Candy Perfume Boy’s list of things he learnt in his “scented journey” as he calls it. I can relate to a couple of them, like:

#3: gender division. If perfume industry is based on half-lies, then gender division is the most manufactured of them all. Once I was sitting close to a colleague of mine, smelling a blotter that had been heavily sprayed with Opium, and she asked: “what’s that perfume you’re smelling? It’s masculine, right?”

#6: there is no such thing as too many perfumes one can own. Well, with this one I’m still managing to disagree, as I’m still trying to see perfume accumulation as a danger.

#7: perfumes can still surprise you. The short answer is: yes, totally. Sometimes that happened for me in a quite emotional way, like with Declaration by Cartier, or Tom Ford Velvet Gardenia. Or, they can even cause unexpected reactions like Baby Doll.

However, there’s a question after that: what happens when they don’t? Is it their fault, or could you have tried harder finding their voice? Something to mull over…

An interesting post by Avery Gilbert from his First Nerve blog, about a research that confirmed what women have known since the dawn of times: natural smell is crucial in attractiveness, also because it’s an indicator of that person’s health. Oh, and in case you didn’t know, males affected by gonorrhea don’t exactly smell like flowers.

And finally, a radio interview with Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez, who became superstars of the perfume reviewing arena with Perfume: The Guide.

Thanks to From Pyrgos for searching for this and posting it. Here is a summary of what you will find, among the other things:

• What differentiates a good perfume from a bad perfume
• Why body chemistry counts, but relatively
• Why there is not such thing as natural perfumes
• What perfume would be given to aliens to explain to them what a perfume is
• Why perfume houses don’t like reviews
• Why perfume makers – on the other hand – do like them
• Tips on what perfume to wear on a date
• What perfume for men Turin thinks is totally irresistible

I don’t think there’s much room for a detailed description of the notes: it’s masculine, smoked, sweet and dirty from the very start, with dirty-but-classy pepper, warm red orange and other sweet notes.

And it will remain like that for the rest of its life on skin, after all, that is what it was created for by Jacques Cavallier in 2011 (Diesel Fuel For Life, L’Eau d’Issey).

Masculine, spicy, sexy, open-shirt and dirty. If this is what you’re looking for, maybe try One Million first, just in case you might like it better, else go for it.

And I would go for it as well, but… I’m in the mood for more, so here’s my take on Emporio Armani Diamonds Black Carat For Him: it’s a good prototype for the perfect masculine, but it’s too polished, too clean, too gentle. L’omo ha da puzza’ as they say in Rome, a real man must smell.

So, I hereby ask: is that all you got? If real men don’t bother about showering and shaving, then add more pepper, take away some of the refined sweetness and make something more uneducated, dirtier, rougher, for cryin’ out loud!

Is there anything like that around? It wouldn’t be my signature perfume for sure (wearing it in an office? Are you crazy?), but it would be something to wear in particular occasions, for someone who appreciates this kind of stuff. Can mainstream perfumes dare for once?

If anyone knows about anything like that, I’m ready.

If this was a color it would be
Emporio Armani Diamonds Black Carat For Him

Emporio Armani Black Carat Perfume Review

The opening of Armani Pour Homme is with a fragrant, very real orange, and – childhood knocking at my door again – the same taste I used to get sucking these fruit drops.

In the background however, there is already a spice and/or a herb of some sort. I couldn’t give it a proper name, but it’s a bit bitter and a bit dirty. As it becomes more present, I would say it’s the warm-but-cold cardamom.

When the heart notes start to take shape, with orange slowly fading out, this Armani perfume for men becomes a soft but solid masculine, warm, spicy, soapy, and sustained by woods until the dry down.

And yet, Armani Eau De Toilette Pour Homme seemed to lack of something, like the mystery of Bleu de Chanel or the elegant dirtiness of Emporio Armani City Glam. But then I realised it was rather for something it had: the 28 years of age, weighing it down.

It must have been quite sophisticated in its time though, and it may still evoke some nostalgic memory of youth.  As for me, I prefer my orange fruit drops.

If this was a color it would be

Armani Eau Pour Homme Vaporisateur

Armani Eau Pour Homme Review

This fragrance was a lot of fun to sample, I was expecting buckets of insulin-triggering syrup but it was smarter than that.

Peach, or something quite similar to it, will be the signature note until the dry down. It’s fresh, with some of the crispness of pear, and although it tends to be tyrannical almost to the point of boring, it’s all the stuff happening around it that deserves to be told.

