Whenever I’m asked to name my favourite novel, I usually pick either Villette by Charlotte Brontë, or A Game of Hide and Seek by Elizabeth Taylor.
Asked a different question, however — what book would I take on a desert island? — I think the answer would probably be Perfumes: the A-Z Guide by Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez.
Published in 2008 and updated in 2009, it mainly consists of five hundred pages of alphabetically-arranged reviews of fragrances, each awarded from one to five stars. It is unflaggingly entertaining. This, for example is from Turin’s five-star review of Dior’s Poison:
Reviewing Poison is a bit like road-testing an Abrams M1 tank in the evening rush hour. People just seem to get out of your way, and if they don’t, you just swivel that turret to remind them you’re not kidding.
I don’t always agree with their judgments. (They give Tommy Girl five stars; I find it lovely for about thirty seconds and utterly nondescript thereafter.) But in her introduction (quoted on the back cover), Sanchez makes this very important point:
Do not be seduced by celebrities, by clever ad campaigns, by beautiful bottles and boxes, by high price tags, by exclusivity, by lush official descriptions, by exotic ingredients, by promises. Believe your nose only. Do not wear a fragrance just to wear a fragrance. make sure it is better than nothing. And if you love something, buy two bottles, because next time the thing may be changed or gone.
Most fragrances are dull or, at best, nice: they merely smell of something… fragrant. Others are utterly vile: a couple of years ago I made the mistake of putting Viktor and Rolf’s Spicebomb on my wrist. I assume that are are people who like this stuff; for me it was a ‘Holy Mother of God, get this crap off me!’ moment, followed by ten minutes’ frantic scrubbing with a nail brush.
Sanchez is right: a perfume should be better than nothing. Here’s her description of a Guerlain classic:
…there are a very few fragrances, mostly older ones, that save the best for later, a few hours in, when they drop their earthly raiment to reveal angelic finery; my first bottle of Mitsouko did that, and the sudden increase in intensity and beauty was so unexpected that for a creepy moment I thought someone invisible must have entered the room. (p.15)
The language is quasi-religious; but it is appropriate. All judgments of perfumes are entirely subjective. It isn’t about how you smell to other people (although questions of what is appropriate to a particular context arise: don’t wear Sécrétions Magnifiques to the office). The question is a simple one: does this make my world a better place?
I sniff a lot of strips and sometimes think, yeah… that’s nice… But nice isn’t enough — certainly not at upwards of ninety quid a pop. I’m looking for a religious experience.
Chanel No 5 is, perhaps, the classic fragrance. Turin and Sanchez list four versions: the (prohibitively expensive) original 1921 parfum, the Eau de Parfum (1980s), the Eau Première and an Eau de Toilette. I had long assumed that these were all women’s fragrances, but over the last year, since Management fell for another Chanel, No 19, I’ve been sniffing at the various versions of No 5 on my own account.
Wandering around Debenham’s in Canterbury High Street one afternoon, about nine months ago, I treated myself to a squirt of the EdP. It smelled truly lovely.
But it wasn’t until I got out on to the street that it really hit me. It was raining. There was a waffle stand, litter bins… all the pongs of tourist-trap-meets-busker-hell…
And then the perfume rose from my neck and scarf, and wound itself around me. Beautiful and seductive. Comforting and reassuring. Bewitching. Utterly transfiguring.
Angelic finery.
Christmas came early this year. Last week, Management generously blew some of her Boots card points on a 100cl spray bottle of No 5 EdP. As I sit in the Caffè Nero on my way into the day job, passing angels have laid gentle hands on my soul and the world is a lovelier place.
Donald Hounam 