SOTD: Hermes Osmanthe Yunnan

And again I whine about this scent. I loved it once. Adored it. Completely understood Luca Turin's five star rating. And then I never appreciated it again.

I perceive it as "matte"--smooth, but a textured, not a fuzzy or furry, smooth. Dry, not liquid. A little bit dusty. I like all that, but it's not enough. For about fifteen minutes, starting about half an hour in, there's a lovely streak of lemon and I have hopes of loving it again. Then the lemon's gone and there's too much sugar and not enough tea or smoke.

I just wandered off to look at reviews of it, and this review on Now Smell This reminded me once again of the existence of The Pour un Ete.

Maybe Din Dan is going to have to wait.

Image: By Peter Kratochvil. Wikimedia Commons.

SOTD: Hermes Hermessence Osmanthe Yunnan, and falling out of scent love

When I first tried Osmanthe Yunnan I loved it. It wasn't in my top five, but I quite understood Luca Turin's very high rating, and I enjoyed spraying it lavishly. I loved it so much on the first sniff that I have a clear technicolor memory of walking away from the Hermes boutique on a sunny San Francisco day. I even considered springing for a full bottle, instead of the bitty 15ml one.

Then, I'm not quite sure when, my attitude changed to "Meh. Kinda sweet." And it's never recovered. I try it now and then in the hope of falling back in love, but, no. Meh. Kinda sweet.

I've finally concluded that the original love was not for Osmanthe Yunnan, but for osmanthus, a scent that I wasn't previously familiar with. Novelty carried me through a few wearings, but now I want more side dishes with my creamy sweet flowers.

Review Roundup: Is here.

Image: By Lyzzy. Wikimedia Commons.

SOTD: Hermesence Osmanthe Yunnan

A little more peace and quiet Friday, and I did put on the Osmanthe Yunnan, my Signature Scent Challenge scent, one more time.

Why only one more time, you may ask? Because on Saturday we go to Barney's and the Challenge forbids sampling. I fear that Barney's wins out over any resolve.

That is all.

Review Roundup: Is here.

Image: By Palbo. Wikimedia Commons.

SOTD: Hermessence Osmanthe Yunnan

I used to love this one. I fully understood Luca Turin's five stars. I debated a full bottle, even though it came in tiny bottles of the kind that I always lobby for.

But now, I can't remember what all the fuss was about. It's pretty flowers and milky tea with a little undissolved sugar crunching in my teeth. It's Perfectly Nice, and no more. What happened?

But, all the same, this is going to be my scent for March's Scent Challenge, a challenge based around the horrifying idea of wearing the same scent for a full week. This is, in part, because I'm temporarily away from my collection. But the other part is my desire to rediscover what I loved about it, and surely a week is enough to let me know that?

It won't actually be a week. The challenge ends on the eighth, so I had to start on Monday, but I didn't pack the Fou d'Absinthe that I wore on Monday, and then I forgot to wear anything at all on Tuesday. See? So I'll be wearing Osmanthe Yunnan for five days, and by the end we'll see if I've rediscovered its charms, or if I'm sick to death of it.

And now I'm off to write 1,667 words. Wish me luck.

Review Roundup: Is here.

Image: By Dennis.B. Wikimedia Commons.

SOTD: Hermessence Osmanthe Yunnan

I've said before that in winter, Osmanthe Yunnan is no more than a sugary floral. One summer, probably last summer, it was lovely. Fabulous. I was anticipating the return of that reaction when I wore it today, but today it was no more than pretty. Sweet and pink and tea, no more. But I'll try it again soon, in the hope that today I'm mistaken.

Review Roundup: Is here.

Image: Wikimedia Commons.

SOTD: Hermessence Osmanthe Yunnan (And signs of spring.)

I've mentioned the mildly puzzling fact that I swoon over Osmanthe Yunnan in the summer, and just respond with a shrug and a "Meh. Pretty. Kinda sweet." in the winter.

I'm seeing signs of spring just now. The magnolia tree has buds, and the daffodils are showing their heads. So I tried Osmanthe Yunnan today, as a sort of test.

Meh. Pretty. Kinda sweet.

Six more weeks of winter? I'd believe a perfume over a groundhog, after all.

I am puzzled as to why I have this reaction, though. Especially about the sweet part - why should Osmanthe Yunnan seem sugary in winter and not in summer? I really need to learn more about perfume - about that whole chemicals-rising-from-the-skin thing. I want to be a more informed perfume geek. There are probably books on the subject. Hopefully at least a few that don't require a chemistry degree.

Forgot the Review Roundup! It's here.

Photo: By Reinhard Kraasch. Wikimedia Commons.

