FLORIENTAL
by COMME DES GARÇONS
ingredients: plum, incense, cedar
Twenty years ago (time flies!), perfumer Mark Buxton and Art Director Christian Astuguevieille revolutionised mainstream fragrance by bringing out the first exemplar of what turned out to be a new genre: spare, transparent, and based exclusively on spicy and woody notes. In essence these were fragrances without a “middle,” since spices are generally up top and woods linger on in the drydown. It is as if Buxton, his exact contemporary Bertrand Duchaufour, and many others since have decided to slice the smoky drydown of Monsieur Rochas (1969) and the cardamom top off of Cartier’s Déclaration (1998) and spliced them together without any intervening middle age spread. CdG has been remarkably consistent and, when faced with one of their asymmetric pebble bottles, we are now fully primed to expect a lean, urbane, quiet fragrance. Floriental delivers the goods, this time with a plummy note of damascenone in addition to the customary cedar, incense, and pepper mixture. No new ground, but faithful to its intent, refined, and well-executed.
woody fruity
