Roja Dove likes his perfumes to be Perfumes: big, blowsy, luscious, full.
And who am I to disagree?
All three of these confident, and laughing, wide-brimmed divas have no fear of lighting up a room with their scent………full-bodied, sweet; panoramic.
And in these vicious, pent up, and mean-spirited times, I say BRING IT ON.
Tuberose, possibly the least inventive of the three but also my favourite, is, if not a carbon copy of Fracas, at the very least an obvious homage; peachy, cinnamon-pinched and wedded to a classicist sandalwood vanilla musk; creamy, sensual and delicious (in parfum especially) : quite the new/old tuberose on the block, with the Frenchness of Caron’s cold cream Tubereuse and even a short-lived remembrance in the head of Karl Lagerfeld’s seminal Chloe.
While obviously something of a throwback, this still does feel like an updated Fracas in many ways, with less of that tuberose classic’s blaring, perfumey base, (if you know what I mean.)
And if, like me, you know for a fact you like the classic tuberoses, you are virtually guaranteed to love it.
Lily, more contemporary and fresh, is a more complex and multilayered creature than Tuberose, something like a cross between Lauder’s Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia and Hermes’ Vanille Gallante, with all the lip-piqued Americana of the former – at ease in the formal and informal – and the Parisian vanillic salt lily sensuousness of the latter.
This is quite a luscious, tropical urban perfume, gorgeous in a way ( if teetering on the verge of overloaded artificiality), but I still know that come the hot summer months I will definitely be draining my small 7.8ml sample bottle – a dot here and there on work shirt collar surely making a pleasing, sunbeamed, beach-hazy backdrop.
Gardenia, like Lily, but unlike Tuberose, is also not a soliflore, but more a trompe l’oeil, marmoreal amalgam of a soap-white mythic, gardenia goddess; a creature of the Hollywood studios featuring very little relation to a living and breathing fungally breathtaking gardenia in the bushes.
While the overall impression of this grand creation has something almost gardenia-like, this perfume is ultimately more green-leafed, and white-smoothed, in the unimpeachable sud-soaped manner of Pure Distance’s Opardu – unblemished, feminine, subtly commanding – enveloping the wearer in an expensive, generous, dazzlingly faux-demure aura of come here, my darling.
I confess that I find it quite alluring.
The Black Narcissus 
Those all sound luscious, especially the Tuberose. I love lily, too. Van Cleef & Arpels had a nice one a few years back, Lis Carmine (?), an airy sort of spicy lily as I recall, and I was smitten. I am extremely picky about gardenias. So few perfumes even approach the amazing quality of the real blossom (is it the same with tuberose? I’ve never smelled a living one). I know they habe to do it by artificial means, smoke and mirrors.
I smelled one of those Hawaiian Floral numbers recently, Gardenia, and I have never experienced a more true to life capturing. I plan to get it soon when the weather heats up and I will report back.
The Roja Dove tuberose, though, I am confident you would like.
These sound good. Of course, you always make things sound good! I think Roja Dove has done an excellent job with his complex abstract arrangements, so I can imagine his soliflores run to the same quality. They sure ain’t cheap, mind. Nice he makes the smaller size available, huh?
Pics are lovely as always.
I was given some sample bottles which will do me fine but even those aren’t cheap to buy. I don’t know if they are great enough to merit repurchases but I know I will enjoy them. I like the rippling richness. He is not afraid.
I like his book and love the Vetiver Extrait. I’ve tried a few others – the names blur into one a bit – Scandal, Beguiled? They’re very coherent and felt like someone rich but not me or someone I’d like.
Gorgeous visuals and superb writing. R
I’m waiting for a bottle of *Natalie* in the post; the fragrance commissioned by the two daughters of Natalie Wood to reflect her favourite gardenia scent. (That’s how I stumbled onto you online – searching for various Gardenias).
Someone wrote (on Fragrantica?) that initially she wore (& gave as gifts) Jungle Gardenia & then left that to order Gardenia essential oil from Egypt.
My mum had a small tin of solid parfum Gardenia in the 70s that I loved. I’ve been searching for that discontinued scent ever since.
I hope my bottle doesn’t arrive in a crystal pile as happened to you recently! (Your train station breakage).
I hope not either.
I do LOVE gardenias though…