There is nothing connecting these two perfumes aside from the fact that we wore them on Saturday night. The Guerlain – a peppery lavender amber – that I found retrograde when it was released and came to love, was just the right thing for a balmy then chilly evening on the water. D has taken a shine to this perfume from Kuwait – rose, tea, ‘patchouli fruit’ and a loukhoumish musk – mid toned, long lasting, fresh and aromatic – and I rather like it on him : its pinkness was perfect for the cherry blossom.
🌸
Which we didn’t see that much of actually because it was too cold to go out on the deck, and I was enjoying watching the trainee geisha, or maiko, doing their thing. They smelled of powder and delicately scented hair oil for their elaborate head pieces ( you couldn’t exactly call it ‘hair’): while dignified and with a definite presence – geisha are actually a lot rarer than you might imagine; my friend Setsuko (in kimono) had never met one before – they struck me as being charming , very talented – and just a little bit naughty.
The Black Narcissus 
Love that last shot! I knew there was some cheek behind the powder.
Ah, Heritage. Ric has two dresser drawers filled with fragrances I bought for him. He only wears them for my benefit. Every night before bed, he reaches blindly for the first bottle his rummaging fingers grab hold of. He is totally uninterested in which is which. They’re all the same to him. Or so I thought.
A few weeks ago, he spoke up. “I’m almost out of one of those bottles,” he said shyly. He reached in the right side drawer and pulled out a nearly empty 50ml of Heritage edp. Vintage. “Is this stuff fairly easy to get more of?”
Well, no. Not exactly, darling. In fact, there’s a chance I’ll never find another bottle here in this remote corner of Canada. I steered him to the two other Heritages in the drawer, the current edt and edp. They were both nearly full, like most of the other bottles in his collection.
He was actually quite crestfallen.
That dear man, in spite of his professed indifference, really knows what he likes. And he loves vintage Heritage. Good on you, Ric.
Thanks for all the photos!
Enjoyed the photos thanks
I haven’t had time to read at all for the last seven or eight days (a dense time at work as I try to prepare my students for the looming AP exams), so it was especially funny to see the ‘before’ and ‘after’ photos of the Geishas…Wonderful to think of a cruise for the sole purpose of gazing at blossoms. The city close to us (Victoria, British Columbia) has long streets full of cherry trees that were presented as a gift by the Japanese community (devastatingly, only about eight years before internment relocations began.) I always associate them with being a university student and waiting for those other exams to end, right around the start of May. Madrigal season.
That’s a nice bottle of Héritage! I only have the newer eau de toilette with the wooden cap, which seems a little too sober to me, kind of wooden in its woodiness… I do, however, have about four different vintages of Habit Rouge stashed in a bathroom vanity, a medicine cabinet, a bedroom dresser, and even a desk drawer in my office at work — now that’s certainly a fragrance that makes me think of blossom season.
No cherry blossoms or geishas here in Nepal- it’s a bizarrely hot, dry & windy Spring too!
Heritage is a Guerlain I’m unfamiliar with. Hope you’ll be trying Guerlain’s new Vetiver?
Neil, I emailed you and sent a DM on Instagram, but since there is limited time trying here too – In Japan until May 1st, would love to connect if you are free!