Sugarspun

If I hadn't been introduced to this fragrance as a bottling in a minimalist glass atomizer, we would probably never have met. Because although I think the bottle is beautiful, it calls out: Not for you, Sugarspun! I stand proudly on a pedestal, the cut glass sparkles in the sun, the logo is emblazoned prominently on the lid; this is for the fine ladies!

Twist #1: This is not the heavy scent of luxury and diamond brooches. Here, the fine lady takes off her pumps to step barefoot into the cool stream, so refreshing is the opening. Although synthetic, it is citrusy, green and clear with a small pinch of dark melancholy, not very sweet. The apple blossom foam shampoo associations are countered by the rather tart, straightforward bergamot leaf. The fresh euphoria of the flowers is grounded by the woody notes, which then take over.

Twist #2: Cedarwood makes an appearance. Has a nice-smelling gentleman snuck in here? No, that's me! And that from this pale pink colored liquid? I'm slowly getting dizzy. A straightforward, even serious woodiness unfolds, still hand in hand with light citrus, becoming softer and deeper. A focused fragrance, a cool breeze on the first warm days of the year.

With its unexpected facets, the fragrance is also versatile: it goes with a little black dress as well as jeans, in the office, on a trip to the countryside, in a chic restaurant and at a punk concert. Gender, age? No matter! A good example of what marketing does to us.

Twist #3: After a long day, I'm lying in bed, my wrist suddenly scented with delicate cream. Still Twist? Yes! Barely perceptible, but wonderfully subtle and flattering, once again completely unexpected. Because if there's one thing I have to criticize about the fragrance so far, it's its lack of subtlety; despite its stylistic breaks, it comes across as quite loud and linear, lacking that final touch of sophistication. At this point, a warning regarding the dosage: the spray head of my 50ml bottle is extremely potent, one spray is enough!

All in all, a good match, the Twist and me. We'll have a lovely spring together, it'll probably be too heavy in the height of summer, but it might suit the fall foliage again. I'm looking forward to what's to come. More plot twists not ruled out!

Which fragrance was it? Idôle? Miss Dior? Oh dear! About two hours earlier, I had tested my way through the medium-sized perfumery. Nothing had convinced me. But as is so often the case, a whiff didn't land on the test strip, but on my thumb. And there now sprouts a delicate rose dusted with powdered sugar, dragging me mercilessly back into the perfumery and retracing my steps. What a relief when we find each other again!

This love at second sight, the faint echoes of an on/off relationship, has stayed with me to this day. If I don't wear the fragrance for a few days or weeks, my enthusiasm is limited - to put it mildly. It opens as if all the women's fragrances in a department store perfume department had arranged to meet up with a few cans of hairspray under my bed to jump out together and spray me all over. Orange blossom and freesia storm around me, it's sweet and shrill and I'm seized by a brief panic - I'm not 17 anymore, I can't smell like that.
But once this shock is over, this beautiful rose blossoms, softly nestled against jasmine. The freesias recede, becoming more delicate and clean, just the way I like them, and leave room for a powdery, lightly elegant, never dominant musk. How beautifully caressing, relatively sweet, I can't suppress my smile. This is what good humor, warmth and cheerfulness smell like to me, but without digressing too much into the banal.
By the evening, the sweetness has faded and now the fragrance smells most strongly of Narciso Rodriguez, powdery, slightly woody and creamy, and I am determined to wear this wonderful fragrance, this pure happiness in a bottle, again the next day. Until I feel like wearing something else again. And then the fragrance stays on the shelf for another week until I reach for the bottle again - and then the dance starts all over again, the fragrance molecules arm themselves for the attack, I wonder what possessed me, we finally fall into each other's arms laughing.

There are many of us who are instantly hooked by "Oooh, that smells like freshly washed laundry!" and immediately grab a fragrance called Laundrette in a modern, minimalist bottle. Why actually?

