I want to lick your... perfume? Kerosene's Unknown Pleasures (perfume review)

I love the name of this perfume by The House of Kerosene. "Unknown Pleasures". What does it mean? Anything you want it to mean! That's the beauty of it. OK, technically it's the title of a Joy Division album. But really, isn't everything what you make of it? ;)

You're walking down a cold street in Manchester, listening to Joy Division, sipping on a warm cup of London Fog. This fragrance opens up with the smooth sweetness of honey with Earl Grey tea, with a zing of lemon. It dries down to a cozy vanilla, soft tonka bean and waffle cone base, sure to make any gourmand lover smile.
Notes: Earl Grey tea, lemon, bergamot, honeycomb, tonka bean, caramel, vanilla and waffle cone.

Unknown Pleasures is Kerosene's first gourmand, and it's a stunner. And that's coming from someone who rarely enjoys gourmands unless their nutty and bready! This one is not. It's a delightfully straight-forward tasty treat that springs up brightly with lemon and a splash of tea and honey, then rides that lemon-honey wave for a bit before folding into a vanilla-waffle cone base.

Straight-forward does not mean boring, and this scent is certainly not dull. The lemon is bracing and invigorating but never falls in to furniture polish territory. It's fresh-squeezed and sparkling. The tea is subtle, at least on my skin, adding a slightly herbal counterpoint to the acidic cheeriness of the lemon. The honey is also soft, never urinous or "iffy". And then there's that delicious base! I was discussing recently with some friends whether we enjoyed the top notes, the heart notes, or the base notes of scent best. I am a base notes kinda gal. This scent is almost all top notes and base notes. It's lemon-tea gelato scooped high on top of a waffle cone, a combination of two distinct experiences that are meant to be together. The base lasts for hours and gets more cuddly as it goes.

I love this on me. I love it on my kids. And it's 100% "unisex" - if my husband would let me spray things on him, he'd get doused with this. I will grab it frequently year-round, but I think a hot summer day will be extra-perfect for Unknown Pleasures. And rainy days. And snowy days. And sunny days... OK: all of them! Now, if you excuse me, I'm off to sniff my arm for awhile...

Disclaimer: I'm friends with the perfumer, John Pegg.
I'd like the perfume anyway, even if someone else made it. ;)
Sample via the perfumer

I recommend buying Unknown Pleasures via MiN New York. $140

Perfume Review: Angel (Thierry Mugler)

This weekend, I worked at a huge event at a DC-area mall. It was packed and I felt like I was standing at a conveyer belt doing makeup! But as busy as it was, it was a blast. The women I worked with (coworkers and clients) were lovely. Except...

Except for the woman who worked for the department store in some aspect, the one who kept walking past dragging a huge cloud of Thierry Mugler's infamous Angel in her wake.

                                                    It was exactly like this...                                       via

Angel. Infamy! It's strong. Intense. Rich. Distinctive. Polarizing. Easily overdone.

via

Each time this woman walked by she nearly choked me. You're reading the words - maybe even nodding in understanding. But I don't know you really get it. Let me flesh out this scene a bit more, make it more clear. When you stand in a cosmetics department for 8 hours, you lose all ability to discern scent. You no longer smell your own perfume, even snuffling your wrist. The wall of perfume, the women and men milling about in their own fragrances... It's immediate olfactory shut-down.

The fact that I could smell that woman's Angel in such a setting and to such an extent...Damn! That's a testament to the power of the stuff. And I didn't just smell it - I could nearly taste it. It literally stuck in my nostrils and stayed with me for over a half an hour after leaving!

Ok, so we've talked about Angel's power. *Shudder*

What does it smell like? No, really, I'm kind of joking now. Just about everyone and their mother know what Angel smells like. Well, maybe my Mother doesn't (Hi, Mom!). For her, let's briefly discuss...

                                                Not a fan.                              via

The list of notes shows the insanity: melon, coconut, mandarin orange, cassia, jasmine, bergamot, cotton candy, honey, apricot, blackberry, plum, orchid, peach, jasmine, lily-of-the-valley, red berries,rose, tonka bean, amber and vanilla, patchouli, musk, vanilla, dark chocolate and caramel.

Bizarre, right? But somehow, it works. It works! And it's the scent that launched a thousand ships, too. Angel opened wide the genre of gourmand fragrance: foody scents, perfumes that smell like dessert or confections.

On me, Angel is a pleasant chocolate patchouli. (One hundred and fifty thousand notes, and that's all I get: chocolate patchouli!?)

I love it, though, I really do, but grab my sample rarely. I have to a moment to consider why that is, huh? In part, I think I don't want to smell like anyone else. (Imagine if TWO of us wore it this weekend?) Also, it such a polarizing scent (many people loathe it 1) - do I want to offend? Of course not! And then there's the power. As someone who was a teen in the 80's, I live in fear of overwhelming throw and stifling sillage.

