FASHIONISTA'S.... Here ye, here ye.

If like me your every waking moment is spent contemplating the importance of fashion (and the lack of it floating around... thanks Primark!) then you too may enjoy the new AW edition of Elle's Collections magazine.

Brings to the front the main feel's, looks and trends of the coming AW collections without muddling its words. Polka dots, tartans, fetishism, androgyny, 40's Glam, 60's chic, patterns cut in velvets and silks to produce "jewel' tones, lush stuff.

Not only does it give the reader AAA passes to the biggest and best shows during Fashion week it does so with a generous helping of wit. Just a fun read really.

So, if you dont want to be making beauty blunders or fashion faux pas this Autumn I suggest you buy a copy of this beautifully edited magazine.

Lobster. Anyone?

Why is it that in Scotland when the sun comes out the men take off their tops to expose their transparent skin and the women wear what can only be described as a bandana round their breast and a dish towel round their genitals?? why? just why?

I have summered all over the world and every other nationality show dignity and a little respect by making sure they dress appropriately and are sensibly covered.

Men still show their stylish side in lighter fabrics and showing just the right amount of skin,

and the women are always impeccably turned out no matter the temperature 

apart from Brazil but then most Brazilians have athletic, toned, bronze skin and lets be honest 90% of the population are easy on the eye.....

Time for emigration/booking myself away for the summer/taking a mini gatling gun out with me.

Scotland, you really are a classy lot.

A Tale from Tails.

As the final curtain draws on the Penhaligons Anthology series. Fragrance expert, writer, critic and all round scented saint over at The Silver Fox has written a beautiful short story inspired by Esprit de Roi.

A scent of Twilight love

This is a visually imprinting piece of writing concerning scent, very clever. Not like the usual posts found on those other Fragrance blogs.

"He was standing at the end of the ruined glasshouse, somewhat lost yet entirely found. The sweet odours inside the shattered structure were tropical and oppressive. I started walking toward him. He showed no sign of really noticing me. As I got closer, I noticed the floor around him was smudged with raspberries, crushed into the earthen floor, mixed with lichen, bruised geranium, dead leaves and mosses."

Top image and paragraph copyright @ The Silver Fox

Buzzee as a Bee.

Back once more for two weeks straight in the lovely environs of Hope Hairdressing one of Scotlands leading hair salons.

There will be a lack of postage this week and the following, that i do promise!

The mornings are bleary eyed, the days are smashingly good and the nights are a haze of Sobranie smoke, Vesper trails, plumes of Tom Ford's Black Orchid and have involved a lot of late late nights..... no rest for this wicked little worker bee.

Buzzzzzzzzzzzz!

No Lillet in my usual cocktail bar god only knows what vermouth they were using...... bitches.

Over and out.

New Autumn leather....

Yum. A thunderbolt of excitement struck me today. Sitting re-reading my copies of Vogue, Tatler, Elle and the like whilst enjoying an amazingly well roasted coffee and after glaring at the new Bottega Veneta AW ad campaign the prospect of their new and much anticipated fragrance release began to overwhelm me....

Penciled in for an August launch nationwide here in the UK, you can bet your last dollar I will be visiting all the usual fragrance halls on the day of its release for my initial whiff and then hopefully, hopefully the parting of my own cash to own a bottle of this exciting new jus.

Cast your minds back to the marvelous scented candles made in conjunction with L'Artisan Parfumeur back in 2005, handsomely encased in the trademark BV woven leather..... nom nom nom!!

The fragrance is made by scented behemoths Coty Prestige which holds a somewhat impressive track record for creating some of the best performing "designer" perfumes over the last coupla years (think Vera Wang, Chloé.... Marc Jacobs.) The perfumer scoring this one off is Robertet whip cracker Michel Almairic nose behind the perfumes of Chloé, Gucci and Giorgio Armani.

Categorised as a Floral leather chypre, something of a Coty speciality.

10 year Veneta vetran Tomas Maier Head of creative design at the italian fashion and lifestyle powerhouse said this about the new composition.. “An old house in the beautiful countryside in the Veneto region of Italy with rolling green hills, where we’re from. I envisioned a room with old wood floors, library walls and leather-bound books with the windows open wide, the breeze coming in and cut grass, hay, moss, garden flowers, growing through the room and everything mixing up. That’s where we started.”

 Sounds to me like a there may a perfect balance of dry, coumarin/tonka notes mixed with smoky Jasmin and leather accords rounded softly with powdered aldehydes.

The only released notes I have found are 

Bergamot, Jasmin Sambac, Pink Peppercorn, Oakmoss and Patchouli.

Other than this I really just wanted to share the new AW campaign shots, stunning, sad and beautifully balanced. Love the play on textures and the models expression.

Lush.

Beach House - Heart of Chambers

Costume|Change

October fast approaches, bringing with it my sisters wedding.

Exciting times.

A little less exciting is the prospect of waking up early tomorrow for a kilt fitting.. again!!!

Not that I dislike having clothes tailored its that god forsaken "skirt" that I detest. Really, a kilt?? Just because Im Scottish doesnt mean I have to wear a fricken kilt surely.

What the sister says goes I suppose. It is her big day.


I have given in only due to the fact Im allowed to have a costume change after the ceremony. Mid day I will change from the kilt to a three piece suit (either Paul Smith Prince of wales check or similar from Vivienne Westwood).

As we move into night Im planning on changing yet again into a two piece tuxedo (vintage Brioni).