I was curious about the fragrance and wanted to think about it, so I ordered a sample. The fragrance is as clean as expected, not soapy-clean, but floral-clean, not really pure white for me either, rather light blue with a slight tendency towards lilac, splashes of color from iris and freesia, light and cool and fresh, but still with a certain melancholic depth, which I attribute to the blackcurrants. It stays close to the skin and won't turn a subway into a Persil meadow full of sheets rattling in the wind, but I can still smell it on my skin after about 7 hours and on my sweater the next day. A beautiful, fresh, pleasant scent, a spring walk on a Sunday, sitting with loved ones in a meadow of flowers. Almost bought.

Back to the initial question, what is so special about fresh laundry? It's actually commonplace and easily available at any time: Washing machine open, dirty laundry in, wait an hour, fresh laundry out. Do I have to pay €80 for this? No, if the need for the fresh laundry scent didn't go deeper. Someone is taking care of you, it's clean and tidy, someone means well with you. It's clean and tidy around you and that's how it smells, at least a little bit of laundry day in Bullerbü idyll in this dirty and cluttered world. A small consolation.

And then came the memories of my visits to the laundrette. This was where we met up when we had no money and no space for our own washing machine. There was always something (or someone) to watch, students inside with hand-rolled cigarettes and laundry in huge backpacks, scolding mothers, the rattling of laundry trolleys on the tiles. I liked to sit there, to read, to watch, a little microcosm. Or back then, when I felt more alone than ever in my life, the small-town girl on work experience in the anonymous big city, and an older lady in the laundrette was the first person who really wanted to talk to me, it was so human, so approachable.
And it is precisely at this point of the laundromat association that Ms. Toni's Laundrette weakens for me. It is precisely this human, loud, perhaps a little bit grubby quality of the laundrette that I feel is missing here to perfection, because the straightforward freshness also seems a little distant, takes a step back from the dirty laundry, doesn't take you by the hand and doesn't let you participate in everyday life. Minimalism may be liberating, but it's also always a bit aloof and I'm not like that. I sometimes spill coffee on my pants. A little twist in the fragrance, a little stumble and it would be a great love. But still: almost bought. I'm still thinking about it. But first I should get my laundry out of the cellar.

Here I sit, in self-imposed Corona solitary confinement, trying to grasp an illusion and make it tangible. Ambitious? Dream dancer? Or an impossibility to write about a fragrance with a nose that feels concreted over?

The need to do exactly the latter arose from the realization that it was precisely this nose that made a new facet of this fragrance appear. After a weekend of sweatpants and self-pity, I wanted to feel more presentable again, to do something good for myself, and chose this comforting, fine-creamy vanilla fragrance, which I had previously appreciated for its elegant restraint and cool, melancholy vanilla, which doesn't directly evoke that lactose-intolerant discomfort like a freshly cooked bowl of custard, but gently peeks out between woods and a fairytale-like ink, giving the fragrance a soothing softness.

The new facet, the new realization of the snuff nose: the vanilla has changed! It is suddenly darker and smokier, envelops me like a warm blanket and whispers to me that everything will be fine in the end.

I am curious to see whether the vanilla will reveal itself in other guises, but I already think I understand the illusion a little better: On a chilly winter morning, I wander through a misty fairytale forest, of course I have the forest from Cornelia Funke's Inkheart in mind, and the vanilla is always a piece of home, a piece of security that I carry before me like an old-fashioned little lantern.

Longevity and sillage are rather private, unless you spray the fragrance generously on your scarf and clothes, in which case you'll be walking in a cloud and it will rain compliments, but that doesn't seem to suit the fragrance for me.

As befits an illusion, the bottle also poses new questions for me: if it weren't for this beautiful, soft, slightly mystical blue, wouldn't the fragrance seem different to me? Would it be a much clearer gourmand in a warm old pink?

The fine line between review and speculation, it's time to come to a mundane conclusion. I really like the fragrance, it doesn't impose itself, it's warm, it's modern and yet a little nostalgic, it keeps its little secrets. This is my concession to the vanilla trend and I am very satisfied.

Disclaimer: Typos and logical impurities are solely due to Corona, not the reviewer's wackiness! ;)