SOTD: Aftelier Cepes & Tuberose

I sent off for a sample of Aftelier Cepes & Tuberose more than a year ago, as part of the kickoff of my perfume insanity. It was one of the weirder-sounding scents listed in the classic Now Smell This article 100 Scents Every Perfumista Must Try, and even then I was drawn by the weird. I also loved the idea of natural perfumery, though the prices did shock me, even more then than they do now.

When I sniffed it back then, I remember that I was fascinated, but I didn't even consider buying it to wear. Moving to the present, I wore it Sunday and I wore it today, and much to my surprise, I find it pretty. Not a bland ruffly-girl sort of pretty, but, yeah, pretty. Beautiful, too, but beautiful and weird is less of a surprise, to me, than pretty and weird. Cepes & Tuberose is all three.

When I fall in love with a perfume, I have trouble describing it. I have yet to satisfactorily describe Chanel No. 19. I may very well be having the same problem with this one. The tuberose is startlingly sweet. It starts out almost overpowering, and gradually calms down until, near the end, it's almost chilly, and a little candylike. The mushroom seems to walk in step, always perceptible behind the tuberose, but always subordinate to it so that I can never quite get a good sniff of it. It's dusty and a little brown-buttery.

That's the best I can do. But I want it.

Review Roundup: Now Smell This and Basenotes and MakeupAlley and IndiePerfumes and Perfume Posse and my own later Favorites post.

Image: Wikimedia Commons.