So I wear it at home from time to time. Just a drop! And I revel in the chocolate patchouli for awhile.
Like most overly rich confections Angel is a treat best enjoyed in small amounts only now and again.

House: Thierry Mugler
Fragrance: Angel
Perfumer: Olivier Cresp & Yves Chirin
Released: 1992
Notes: melon, coconut, mandarin orange, cassia, jasmine, bergamot, cotton candy, honey, apricot, blackberry, plum, orchid, peach, jasmine, lily-of-the-valley, red berries,rose, tonka bean, amber and vanilla, patchouli, musk, vanilla, dark chocolate and caramel
Sample: I can't even recall where it came from (ages ago).

Final Word: Sweet in small doses.

Here's an Angel many of us can agree on!

[1] Got some free time? Peruse the Basenotes, Makeup Alley, and Fragrantica reviews of Angel. What a riot! Example: Fragrantica's ADAMbergris says "This is surely (Madam) Satan's signature scent..." Meanwhile, MUA's ipatieva says "...My friend tried it too and she smelled like a homeless person with wet dog." My favorite, though, is autumn89 on Basenotes: "It smells like diabetes would if it had a smell."



Tell me: do you Angel? And were you a Buffy fan? Team Spike or Team Angel?
(While I can appreciate Angel, I was firmly on Team Spike!)

Perfume Review: Jimmy Choo

Let's just start here, for lack of a better place: I do not own any Jimmy Choo products. Not shoes, not handbags, and definitely not the Uggs.

I'm aware of the legacy of Jimmy Choo, and I admire Tamara Mellon for being a savvy and successful business woman.

Mellon and Choo certainly have a great understanding of the luxury market! I clearly do not have a great understanding of the luxury market. I wear Skechers. I own numerous t-shirts, none of which cost more than $15. My "handbag" is from Target. Much of my jewelry is hand-crafted by artisans (I like craft shows), but doesn't really have a lot of value. Let's just say Lindsey won't bother stealing any of my stuff.

Tamara enjoys it...

The only luxury items I own are cosmetics and perfume. The former I know a lot about, and the latter I'm learning.

Mellon, who also poses in the ads, is apparently "into" perfumes. She's been wanting to create one for 15 years, the press releases assure.

Reviews of Jimmmy Choo's first perfume are mixed. It seems to be the kneejerk reaction to assume new, mass-merchandised scents are bad. Some are. Some aren't. But is this one...?



Let me describe it, first. The opening is a musky peachy citrus blend on my skin. Not sharp, plastic, or fake. We're off to a good start! It quickly adds a floral aspect that's a bit harsh (like the spike of a high heel?) at first, then slowly rounds out a bit. The lower notes of Jimmy Choo perfume are a gourmand-inflected patchouli. Not foody, but somewhat caramelized.

It wears well, with a presence. Sillage is moderate-to-strong; lasting power was medicore (fading on my skin in about 4 hours).


This is a people-pleaser scent, in a way, but also somewhat more complex than most of the recent launches I've smelled at Nordstrom and Saks. It's got the fruity bit that's so common popular right now (and I think it does it well). It's got that woody (not oud-y) bit that's so common popular right now (and I think it does it well). It also has that sugary bit all the kids like (and I think it does it well). It's a little of everything and as slippery to pin down as JELL-O. It's kind of like some of the Jimmy Choo shoes which, to me, appear to have a lot going on even when providing fairly minimal coverage.

I like Jimmy Choo perfume. I enjoyed the various phases. I also like that, thanks to the aldehydes present, this seems like a Perfume (Big 'P') rather than simply a perfume. Dressy. "Night-time". I'm a bit cavalier about wearing perfumes whenever the heck I want to, but many may consider this a scent to pair with A Big Girl Dress... and Jimmy Choo slingbacks, of course!

That said, I still don't own anything marked with the Jimmy Choo label. While I found this perfume interesting and pleasant (and will use the rest of the sample eventually) I prefer the floral-patchouli of Flowerbomb (Viktor & Rolf) and Chinatown (Bond No. 9) to the genre of "fruitchoulis" or neo-chypres or however one might label this perfume. Still, I wouldn't say no to a free bottle. Tamara?

House: Jimmy Choo
Fragrance: Jimmy Choo
Perfumer: Olivier Polge
Released: 2010
Notes: green notes, pear nectar, sweet orange from Italy, Tiger Orchid, caramel, Indonesian patchouli.
Sample: obtained at Saks; also liberally spritzed from tester.

Final Word: pretty.






Other reviews of Jimmy Choo: 

• 1000fragrances: Jimmy Choo eponymous perfume - new fragrance review
• Perfume Posse: Jimmy Choo perfume
• The Scented Salamander:  Jimmy Choo, The Perfume (2011): Mix and Match Like a Fashionable Cameleon {Fragrance Review}
• On Basenotes 
• On Fragrantica 
• On Makeup Alley