This Jimmy Choo parfum is – of course – sweet, but its sweetness is wrapped in a thin plastic film, which restrains it and at the same time polishes it with a layer of neon light. And if I could touch this peach, I would swear it’s even slightly sticky.

The fairly thick glazed peach curtain will make Jimmy Choo EdP change very slowly and not that much after all, but after about two hours – it takes a little bit of sharpening the nose – sweetness becomes creamier and patchouli splatters some light mud on it.

It’s only after a couple of more hours, that peach subsides and sets the florals free. That’s the beginning of the dry down, which keeps the dirty patchouli and adds vanilla-sweet notes, but it’s all nice and soft.

Fun, young enough, and all in all quite balanced, if I had to choose between, say – and I’m picking randomly here – this one, Flowerbomb and 212 Sexy, Jimmy Choo parfume would be the winner, Flowerbomb would come second, and don’t even get me started on 212.

The version I sampled was the EdP, it was launched in 2011 and created by  Olivier Polge (Only The Brave, Armani Code For Women, Flowerbomb).

If this was a color it would be

Jimmy Choo Eau De Parfum

Jimmy Choo Fragrance Review

OK, put it that way it looks like a meaningless concoction, but this is what this Givenchy Play eau de toilette is about and it somehow works.

It was launched in 2008 as the Intense version of Givenchy Play for men, and created by Emilie Bevierre Coppermann (Black XS for Her) and Lucas Sieuzak.

It’s possibly the most linear perfume I have sampled so far, but that doesn’t have to be a bad quality. One thing is when you sit down and try to describe what goes on on a paper strip, that’s when you want to see stuff happening, some movida. But when you’re looking for something to wear on your skin, you may not want any surprise.

For that, you have this Intense Play For Him: it’s sweeter than Only The Brave and less aromatic than Optimistic.

If I have to be honest, it didn’t drive me crazy. Sure it’s not hateable, it has a certain amount of warmth a trace of darkness (that’s why I couldn’t put it with the aromatic/fresh ones), and it’s even smoked in the very end, but why didn’t they put more coffee and pepper and less sugar in it?

If this was a color it would be
Play Intense By Givenchy For Him

Givenchy Play Intense For Him Review

Bullshit duly noted, and lesson learnt with this Tom Ford fragrance.

So, where should I start from, top notes maybe? Fennel, that’s what I got: green, fragrant fennel, but with still a floral smell in the background to remind me that I was sitting in a Starbucks and not in my dad’s vegetable garden.

Actually, there is also the typical fresh (but in a kind of disturbing way) chemical smell of white florals, and it’s as if the freshly grated fennels had been dressed with a tablespoon of paint. And what makes this even more amazing is that – at last – both blotter and wrist agreed, almost completely.

After that, the fragrance takes a break and tries to behave, like any good floral would do, becoming denser with floralcy and only putting forth light peppery notes.

And then this parfum Tom Ford gets buttery, and if you ever asked yourself why fennels go so well with butter, that’s because the greenness of the first blends perfectly with the creaminess of the latter.

Get hold of Velvet Gardenia Tom Ford while you can and go nuts: it’s floral, green, smooth, creamy, velvety, perfectly unisex, fresh, warm, dense, one layer on top of the other, of the other, of the other… Why, why was this discontinued?

If this was a color it would be
Velvet Gardenia Perfume

Velvet Gardenia Tom Ford Perfume Review

Emporio Diamonds Armani was launched in 2007 and represents one of the last great fragrances created by Thierry Wasser, before he was appointed in-house perfumer at Guerlain.

The top offers brief citrus notes, and then the perfume opens to rose and lily-of-the-valley. Although the bouquet is delicate and not overly intense, rose is a note that can bite if sprayed generously.

Fruits will follow quickly, blending with the florals. It is red fruits we are talking about here, like litchi, but with little or no sourness and a controlled sweetness. To simplify, there is a vague strawberry bubble-gum feeling in Emporio Armani Diamonds perfume. The result however, is by no means a teenage fragrance, also because the fruity-floral core is wrapped in light green notes, which provide more complexity and depth.

This delicate balance between the delicacy of the florals, the smouldering power of rose and the soft sweetness of the fruits will be its main quality for the most part.  As it moves towards the base, Diamonds Emporio Armani becomes a tad sweeter, thanks to a note of vanilla.

However, the fragrance will keep the balanced structure it has showed so far, and light amber will prevent it from having the usual all-vanilla finale of many other fragrances in the same category.

Nice job, Thierry Wasser, wrapping rose in a slightly gourmand red fruit, leaving us wondering if we should smell the fruits or eat the rose.