I do realise I have put far too much thought into this and will be showing the wedding party up somewhat..... who cares!!! I find any large gathering painful, especially when it involves family. Pay back.

Lipstick traces!?!

Another fantastic posting by The silver fox over at A scent of elegance.

Yet another feast in the form of a two part-er. Part 1 a retrospective look at master perfumer Bertrand Duchaufour creations.

and

Part. 2 a mah-veh-louz review of L'Artisan Parfumeur's Traversée du Bosphore, latex, turkish delight, sugar, apples, spices....... and a few other oddities thrown in for good measure, have a gander, read and follow. TdB is one of my favorite Duchaufour fragrances also.

Up top for me is Penhaligon's Amaranthine launched in 2009, a symphony of white and cream, lace and leather. An ambushed Jasmine accord which is over ripened with clove oil and a synthetic "condensed milk" accord (I interpret this note as more of a "warm milk in a copper pan" than a tooth aching condensed milk note). A hedonistic lover.

Guerlian - A love affair.

For many years I have had a strange relationship with one of France's most notable exports, Guerlain.

The accord which makes up the "Guerlainade"* seems to becoming more prominent, heightened, volumised, steroid-fueled in most of the houses signature fragrances, they are all starting to merge into one single entity several hours after application at least to my nez.

colour, pattern, texture its all blending into one......... ahhhhh!!!

Thats me just being snobbish and looking at the company and its output as a whole. If I were to take each fragrance as a stand alone piece of work I would be hard pushed to pick a flaw in any of them.(even those I find overwhelming for personal reasons).

Recently after reading The Silver Fox's extravaganza Liquoric and Tweed and as the weather has been reeealllly dull I have prematurely approached two old classics normally reserved for the Autumn, Vol de Nuit and Jicky. Jicky allowing me to trudge around the house during the day, swathed in an invisible green forcefield..... dizzying, moody, feeling sorry for myself, depressed looking out of the windows at the muted canvas one minute and then, frenzied Technicolor scenes as the sun breaks through the next. If I do find myself venturing out of an evening I will be doused in VdN it pleases me that I end up leaving patrons of the local cocktail bar bewildered as they step into my petrolic slipstream. Appalled even. Gasps! Fantastic...

Jicky with its sodden woodland "green-ness" and creamy (spookily arousing and sexy) civet note, heart pounding layers of tonka and orris with a slight bruising of dark almost "shiny" clean leathery facets gripping at your throat. Could wear it all day in this bleak Scottish countryside (especially when wearing waxed cotton). Encountering few folks and those whom I do are left walking away wondering who or what I was.... A blur of slate grey, black and plum. A slither of silver, the creek of fine leather with every fast paced step. Glimmer of gold as my labrador rushes past.

Vol de Nuit, hmmmm. Where to start? I love you, I love you not, I love you, I love you not.... I think I love you! Do you want me to love you??

Without becoming boring with a bombardment of notes and perfume jargon I will just say this one piece.... there is galbanum in you somewhere you high flying creature of the night! and Ive dated you type in the past with sickly amounts of galbanum and its always ended sour, I tend to do the dirty and cheat. But that dark bottle green hue you engulf my mind in and the ability you have whereby you excite every neuron in my body means I have to love you, when it suits me.

Unlike its dank woodland floor dwelling sister Jicky, I tend to wear Vol de Nuit almost exclusively at night and I always run the tank dry over the festive season. Here in scotland the weather plummets, the layers are added and the icy chill needs a complimentary fragrance not a contrasting one, something that says "its cold, my hands and my alabaster skin are cold but my heart is warm"

Comforting notes swell and finally explode under a finely tailored pea coat and a burnt orange Hermés cashmere scarf warms with its residual hints of Cuir de Russie, only faint whispers of petrolic green leather as gloves pass by your face, you walk for miles among the snow covered Edinburgh streets, the lights twinkle over head and the castle's illuminated radiance beats down on guests from lands both distant and near. Sensory bliss.

Both of these scents are connected in my mind to dark, miserable countryside scenes and lonely walks along wet streetlamp lit streets but I can easily see both being worn by an angst ridden twenty something from manchester in the late 70's smoking and drinking amongst the brutalist architecture and high rise housing ala Curtis/ Morrissey. How soon is now? Twenty four hours etc. etc.

My main point to this post is to highlight my 5 favorite Guerlain's when worn by men. (or I)
No. 1 - L'Heure Bleu (Extrait) -apply 30mins before leaving otherwise you run the risk of smelling like a 19th century french whore-
No. 2 - Vol de Nuit (Extrait) -Absinthe fueled warmth-
No. 3 - Jicky/Mouchoir de Monsieur -to me these smell very close but in different ways Mouchoir on hotter days...-
No. 4 - Nahema (EDP) -Dramatised chorus of roses, think chlorine tinged pools scattered with roses-
No. 5 - Apres L'ondee - The fresher younger sibling to L'heure bleu, not a dperessed but still slightly suicidal-


No. 6 - Bending my own rules here... but cant have a post solely on Guerlain and not include just one sentence highlighting the stunning, stark beauty of spiritueuse double vanille...... goosebumps at the mere thought. Sacred, intoxication of indulgent near drinkable vanilla. Tasty. Could be my burial scent....

*The "Guerlainade" is a highly secretive accord which many of todays most notable noses believe consists of the following ingredients blended with a masterful hand: 
Jasmine, Bulgarian Rose, Orange Blossom, Bergamot, Iris, Tonka bean and Vanilla with a possibility that there may be some vetiver in there for good measure.