a passing fancy for guerlain chant d’aromes (1962)

I have a perfect perfumed relationship with Chant D’Aromes. As in, I don’t wear this scent often but am excited that it is there in my collection – and more importantly, I love it when I do.

I have two bottles. One, the classical beauty you see above – the vintage, the exquisite, though like easily broken champagne glasses in the washing up bowl the base stem long became severed from the flacon – so woeful ! – so she is hidden away somewhere with probably just an eighth left. So luminous, so mossy.

I also have this (reformulated) edition in the bee bottle (late nineties/ early 2000’s?) though mine is still two thirds full. I actually love this iteration just as much. Though instantly familiar in many ways – even if you have never smelled CdA – can’t find the French circumflexes on my phone – pardonnez-moi – you will still know the type: that fresh, green, floral aldehydic, light and airy chypre reminiscent of Carven’s lettuce fresh Ma Griffe (Jean Paul Guerlain’s first wife, for whom the perfumer first made CdA as a wedding gift, had sworn true love to the Carven, but Jean Paul was determined to create something similar but even lovelier – and who can deny that he succeeded ?

Ma Griffe is far more crisp, pared down – almost startingly fresh and new. CdA is fuller, lilting, one of the happiest perfumes ever made.

There is nothing else quite like it.

The expected bergamot and mandarins are a gateway to the orchard, but swiftly an unusual clasping of gardenia, honeysuckle and mirabelle plum take centre stage, softened with cloves and frankincense, sandalwood, vetiver and just a whisper of vanilla, all evaporating dizzily upwards in a swirl of joyous aldehydes jasmine and ylang:rose, soft, yet trilling with the soon to come classic chypre base – caressing, velveteen – never in doubt. Green is the colour of my true love’s eyes ; delicate; rich.

This is a sparing relationship : I don’t want to impose, nor waste the bottle. The likelihood of my finding another one is sparse. Vintage perfume is disappearing from view, and what is left is often extortionately expensive

-like the bottle above, which I would adore to own, but which is this price

on eBay.

It’s a shame. Japan is still awash with vintage Mitsouko. I love, need, and wear Mitsouko more frequently than I admit to myself – to me it is a comfort scent that provides a pleasantly cushioning backdrop whether at home or outside. It just….is. I don’t thrill to it, on the whole – there are exceptions to that rule when I feel plush and divine – but on the whole it is more like a trusted old friend I have perhaps taken a little for granted.

If I were a true raving Mitsouko devotee, though, I would definitely move into temporary lodgings in Japan with empty suitcases on a special, ambassadorial Perfume Visa, lie in bed drinking bubbles and simply order and order from online auction sites here like Mercari- where Mitsouko, in all its forms and iterations – and almost always vintage – can be had for a song

(¥1000 = about five pounds / seven dollars)

Mitsouko is like tap water here. ABSURDLY cheap. The bottle above to the right (¥2,200) is my preferred form of the extrait : just a tenner for spiced, sylvan perfection!

There are only two historically entrenched Guerlains in the fragrance fundaments au Japon, hence the relative abundance.Vol De Nuit is the only other ubiquitous Guerlain ( not Shalimar ) here in certain circles : only Night Flight and Mitsouko made it into the Japanese psyche in the same way as Chanel No 5 or Diorissimo from Paris as bona fide omiyage high level souvenirs : Apres L’Ondee? What is that ? As you know, Vol De Nuit is one of my absolute holy grails so I take solace in knowing there is still so much of it out there in dusty old Tokyo armoires hidden in lower drawers of some stoic nonogenarian gritting her teeth rather than de-seal some pretentious French Perfume but for me, those black and white outer sixties boxes with the inner zebra skin felt rorsasch are perhaps the ultimate aesthetic.

So. You see. Not cheap as chips like our Mitsy, but still a darn lot more inexpensive than other delicious Guerlains I have also been craving such as a perfect Nahema.

Insanely overpriced!

I have just about enough Nahema to be going on with so can probably survive the avarice of lusting after these bottles (because sometimes you just do want to practically drown yourself in these fumes, n’est-ce pas rather than wistfully dabbing and noting the fall in the meniscus). And yet there is also a great pleasure in treasuring the preciousness of what is left. They become almost rarified olfactive artefacts you stare at respectfully valuing each drop.Chant D’Aromes is also now far beyond my reach.

(WANT ! but shan’t have..) Semi affordable ! But

It is a kind or of a shame though, because I sprayed on some Aromes the other day on an intuitive whim on skin and a scarf with a certain level of Chapmanian abandonment and thoroughly enjoyed it. Aaaagggh, And then yesterday, at our friends apartment in Yokohama for a delayed and rescheduled Christmas Dinner/ Boxing Day/ New Yeat’s celebration complete with Christmas pudding and home made brandy butter and mulled wine, after giving Justin a big bag of samples of all the high end woody and oudhy things that he can pull off and I would never even attempt to (we had a fabulous sniffathon after dinner): Setsuko then brought out her own collection – including a Caron Fleur De Rocaille I once gave her as well as a pristinissimo diorissimo extrait I also bequeathed – HOW GOOD DOES SHE SMELL IN THAT MUGUET WHEN DRESSED UP IN A FORMAL KIMONO ? You will just have to take my word for it.

But anyway. She then mentioned Guerlain Chsnt D’Aromes.

‘Remember you once gave me a bottle ?’ she asked me, amazed that I absolutely didn’t.

‘Yes, you did. I love it’

I said she must have been mistaken. I hold onto this perfume rather zealously and it is not one I would tend to give out to other people.

‘No, you did – I will show you’

– and she went off to retrieve it.

What she brought back to the table was one of those 7ml Mitsouko extrait bottles – the ones still used by Guerlain – that I must have washed rigorously and aired and dried and relabelled, and then decanted some of the delightfully vernal elixir into – empty now but still unmistakeably CHANT D’AROMES. We glanced at each other. ‘Ah… yes’.

D and I did part one of our annual perfume collection polishing and dustathon today and I calculated, sly-eyed, re-evaluating my two bottles that I probably do have enough left to give her a refill. She wouldn’t let me take the bottle of though – she wants to come here, to the source. I had totally forgotten ever giving any to Setsuko in the first place but then she said ‘I really like it- so fresh, light, floral but … soft ‘ so emphatically that I realized there was no other option : sometimes, things in life this beautiful do simply need to be shared