SOTD: Parfumerie Generale L'Eau Rare Matale, and a minor tea roundup

This is a tea fragrance, but it's not redundant with any other tea fragrance that I've tried. It's much darker than the bright, sugary American South iced tea of ElizabethW Sweet Tea. It's missing the floral and green tea notes of L'Artisan Parfumeur's The Pour Un Ete, replacing them with darker, stronger black tea. It's far less friendly than the warm, affable, winter-spices scent of L'Artisan Parfumeur's Tea for Two, and more bitter than the bright sunshine of L'Occitane's Bergamot Tea. It doesn't have the pleasant herbal meadow notes of Lorenzo Villoresi Yerbamate or the soft, creamy florals of Hermessence Osmanthe Yunnan. It does have a very close relationship, to my nose, with Parfumerie Generale Harmatan Noir, which I've already discussed in embarrassingly rhapsodic detail.

It's not particularly eager to please, and I seem to fall for that kind of fragrance. It has an uncompromising, medicinal-but-all-the-same-pleasant edge that reminds me of... OK, I was going to say thyme, but I went to LuckyScent to read the list of notes, and I see sage. Yes that's what I'm smelling.

My limited expertise in teasing out notes is no match for the rest of this one. There's tea, of course. And a tangy note that takes the role of citrus with tea, but isn't citrus - maybe it's the bergamot, mixing with the sage. "Burnt woods" is listed, and I do indeed get a charred note - not sweet woodsmoke, but bitter burned carbon. It claims to include white flowers, but I don't get the faintest trace of this note - to me, it's entirely non-floral.

It's one of my few season-independent fragrances - in the winter I rarely want a "refreshing" fragrance, but this is an exception. This is a solid favorite, one that I would wear quite frequently if I weren't constantly sampling.

Oh! Review Roundup! This is reviewed at Perfume-Smellin' Things and Now Smell This and IndiePerfumes.

There's also, by the way, a related fragrance called Hyperessence Matale that's said to tweak the proportions a bit, away from tea and toward the flowers, bergamot, pepper, and so on. I intend to smell it one of these days, but I don't really want less tea, so I'm not waving my arms too frantically to get my hands on it.

Photo: By Editor At Large. Details and license at Wikimedia Commons. Click for details.

SOTD: Hermessence Osmanthe Yunnan

I can't make up my mind about the Hermes Hermessences.

On the one hand, they're very pretty. People seem to agree that Jean-Claude Ellena perfumes are pretty, but then they diverge on whether they're masterpieces of transparent simplicity, or just plain simple.

I would have been in the first camp, but putting this on on a fall day, it appears that I'm in that camp only in the summer. In the winter, I'm finding Osmanthe Yunnan, just... pretty. Nice tea, lovely osmanthus, pretty relaxing scent. I'm not sorry I have some, but I'm not doing the eyes-closed drinking-in-the-scent thing.

And then there's the exclusivity thing. You can only buy the Hermessences in a Hermes boutique. (Well, maybe you can also mailorder them from a Hermes boutique; I don't know because I haven't tried.) And while they're very generous with samples if you're standing in the boutique, they're not interested in mailing you a sample - I've tried. Now, to be fair, Hermes is wonderfully generous with samples of their regular line, more than most other houses.

And then, going on to the very superficial, there's the bottle. It strikes me as well, dull. The full size does include the leather cap; I suspect that the combination reflects the leathery, horsey Hermes vibe that I just don't get.

And the size. They had the foresight to produce them in 15ml bottles, but you have to buy a set of four. If you just want one fragrance, you have to buy the big bottle. Or get your hands on a 15ml bottle from someone who bought a set, which is how I got mine.  I guess it's not realistic to expect an expensive house like Hermes to offer a bottle of perfume of any size, in their exclusive line, for less than fifty dollars. But I can still want them to.

And the strength. You might need to buy the big bottle, because you have to spray a fair bit of these on to really smell them. I'm a one-spray person with most perfumes; with Osmanthe Yunnan I apply seven sprays without really thinking about it.

So no doubt I will return to the topic of Osmanthe Yunnan in the summer, and swoon all over the page. But right now... it's OK.

Review Roundup: Now Smell This and Bois de Jasmin and Perfume Posse and The Perfume Heretic and Perfume-Smellin' Things and Basenotes and MakeupAlley and Fragrantica and SmellyBog and WouldSmellAsSweet and Les Tuileries and Vetivresse and PereDePierre and The Perfume Bee and Olfactarama and Olfactoria's Travels.

(Updated to expand the Review Roundup.)

Photo from Wikimedia Commons, by Kurt Stueber. Click for Details.