Souffle de Soie and Rouge Trafalgar are two fragrances in Dior‘s exclusive, high-end, and quasi-niche Privée Collection (now sometimes referred to as the “Maison Christian Dior” Collection). Let’s take a look at both.
Dior Rouge Trafalgar. Photo: Dior
Dior Souffle de Soie. Photo: Dior.
Francesca Bianchi‘s Sex and The Sea and its sibling Sex and The Sea Neroli are tales of two different days at or near the beach. Today, we’ll look at both and how they compare.
Diego Miguel, model, via INYIM. (Website link embedded within.)
Collage: my own, of the following photos. Left: Photographer unknown. Source: Shotkit.com & Pinterest. Right: Photo by Claire Harrison for Slink Beauty.
Sometimes, when I wear La Douceur de Siam, I’m reminded of the famous Forrest Gump line about life being like a box of chocolates, “you never know what you’re going to receive.” In the case of the Dusita fragrance, it’s not chocolates with different fillings but, rather, a tropical fruit salad. Like Gump’s box of chocolates, it sometimes opens up to reveal unexpected surprises, though, at its core, its fundamental essence is always the same: fruity, tangy, tart, and zingy sweetness with a profoundly exotic character. Pissara Umavijani takes this fruity core, layers it with frothy, luminous, tropical florals and creamy vanilla mousse, anchors the bouquet on a base of Mysore sandalwood, then envelops everything in airy clouds of soft benzoin amber and spices for a scent that is always fun, bright, and exuberantly happy. The end result often reminds me of another fragrance, Neela Vermeire‘s Bombay Bling which several bloggers used to characterize as “Prozac in a fragrance bottle.” I think La Douceur de Siam has a similar tropicality, character, and effect.
Times Square in 1986. Photo: Life Magazine. Source: Pinterest.
Times Square, one of two new releases from Masque Milano, seeks to take you back to the cacophony, smells, and busy streets of New York City before Mayor Giuliani cleaned it up in the 1990s. Masque’s official scent description is one of the most unusual, unexpected, and humorous accounts that I’ve come across in terms of what a perfume brand promises to offer you if you try its fragrance. It bluntly and cheerfully talks about the city’s “stink” and its many, divergent “miasmas,” from the scent of cheap tobacco to the garbage on its streets and how the “cherry of the whore’s bloody-red lipstick melts with the strawberry of her chewing-gum.” Yet, if you “find your way through the crowd of bachelorettes waiting for the male-strip show,” [there… ] will be a flood of tuberose and carnation.”