HS3

It’s a pity, but Serge Lutens has decided to pull Douce Amere from its export line, and only offer it exclusively as a Paris bell jar. I’m sure they have their reasoning behind all of their marketing, whether it be their exclusive Paris line, or single year limited exports, but I don’t like it. When I heard that Douce Amere was being pulled, I stopped putting off the purchase and emailed my SA at Barney’s to have her hold me a bottle until their next bag event.

Douce Amere is a gorgeous scent. It combines the familiar sweet, hay-like base of Serge Lutens that is reminiscent of the drydown of Chergui with a crisp, icy anise opening. It has a slight boozy feel to it in the top notes that might remind you of a whiff of Chartreuse liquor. It settles into a comforting, velvety middle with signature SL cues. It’s a great addition to the line, and a pity that it’ll be infinitely harder to get (for those of us outside of Paris).

I guess a set of photos of one tan labeled Serge Lutens is not much different than the next, but Serge does have beautiful bottles, so I figured it couldn’t hurt. Here are just a few that I snapped – nothing fancy, but for those new to Serge, it’s a nice way of checking out the bottle!

Oh man – it’s good to have a new camera. While my Maxxum 7D from ‘04 was nice for its time (rest its little Minolta soul), this new D90 shows that they’ve come a long way since then. I was a big film snob for a while and only used the dSLR just for little here and there photography. I think this new camera will change my mind – it’s a really great piece of equipment.

Enough of that – on to the point. I got my gorgeous new bottle of Comme des Garcons LUXE Patchouli in this past week. Franco at luckyscent personally saw to my order and really did me good for samples on this order. I was thinking about getting it from beautyhabit (another great site!) because of their 10% off sale, but he promised to make up for the difference with samples. I really wanted the pyramid bottle rather than the cube, so that’s all I needed to hear to get it from luckyscent.

I’m still just as enamored by the gorgeous scent in the bottle (it’s sprayed on my arm right now and every time I catch a whiff, I’m more and more pleased with the purchase). I managed to get it at no cost out of pocket because I sold a couple Creeds to pay for it. Creed employs some really bizarre strong-armed tactics and legal threats to maintain their questionable history story and a recent example hit close to home and made me decide to no longer patronize that company. I sold the ones I could live without and kept a couple that I or the fiance really love (hey, morals only go but so far ).

PHOTOS!

I need to set up some new sets and such for photos like Nathan Branch does (incredible photos!), but until then, I hope you enjoy the same ol’ black on plexiglass look. Oh, and for those who wonder, it’s a 2 prong to 3 prong plug converter that’s holding the box up in the first photo – it was handy.

I recently ran out of my Amouage Ciel sample after a couple wears. It struck me absolutely perfect for what they market it as – a fragrance to welcome spring with. The stars seemed to align as I got an email from Luscious Cargo (they are fabulous by the way and reopening a brick and mortar store here in Central FL in a few months… I’m excited) that they had added a few scents and upped the discount on their clearance sale. I went onto their site to find an already discounted bottle of Amouage Ciel for Him in the older leaded crystal bottles, plus an additional 30% off. I knew that kind of discount on an Amouage wouldn’t find me again soon, much less on increasingly hard to find older packaging. I bought it. If you’ve never ordered from them before, I urge you to do so – their packaging is incredible. It comes filled with samples, raffia, candies, incense, dried orange peel, and lavender. It’s such a great experience to get a package from them.

The bottle is gorgeous, though the outer packaging is a bit hokey. While I really do like the newer bottles and great boxes, I feel like using plastic caps (on most… Silver is metal) and regular glass bottles seem to have a hard time justifying their packaging premiums. On this one, they also lost the azure blue color of the juice for a light golden in the new packaging, only keeping the blue in the small plastic gem in the cap (the juice looks greener in these photos than it is… sad little camera). Also, the sprayer on these older bottles is unmatched… it’s a full, luxurious spray that is really quite satisfying. Imagine a KSSSHHHT versus a PFFT. Make sense? Thought so.

Apologies for the less than optimal photos – both, BOTH of my digital cameras broke within two weeks of each other. I haven’t had a chance to get a new one yet and have all the strobes taken down, so the Sony point-and-shoot had to step in snapshot style.

Tom Ford recently released his new White Musk series, consisting of Jasmine Musk, Urban Musk, White Suede, and Musk Pure. All 4 of them were pretty impressive to my nose. Musk Pure is like a new interpretation of Kiehl’s Original Musk and Serge Luten Musk Koublai Khan, but with a twist. Jasmine Musk is a good take on what the title says, White Suede is a creamy leather with light, sweet musk notes, and Urban Musk (which I found to be the most daring of the bunch), adds a dirty note to the opening and heart and dries surprisingly sweet on my skin. Tom Ford calls this one “carnal.” I talked myself into getting Urban Musk recently at a Tom Ford event at Saks and have been enjoying it quite a bit. My SA threw in a huge factory spray of White Suede as well so I’ll be set with that one as well.

Here are a few shots of Urban Musk… I think they could have done a bit more with the bottles than just make them clear with a white top, but it’s still pretty striking.

Recently, the house of Narciso Rodriguez released a his and hers limited edition version of their hugely popular musc series in EDP form (and a new, different formulation). I was in Saks over a month ago when my SA showed me the limited edition musc for him tester they had from under the counter. She said that they had only gotten 3 bottles, and they had all sold the day they got them. I tried the tester and got the familiar Narciso musc notes, but with a twist. This is like a combination of the musc oil for him and the regular musc for him EDT. It is said to be “a tribute to musk” and it lives up to its billing. It’s by no means a dirty musk – you won’t be howling or wondering whether people will think you just forgot to bathe. Among the listed notes are musk, iris, and pink berries.

A few weeks went by and I got an email from my SA that she had gotten a couple more bottles in and had one put aside for me. It was only $59 (minus the 10% off for a Friends & Family event), but the difficulty of tracking a bottle of this down makes the price a non-factor. It’s no easy feat to find one. I eagerly picked it up (and was also talked into a bottle of the new Tom Ford Urban Musk by the Tom Ford reps on hand during the event… another fabulous musk) and wore it that night.

The bottle is gorgeous as well – it’s similar to the regular musc for him, but the lining inside the heavy glass is metallic. The sprayer is also just as full and sturdy as you’ll find on the EDT. I am by no means a one scent kind of person, but if I was forced to narrow it down to 10, this would certainly be a top contender. I’ll post a few more photos of the great bottle this week.