Among many perfumes that claim to be upbeat and uplifting, the simplicity of Armani Emporio Diamonds with a transparent name and a transparent bottle (diamond-shaped, of course), is the real thing. If you like sparkling, happy fragrances, with an edible quality, this is the one for you. Regardless of your age: more than ever, with this Diamonds for women, it’s the spirit that counts.

If this was a perfume it would be:

Perfume Diamonds

Giorgio Armani Diamonds Perfume Review

When the florals have found some balance, the fruits come out again (peach, if you ask me) and turn out to be a fair amount. In spite of that however, I put this in the sweet-floral category, as it’s still mainly floral and the sweetness is more intense than in the fruity floral ones. Check those for less sweet stuff.

So, we were saying, Guilty perfume by Gucci is more on the floral side: it goes easier on the blotter, more sparkling and fresher, but more animalic on the skin (according to this other review it’s the pepper). Florals (mainly lilac) will remain in the foreground for the most part anyway.

It’s a pattern I’m starting to see with this type of fragrances for women, in which the intention of the perfume maker seems to go mainly floral, but without giving up the contribution that fruits can give in modifying the floralcy and enhancing the sweetness.

As Gucci perfume Guilty evolves, there will be more balance between the two sides, but their connection will be tighter and harder to untangle. Until the finale, which is still sweet but greener, thanks to patchouli.

Gucci Guilty Eau de Toilette is reasonably sweet, although some may find it a bit too much. It’s classy and “adult”, a term that in my own vocabulary stands between “young” and “mature.”

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Gucci Perfume Guilty

Perfume Gucci Guilty For Women

It’s quite recent, launched in spring 2011 with the version for Her, both created by Francoise Caron (Hermes Eau D`Orange Verte, Rock’n Rose by Valentino among the others).

The opening is very fresh, almost cold. It’s just a generic freshness at first, but then all the layers will start to gradually come out: at first light sweet notes, and a not-too sour mandarin.

And then come light unisex florals with also aromatic green notes, which make it a bit more interesting. It feels like a sort of sweeter version of Lacoste Essential Sport. No amber so far.

So there you have: your popular and safe aromatic / fresh perfume for men formula:

citrus + floral + sweet + aromatic

The sweetness is more prominent, whereas the florals seem to remain in the background. On my skin it came out more aromatic, whereas on the blotter the freshness was higher.

It is quite similar to Diesel Only The Brave, and although both are too sweet for my taste, I would personally prefer Optimistic as the citrus seem to be more present.

It’s possibly the most unisex fragrance I have sampled so far, until the end, when amber and the classic masculine clean smell come in and pull it more towards the masculine side. And the sweet notes step aside.

As I said, this Paul Smith Optimistic For Men won’t be the most original thing on this earth. However, they managed to make it as least dull as possible. It will be great for informal post-shower moments, and it seems like they made an effort to make it optimistic. if this is the very first perfume for men you ever sample, or if this category has not fallen from grace with you, you may want to try it.

If this was a color – before the dry down- it would be:

Paul Smith Perfumes

Paul Smith Optimistic Review

It starts with very quick fruity notes, and then you’ll get a bouquet of intense and dense white florals, which are given a paintbrush of spicy, woody and citrus notes.

It feels like a diluted version of Opium, but not in a derogatory way, quite the opposite: intense and extreme don’t have to be always the same thing, and there goes your proof.

In the heart notes, the florals are still intense, but the sour nose-filling side is left out in favour of the cleaner one (probably thanks to jasmine), which melts great with the citrus.

The result is a great balance, of intensity and cleanness at a general level, but of many other things as well: sweet + sour (from the floral) + fresh (from the citrus) + powdery + spices. This means you will feel all of them, but none will step on the other.

In the dry down it will become softer, slightly warmer and cleaner.

Calvin Klein Perfume Beauty is a great fragrance and a mature one: 30-35, maybe 40 would be the appropriate entry age I believe. It was launched in 2010 an created by Sophie Labbe (Nina Ricci Premier Jour).

I liked all the Calvin Klein perfumes I reviewed so far, but this stroke me as the odd one, and in a positive way. It’s a more oriental version of Beautiful and a more human version of Opium. it’s the revenge of the intense-but-moderate, of the normal with a twist, as we all are.

And, on top of that, it’s quite sexy (and remember: guy’s opinion here).

If this was a color it would be:
Calvin Klein Beauty Fragrance

CK Calvin Klein Beauty Perfume Review