Yesterday, feeling spry and rejuvenated, and looking for reinforcement of the fact, I went into Paint ‘N Powder, the perfume shop in the Royal Arcade. I usually stay away from this place.  There’s something deeply wrong about the mass plantings of diamante brooches and the tester bottles hidden behind the phalanx of short, determinedly unglamorous shop assistants.               

Acquiescence being the only possible strategy amongst the clutter, I asked for inspiration.  She asked for clues, “what’s in your wardrobe?”  Now being a perfume aficionado in a previous life, I knew she wasn’t asking about my unironed shirts and the pants with the safety pin holding up the hem.             

“Oh, Sonia Rykiel, Chanel’s Rue Cambon, and, would you believe, Maroussia?”  I thought the Chanel might intrigue her; no populist Allure or Chance for me, but one from Les Exclusifs range, $330 a pop and counting.  And the Maroussia – cheap, Russian and entirely innocent — would indicate my love for piquant contrast. “Ah, you like fruity and rich,” she said. Mmm, so much for piquant contrast.             

First, she sprayed Les Merveilles by Hermes on my right wrist. Ugh.  Too fruity, too simple, a pale imitation of the Sonia Rykiel. Then she sprayed Balmain’s Ambre Gris on my left.  This was better because softer, less sweet, more complicated. Just then we were interrupted by a man who rushed in to announce he was illegally parked and needed to pick up a perfume quick.  It sounded exciting, and so galvanised the phalanx I immediately wished I were illegally parked.  It also gave me the chance to back out gingerly between the cubic zirconias, and go off to my hairdresser.              

To my surprise, Les Merveilles went through a brief heyday for a few minutes sometime in the afternoon, while the Balmain became a complete drag by the time I reached Bourke Street Mall.  In short, it was a typical episode in the life of an ex-aficionado: nothing smells the way it used to.    

Nothing excites me like the Dioressimo, the L’Interdit, the Je Reviens of the days when I snuck off from my first job down to the perfume counter at David Jones in Sydney, nor the Le Must de Cartier of my early twenties, nor the Eau Sauvage of my first proper lover. Nothing compares with the thrill of the first perfume I ever bought on the proceeds of my part-time job at Kmart, Arpege, nor the quantum leap I made with the second, Chanel No. 5.              

No, something changed in the 80s, and it wasn’t just me.  Something mean and nasty crawled into perfume-making, and it’s still there.              

*****              

Nostalgia for past glories is part of the whole point of perfume.  Perfume, the movie, and the original book by Patrick Suskind, was all about the attempt to recapture the essence of the red-haired girl.               

But it’s also a fact that in the 80s many of the original perfume houses began to be taken over by the big conglomerates like LVMH and, with the maximal profit motive installed, nothing’s ever been the same.  How can it be when the time taken to produce a scent is so much less? As Luca Turin notes, “serious perfumes used to take at least a year to compose,” yet for major brands, “that time is now typically down to three months.”               

The major difference between most contemporary perfumes and earlier — say, pre-80s — perfumes is the move from complexity to simplicity, from intrigue to prettiness, from musty to clean.  To put it another way, from the erotic to the hygienic.  It’s like perfume houses, or more precisely their shareholders’ Boards, stopped trusting the public to “get it.”  Like they could no longer afford to delight some, but only to offend none.               

It’s also about the triumph of a particular aesthetic, though I’m using the term loosely.  It’s the aesthetic of the merely pretty, the aesthetic that in Australia holds up models like Jennifer Hawkins, Miranda Kerr, Lara Bingle as the most desirable women.  Lara Bingle!  Good grief!  It’s like a four year old playing dressups in black Prada and Christian Louboutin.  So infantile, so pretty, so boring, so sexless.          

It’s the antithesis of the jolie laide aesthetic found in France.  Literally, “pretty ugly”, the French have always understood about women who are attractive while not being pretty.  In fact, men can be jolie laide too.  I once had a boyfriend who was both beautiful and ugly at exactly the same time and I never tired of looking at him.             

Looking down the staircase in Coco Chanel's apartment at 31 Rue Cambon

At least the sport of perfume criticism is flourishing.  Here’s one blogger’s view on the Balmain Ambre Gris sprayed on me by the Paint ‘N Powder guard:            

A new fragrance coming from a very famous house which launched marvels of the kind of Jolie Madame and Vent Vert.  Unfortunately, their new creations cannot be compared to the old ones; they come in very classy bottles, but their content is dull and totally devoid of innovative potential. Ambre Gris — once again, a fragrance with “Ambre” in its name — is not worth analyzing, it is just one of those Amber fragrances which are floating the market at the moment. Yet, I would not call it unpleasant, but if you are looking for something stylish and original, this cannot be your choice. Save your money and get the decent and well made Ambre by Yves Rocher instead, or go for Maitre Gantier et Parfumeur “Ambre Précieux,” nearly the same price as Ambre Gris – but so much more refined.           

Here’s the completely over-the-top Bois de  Jasmine on another “exclusive,” Cologne Blanche from Dior,  a man’s perfume that a former client of mine used to wear.  Whenever I got out of the lift at work, I always knew if he’d arrived before me.           

However, there is something ethereal and alluring about the fragrance that makes one want to lean in and inhale the scent emanating from the skin. The stunningly elegant drydown is reminiscent of inhaling the bittersweet aroma of peach stone …           

And here’s Luca Turin again — author of The Secret of Scent and the bible of perfumery, Perfumes: The Guide — on my expensive, uneasy 31 Rue Cambon:           

Every one of these is as good as it gets, but one gave me an emotion I hadn’t felt for years.  It was the thrill of feminine beauty, the pang of pain and longing you get in Rear Window when Grace Kelly breezes in, throws her coat on a chair and saunters over to give James Stewart a kiss.  It is 31 Rue Cambon, after Chanel’s Paris address, and the best Chypre in thirty years.  With current perfumery restrictions on oakmoss, a new great Chypre had seemed impossible.  Remarkably, Chanel used a pepper-iris accord instead to achieve a classical effect in a completely novel way. (1)        

I wish I felt as excited about it as he does.  I’ve owned it for six months, but only worn it a few times.  It starts off very sharp but with the intense femininity and classicism Turin describes, then it quickly goes soft and somewhat bitterish. This is the phase I like the least and unfortunately it lasts for hours. It changes again many hours later, and finally, the next day, is at its most beautiful.  But it’s a long time to wait for beauty, and if you wanted to seduce someone with it you’d have to spray yourself the day before.  So no unexpected encounters for it!         

Still, I’ll persist with it for a while yet because its very contrariness is a delight compared to the cheap thrills of other contemporary stuff.  The restriction on oakmoss intrigues me too.  I don’t know what it means, but I intend to find out.  And to be almost illicit with oakmoss is surely a bit like illegal parking.         

*****       

Notes
1.  http://www.nzzfolio.ch/www/d80bd71b-b264-4db4-afd0-277884b93470/showarticle/e324be7b-a531-4b17-ad54-58d0f53c4e3c.aspx 

Images: Actress, Romy Schneider at Coco Chanel’s Rue Cambon apartment in 1960; courtesy of Perfume Posse and www.verdeau.com