Guerlain is more gorgeous, Chanel more chic, but there are few – if any – perfume houses more elegant than Hermès.
While I have long enjoyed the beauteous Calèche, it was only a couple of years ago that I first came to know that perfume’s similarly well bred, but slightly more brooding and restless alter ego, Amazone, both of which, in eau de toilette (pictured) I picked up in Tokyo after an exquisite afternoon of listening to koto music at a 1920’s tea house in Shibamata.
Amazone’s uniqueness, I have come to understand, having encountered this DELIGHTFUL vintage eau de parfum lent to me by Z ( a warmer, mossier pulse that goes straighter to the heart, the edt greener and matinal) and which I will admit I wore a little of today for a much needed day out with the D in the big city, is in its curious tension between a coy green chamois vetiver and oakmoss; sandalwood; contained; sweet, aldehydic – with a hint of the outdoors and a blushing rebellion; freshened with a piercing hyacinth, galbanum, jonquil, black currant bud and narcissus; questioningly erotic and refined.
The Black Narcissus 