Colognoisseur Holiday Perfume Buyer’s Guide 2018 Part 1- At The Mall

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As we approach Thanksgiving in the US it is the demarcation of the beginning of the Holiday shopping season. As soon as the last bite of pie and the last dish is loaded in the dishwasher on Thanksgiving; shopping begins. It starts with overnight bargain hunting into what is known as Black Friday.

Fragrance is a popular gift. There is even a beautiful commercial for a department store about a blind husband knowing his wife by her perfume. I think buying a perfume for someone is a big risk because it is such an intimate gift. I do have a suggestion on how to do it in a more intimate way at this link.

Even so I know many will still be buying fragrance this Holiday season. For my Buyer’s Guide I do Part 1 with a list of perfume you will most likely find at any mall or department store. Tomorrow, before Small Business Saturday, Part 2 will focus on independent brands found at local brick and mortar perfume store.

The list of perfumes below is meant to give a breadth of choice to anyone looking for a specific style. Links to the full review are in the names.

Atelier Cologne Iris Rebelle– This is a transparent rooty iris instead of the usual powdery version. If you ever wanted to see the other face of iris, here it is.

Britney Spears Prerogative– Britney Spears was one of the early successes of the celebuscent wave of the last few years. Leave it to her, as the trend has diminished, to remind me that it still can be quite good. Perfumer Honorine Blanc produces a fruity gourmand perfume.

Buberry Her– Of all the transparent style of perfume I encountered in 2018 perfumer Francis Kurkdjian created a crowd-pleaser. A fruity airy bubble that you float in happily.

Cartier Carat– This is what I consider to be the best mainstream perfume of 2018. Perfumer Mathilde Laurent composes a kinetic prismatic transparent floral. It is like a constant motion machine of floral jewels.

Commodity Velvet– The entire brand is a great choice and 2018 was a great year for it. The reason they have been so good is they allow a perfumer to bring a niche aesthetic to the mall. It results in some stunning efforts. Velvet is Jerome Epinette’s rose floating on top of a pool of vanilla. Simple and gorgeous.

Gucci Bloom Nettare Di Fiore– Gucci is making a fragrant statement again. Both of this year’s flankers of Gucci Bloom were excellent but it is the spicing up of the core accord of Bloom which is what makes Nettare Di Fiore ideal for fall and winter.

Jo Malone Jasmine Sambac & Marigold– Jo Malone is another brand which had an outstanding 2018. Jasmine Sambac & Marigold was the bellwether for that. This is an unusual pairing for jasmine as the green of marigold creates a unique floral harmonic.

Nest Cocoa Woods– Is an austere dry mixture of sandalwood and sequoia coated in cocoa powder. If you enjoy woody perfume this adds a gourmand style on top of that.

Terre D’Hermes Eau Intense Vetiver– Christine Nagel produces her version of the classic Terre D’Hermes. Her choice is to take vetiver from the background of the original and move it out in front of the dry synthetic woods. It is a perfume which I think more of the longer I spend time with it.

I wish all my US readers a Happy Thanksgiving and let me be the first to wish all my readers a Happy Holidays. Now…..Ready……Set……Shop!

Disclosure: I received samples of all of the perfumes mentioned in this article from the manufacturers.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review Burberry Her- Fruity Musk Meringue

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Whenever I make my periodic field trip to the local mall, I sometimes see how out of step I am with the typical perfume consumer. I had already gone in and collected a bunch of strips of the new releases. I then play a little game. I can sit in a comfortable sofa just outside the entry to the fragrance department to a big department store. From there I watch the stream of people taking strips from the sales reps handing them out. The other thing which is next to me is a garbage can which is the first opportunity for anyone walking to discard the strip if they don’t like it. This becomes my very unscientific research on what new fragrances are making an impression. When I sit down having smelled the offerings for the day, I make my choice on which I think will not end up in the garbage can. Over the past year or so I have seen a distinctive trend towards lighter airier constructs being the strips which keep getting sniffed. On this recent trip it was one of the lightest of the day which I was surprised was the winner; Burberry Her.

Francis Kurkdjian

Burberry Her is another of the recent new releases to go after a more transparent fruity gourmand. Perfumer Francis Kurkdjian was asked to compose this perfume. M. Kurkdjian is one of the perfumers who understands the use of all the musks at a perfumer’s disposal to create the effect he wants. For Burberry Her he uses a successive layering of musks to provide an expansive meringue-like lightness to which he adds a bounty of berries. The official note list mentions florals here but I have to say that if there is jasmine here it is one of the synthetic expansive versions which becomes part of this airy transparent bubble at the center of Burberry Her.

The opening of Burberry Her is those berries. If you are a fan of berries in perfume almost all of them are here. If M. Kurkdjian was not going to lighten them up this would rapidly become too much. What keeps that from happening is this expanding transparency courtesy of the musks. Just as the berries begin to concentrate into something strident the musks spread them out increasing their opacity. There is a point where I would have liked to have the opportunity to stop this effect from going as far as it does. That is when the fruit still has a presence with the musks inflating them. It is only for a short time as the eventual end point is a shimmering globe of light berries which is where this stays for the duration.

Burberry Her has 10-12 hour longevity and average sillage.

On my afternoon at the mall Burberry Her was the runaway winner as I observed people handing the strip to others they were walking with. My guess is there is a market for this style of perfume among more casual perfume wearers. Within those boundaries Burberry Her is one of the better ones.

Disclosure: This review is based on a sample provided by Burberry.

–Mark Behnke