made of Teflon. But when I wear the fragrance, I do not reveal my personality so quickly. A scent that keeps my secrets.

A Bakelite night: Is without shadows. Creates strong outlines. Creates clear contours. Is blue. Is green. Is metallic. Like the shell of a beetle. A beetle made of plastic.

I play Mahjong. Not the game you play on the computer to kill time that works like a memory game. I mean the wonderful game that became famous in the twenties and has its roots in China. Today, most tiles are made of plastic. The more beautiful games are made of fine wood. The first old games were made of ivory. Later, the tiles were made of Bakelite.

I am fascinated by this fragrance. It alienates me from myself. The scent makes me think rather than feel.

Some perfumers are designers.
Some perfumers are artists.
Some perfumers are magicians.
Some perfumers are sorcerers.

I would never wear this fragrance on a date… But for a rendezvous!

The music that belongs to this fragrance rattles. It becomes faster, angular, edgy, whipping. The notes describe the sound and not the melody. Suddenly it stops and the light comes on and all the alcohol is spilled on the floor.

You can tell when something is special.

When the game was played in the twenties, you could lose a lot of money. In the big metropolises, it was played in back rooms. Long cigarette holders. At dark tables. Lacquered. The wood of the tables - and the fingernails.

“Here are five marks. Go to the supermarket and buy me five kilos of love!”
“Love can’t be bought!”
It can be...

There remains something artificial. Even when seeking help in the images of nature. Do I think of flowers with this scent? Perhaps anthuriums. For me, one of the most unnatural flowers, if such a thing exists.

If you’re lucky, you might still find such a game among antiques. You quickly feel the difference between plastic and Bakelite.

“The world that is moonlit.” Rilke

The Bakelite game pieces are spread out and mixed on the table. When the pieces touch each other, a sound is produced: a bright clicking, which has been compared in China to the chirping of sparrows. Mahjong is called the “Sparrow Game” there.

The fragrance pyramid does not help me at all. I smell Angelica too. But what good does that do? I believe all the ingredients only serve to create a flat surface on which a drop of dew, rain, or a bead of sweat would slide down.

I remember a painting. A portrait of an expressionist. The woman’s face red. Nose and chin pointed. The hair like a triangular tower black. Deep rings under her eyes. The lips shaped like a lightning bolt. If the painted woman had worn this fragrance, her face would have to be painted green.

When fingernails glide over plastic, they can break. When fingernails glide over Bakelite, you feel as if you could carve into the plastic and little moons would be left behind.

The surface of old Bakelite does not feel as cold as our current plastic. It is cool in the hand and quickly becomes pleasantly warm, and then it has something waxy.

The fragrance is a shapeshifter. A shapeshifter on my skin. It uses it as a projection surface for itself. Thus, it is the most selfish scent I have ever worn.

Now I am sure. It must be much easier to bottle a walk in the woods than to capture a rough, angular lump of plastic.

No love story is told here, and there is no passion either. Perhaps a cool attraction… But that will be over by tomorrow.

The first impression is a bit smoky. But that is already the gentlest association.

The light shapes the surface. Bakelite does not shine. It’s more as if the material swallows the light and only throws back the rest of the light it retains.
The surface shimmers. If there were a word: candle-cold...

The men have no hair on their chests. They have no hair at all - nowhere. They are shaved - everywhere. But it’s not about skin here. More about white, stiff linen. No: the fabric of the shirt must be more artificial.

I smell this fragrance days later on me. On my hands and on my things. In my car. And every time I smell it, I think: It’s still there.

The amber night has seeped into its own darkness. Here is the ballroom in artificial light. Men with their hands on the ladies’ knees and their eyes on the waiter’s lips. They would laugh to death about Ambre Nuit here.

This flower is not worn in a buttonhole. It is worn in the belt buckle.

The knight does not wear armor made of steel.

