I’m going to end this where I began it with a scent of my childhood. In the South Florida neighborhood I grew up in we had a small citrus orchard nearby. It was run by Mr. Meeks who would hire us as his pickers when the fruit was ready to be harvested. It was the first money I would earn for myself. After a day of work I got a crisp dollar bill for my effort. When we took a break for lunch, we would sit in one of the trees and pick an orange for dessert.
The scent of those days was beautiful. The sun slanted down through the green leaves as we picked the fruit and placed it in a crate. Mr. Meeks would come by and pick it up. The green woodiness of the trees and the leaves combined with the citrus for a scent which can take me back to those days over fifty years later.
Citrus within modern perfumery has become synonymous with warm weather. I have a natural attraction to the best of them especially when they connect with my memory.
When it comes to orange there is no perfume which has ever found that place for me better than Atelier Cologne Orange Sanguine. This was the star of creative director Sylvie Ganter’s debut cologne absolue collection. Ten years on it is probably the flagship of this very successful line.
For lemon it also is from Mme Ganter’s brand with Atelier Cologne Citron d’Erable. This is the definition of a cooler weather citrus perfume. Adding maple syrup as the sweet counterweight to the lemon is a brilliant choice. This is the chill of sunset sitting at the top of the lemon tree watching for the flash of green.
Chantecaille Vetyver has my favorite grapefruit paired with the other warm weather perfume ingredient, vetiver. In this case the sulfurous nature of the rind is allowed to find harmony with the sharp green facet of vetiver. In between is the tart pulp of the fruit. There was a study that wearing grapefruit makes people seeing you as younger than you are. I wonder if they see my inner ten-year-old when I wear this?
I’ll have some closing thoughts about the whole challenge tomorrow to bring this to a close.
–Mark Behnke
