Now it's been discontinued and the bottle option is gone (if you know of someone who still has bottles, don't tell me!), and I'm down to the large decant option. I'm wearing what's probably the third-to-last wearing from my small decant. And for the first time I'm asking myself, beeswax or no beeswax, do I like the gardenia part?
Yes. I do.
I see why others dislike it. It's cloyingly sweet, with a medicinal edge. And there's a bit of a ripe-dairy vibe - that's probably the note that people smell as blue cheese. This is not a fresh, dewy flower with a lovely drop of morning dew, it's an overheated flower that's starting to decay.
Yum.
Yes, I'm strange. I'm the one that considers "smells like mothballs" to be a reason to seek out a perfume, remember? In fact, I can see the mothball/rotting-meat perfume (Tubereuse Criminelle) and Velvet Gardenia as being cousins, capering in surreal but oddly beautiful costumes, surrounded by a crowd that's keeping their distance from the medicinal vapors, but still can't help but watch in fascination.
Decant time. Yep.
Review Roundup: Is here.
Image: Wikimedia Commons.
To my nose, there is an orgiastic quality to Velvet Gardenia, which admittedly sits ill with the image of decay. Indeed, the particular combo of orgy + rotting meat in my imagination may not even have a name, which is probably just as well.
ReplyDeleteI have a bottle which I hardly ever use.. be happy to send you a large decant. I hardly ever use it. No strings attached and free.
ReplyDeleteP.S. when i say large, i mean the Sephora travel spray vial size since i don't have decanting supplies. I only put anonymous in profile cause I can't remember my google account name!
Howdy, flittersniffer! Hmmm. Yes, that's just not a happy image. Decayed flowers, yes, rotting meat, not so much.
ReplyDeleteYo, Anonymous! Thank you so much for the offer, but sadly, I'm still in the throes of the Postal Regulation Phobia - I fear to mail perfume, so I never accept kind offers of mailed perfume, because it seems Wrong to join in if I'm not going to reciprocate.
That's fine.... If your ever in Chicago area e mail me @ dc9nini@me.com & we,ll see what we can do.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Anonymous! I'll remember that. :)
ReplyDelete