Now do what you want with all of this.
The fragrance does that too…

Coffee break. Teased hairstyles in colors ranging from light blue to Snow White black…

“Anneliese, have some rumtopf with your ice cream!”
“Oh, Resi, it already smells so much like alcohol… It’s strong, isn’t it? I still have to drive.”
“Take it, Anneliese! There are only dark fruits from the garden in there.”
“Oops! Oh God! The couch… Will that come out?”
“Don’t worry! Just don’t rub it! I’ll use leather care. I got it from HaRa.”
“Yes, but the apartment will smell of it for days. You won’t be able to get that out of the room.”
“Oh, I actually quite like the smell…”
“Then you have the cream!”
…

That’s how I imagine the scene when I should vividly describe the scent progression of Alexandria II…

With the first of the five crazy sprays, I was already completely shocked. Why did I keep spraying? I don’t know!

For many here, this scent is apparently something very special!
Therefore, I say in advance: Everything I write is entirely subjective. I also believe I can sense what fascinates people about this scent. None of what I write is meant to question the validity of the enthusiasm of most in the other comments...

Nevertheless...

Some of the previous critical commentators describe their impression with the term “medicinal.”
I know exactly what they mean. For me, I further narrow it down and describe it as strongly alcoholic.
But this is not the gentle alcohol of a liqueur and not the scent that describes the variety of herbal schnapps or fruit brandies, but rather it is for me the piercing alcoholic note that strong cleaning agents or cleaning care products possess: namely furniture polishes, leather care products, stain removers.

“Stain-away! Cleans and cares. Now with an even creamier scent”
At this point, it is often asked whether a sample might have gone bad. …. No!

I have rarely, if ever, had such a strong initial defensive reaction. When some commentators write about a compulsion to wash, I also have an idea of what is meant. The piercing scent - to write about the smell would now be too negative - actually affects my nasal mucous membranes and settles on my tongue.
I had already prepared for a day with a headache. And I am really, really not sensitive.

Linen shirt, cashmere sweater, down jacket… The nose in the crook of my arm detects the scent as if there were nothing between skin and olfactory organ.
I leave the house ... and the scent becomes more pleasant.
It’s almost as if the scent needs the air to breathe itself. Like a wine that, freshly poured into the glass, is sharp in the nose but becomes softer and velvety after 30 minutes. But certainly, here too: the spontaneously noted association of alcohol.
But I now know what is meant when the scent is enthusiastically described to you...
For a brief moment, I think maybe I need to be more patient. Perhaps I will find it appealing…

The scent surrounds me the whole time. Again and again, it wafts into my nose. When I turn my head, when I lower my face, when I run my fingers through my hair …
I hesitate to speak of penetrance. (“Serves you right!”, I hear you say. “5 sprays! At Xerjoff! At Alexandria!!!”...)

As soon as I re-enter the apartment, the scent becomes too much for me. But it’s not the intensity or the sillage. It’s the scent itself that overwhelms me.

I hardly perceive the scent of roses. For me, oud dominates.
Lavender? Possibly. Amber? I imagine that to be softer.

I rarely compare scents with each other because I often think they are very independent compositions that can be described against the backdrop of one’s own perception but rarely withstand comparisons…
Here, I dare to do so, knowing that I will receive much contradiction.
I really enjoy wearing Guerlain’s Santal Royal.
At times, Alexandria II reminds me of it. But in Guerlain’s scent, the composition of rose and oud is more harmonious, creating a large arc, feeling coordinated, balanced.

I have written two detailed, enthusiastic comments on two Xerjoff scents: “Accento Overdose” and “Opera.”
There, the floral notes, the exuberance, the lavishness really captivated and grabbed me. Alexandria does not achieve that.
Perhaps I prefer the bright, fruity, truly floral aspects of the brand.
Although I generally like more angular scents, this one feels too clumsy, perhaps a bit too rude.

Towards the end, the scent becomes softer. It takes on a creamy quality. But even that is not the creaminess of desserts or fragrant skincare products, but rather the cream for leather care. And there is alcohol in that too.

Whether kings really smell like this, I do not know. If so, it must have been the Egyptian pharaohs… Perhaps.
But: I do not make that connection.

The scent possibly does not connect with a person for me at all.
It remains “in itself.” It is a scent without human qualities.
For me, it is just alcoholizing itself. It alcoholizes in my nose, on my tongue, in my esophagus, and in my head.

To speak of disappointment would be wrong. ... But I do not like it.

“There’s a knock…”
“There you are, my dear!”
“Good day, ladies! Good day, Aunt Anneliese!”
“Is this your Sebastian? My God, he has grown! And so stylish! With a rose on his lapel! How old is he now?”
“36 already! ... Law…!”
“Ohhh! You must be so proud! You can really see how time flies with the children.”
“Sebastian, have some rumtopf!”
“Mom, it smells so…”
“WATCH OUT! Oh, Sebastian! Don’t sit on that stain! Now you’ve got all the furniture cream on your pants!”
…

Awakened in the Arms of a Satyr, a Faun…

Your sheet-covered beds are not my thing!
Nor are your pillows in the cramped bunks, where you hide when you indulge in your lonely, lustful thoughts and put more effort into concealing them - even from yourselves - than in surrendering to them and truly letting them be.
My bed is the moss. My pillow is the leaves.
I don’t need your blankets. I want to see!

Last night in the clearing, you saw me. And I saw you.
As I lay there. And you were startled. Not just because of my appearance. For I am beautiful. I am beautiful, even - no: because my goat legs and my horns bewilder you. These - and my fur.
Last night in the clearing, you smelled me - even before you saw me - I know it.
I saw how you turned away. How you wrestled with yourself. You were caught between repulsion and fascination. You turned away yet still followed that scent, that smell.
And when you then came closer to see what it was, and as I lifted my upper body, propped up on my arms, and when you ran away, I knew: You would come back.

And you are here. So quickly.

There are no roses or lilies beside my bed. That’s not my thing.
But I gladly let flowers bloom for you. Deep violet with yellow veins in their fleshy petals. Right close to the ground, where the mushrooms also grow. They only open in the dark. When the sultriness of the day transitions into the sultriness of the night. When beside the moon, the scent of this flower with its waxy sweetness marks the night. Threads of its milky white sap attract the insects. They settle on its cups and drink from the sap like nectar. Their wings are shimmering green and their buzzing dull. Sooner or later, they fall silent. For the flowers do not let them go.

Does the scent enchant you? The damp leaves, the flowers, and the moss? The mushrooms - even decay?
If all of that, then how much more me!

There you are. Close to me. So close.
Breathe me in! Do you smell like I do? Not like soap or lukewarm water. That’s for your heroes. I smell of skin and fur, which is everywhere you touch. Soft, very soft in this place. And here, bristly hard. Drops of resin in it, stuck from the trees I rubbed against. And in the beard on my chin, honey from the hives I drank from. Do you smell that? My breath close to yours. Of the vanilla oil from the pods I tore from the bushes. Bitter, because without sweetness. And of wood and bark, which I chew just to pass the time. I smell of body and everything that it is and what it takes and what it gives. Of tallow and oils.

Love is not my thing. Lust: That’s what I’m good at!
I approach you. I lower my head. And as I lower it, one of my horns touches you, right where you are most sensitive. At your side. The tip glides over your skin. Down your flank and down to your belly and down to where your belt would be. Do you shiver?

Press your face against my cheek, in the crook of my neck, at my ear, in my nape.
Smell the flowers I have rolled in. Smell the fruits I have crushed and whose juice I drank. Smell the herbs I played among and with which I rubbed myself. And smell the animals in whose dens I have lain. Smell the rain in my wet fur. Smell the traces of all desire. My desire.

And when your desire then tears you apart, it is only because you are lost in the powerless-free fall in the pitch-black sky and at the same time your fingers claw into the damp, mossy ground and because roots shoot from them, holding you to the ground, here with me. And while you fly and at the same time become one with the humus, you will call words into the trees that you do not know.

And an overwhelming scent will carry you. From flowers, from trees, from juices, from animals, from wind and grass, tanned, anointed, from sweat and smoke.

In the morning then in your bed between the rumpled blankets. You will still smell it. Soft now, a little airy, almost harmonious and nearly sweet.
Between the rumpled blankets - and you know:
In that night, it was the arms of a satyr, a faun…