Interview with Jean-Paul Guerlain and Thierry Wasser

Browsing through my Russian blog I found a link to this interview posted by moon_fish (you probably know him on Basenotes under the same name). It's an interesting reading. Enjoy!

http://www.wallpaper.com/art/guerlain-interview/2918

Guerlain homme - a practical joke?

Russian version - click here

The whole summer I was teased by the bloggers writing about new Guerlain Homme fragrance. Finally I could smell it from the blotter in the perfume shop. Unfortunately there was no love from the firtst sight. My nose has got a sweet citrusy smell classified by my brain as “eau de cologne, masculine, fresh, sweet, common…” But I did remember the positive comments about this fragrance and decided to give it a second chance.

The first very short notes reminded me of iris from the namesake fragrance from Dior. The iris vision lasted only the seconds and later I could enjoy a nice glass of Mojito cocktail as it was promised. The resemblance with Mojito consisting of lime pieces, rum, ice, fresh mint leaves and sugar syrup was remarkable. A soft greenness of mint was resonating with a green bitterness of geranium leaf (oh, sorry, it was pelargonium mentioned in the pyramid). That emphasizes a fougère character of the fragrance, but not the classic aromatic one. This one is a soft floral. My skin likes the sweet notes and gratefully enhances the sugar part (maltol?) of the fragrance. I am not sure how rhubarb smells, but guess, that it is the rhubarb that gives a resemblance with rum to this fragrance. It’s funny to notice that Mojito cocktail comes back and goes again, playing with the fougère note. I was glad with the base that nicely support the fragrance and doesn’t let it turn “rancid”. Although I couldn’t really smell the woody cedar-vetiver note as obviously as it was promised.

Luka Turin in his review gives Guerlain Homme four stars from fives and in general speaks good about this fragrance calling it “rum wood”. He emphasize that he has already heard something like that in Yohji and he has also seen a similar bottle at Dior Homme. I do agree with him about the resemblance with Yohji. The last one has less obvious citrus note and more strong character. Guerlain Homme could have been called Yohji Light or Yohji Summer.

While exploring the fragrance, its presentation and the legend created by Guerlain I couldn’t get rid of an idea that it’s a kind of a practical joke. Follow me…

First of all we see Guerlain famous with its classical fragrances making almost a mass-market fragrance with Mojito notes. Many fans of Guerlain were almost offended by such a gesture and started to talk about the “fall of the Guerlain House”. Second they promised us a potion evoking a wild animal from the darkest corners of the male spirit. But what they did give to us? A glass of Mojito and an advertisment film about a Mowgli? It smells wrong. Unless… May be it is a big practical joke that the Head of Fragrance Development Sylvain Delacourte thought up drinking a glass mojito on the sultry evening somewhere in the tropical jungles? Who knows? I couldn’t evoke a beast with a sample of Guerlain Homme, but it reminded me of a simple wisdom, that you don’t have to take life too seriously. May be it’s time just to relax, drink a glass of mojito and behave silly for your own pleasure. Life is to enjoy.

Pyramid (derived from the fragrance description on the Guerain website):

Top notes: Mojito (Jamaican rum, mint, lime)
Middle notes: pelargonium, green tea
Base notes: Cedar, Vetiver, Rhubarb

Perfumer: Thierry Wasser in cooperation with Sylvain Delacourte

A piquant detail: Aren’t those wild green eyes of Renne Castrucci, the face of Guerlain Homme amazing? Check his profile and you find that his eye colour is blue (http://www.chadwickmodels.com/model/1467)

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Making of:

Mitsouko - the masterpiece, the story, the legend

Russian version - click here

Image: AromaX

Mitsouko is a perfume created in 1919 by Jacque Guerlain. Just after the World War I – the time when people tired of cruelties and were longed for softness and joy to smelt the ice in their hardened hearts. The light, warm and tender fragrance fulfilled this need. Mitsouko was a masterpiece that is still popular and loved. One of the few fragrances which has survived all the reformulations without loosing its charm and beauty.

The name Mitsouko comes from a novel of Claude Ferré “La Bataille” (The Battle) written in the same year. The main character is a young Japanese woman Mitsouko, the wife of a Japanese admiral who felt in love with a young British naval attaché – a thrilling affair of passion between two young loving hearts with elements of intrigue and deceit. The admiral did knew about the affair of his wife, but sacrificed his pride for his country.

The rumours says that Guerlain was inspired by his own love affair with a Japanese lady, but the truth remains behind the veil of mystery, because the “Mitsouko” means “mystery” in Japanese.

What does the mystery smell like?

When I put it on my skin it reminds me on cookies – yes, Mitsouko smells cookies on my skin – a sweet slightly milky fragrance I know from my childhood. It fills me with peacefulness and joy and I just want to keep smell this fragrance as one whole note without analysing the ingredients… no oakmoss, no bergamot, no peach – just cookies. My personal experience says that it’s not easy to “smell through” a note of an accord that give you a strong emotional impact – when you either like it a lot or hate. It’s also difficult to analyse a good balanced accord. The good accord is a point when you actually don’t smell the ingredients, but a new note that smells differently than just a mix of the components. The better the accord, the more difficult to analyse. Mitsouko is difficult for me because of both – it’s a perfect accord and it hits my emotions.

Sometimes it helps when you know learn the ingredients first. In perfume terms Mitsouko is a fruity chypre – a perfume based on the contrast between dark, dry, earthy and mossy smell of Oakmoss and light, fresh and citrusy bergamot mixed with a fruity note of peach. It´s remarkable that the spirit of intrigues and deceit is found not only in the name of Mitsouko, but also in the fragrance itself. Mitsouko smells peaches, but there are no peaches in Mitsouko – it’s the first (or one of the first) perfume where the synthetic material is used that is unknown in nature to simulate the peach fragrance.

The peach is made of synthetic material – C-14 (so called peach) aldehyde. In fact the C-14 aldehyde is not an aldehyde, but a lactone, but they didn’t know it in times of Mitsouko, so it’s still called C-14 peach aldehyde (still smell the intrigue and deceit? Even within a single ingredient of the perfume?) The smell of C-14 peach aldehyde (lactone) has a sweet fruitiness of peach and a creamy note of milk. The dark earthy oakmoss is a bit too heavy material to make a light and joyful perfume. The fresh brightness of bergamot alone is not enough to make a good chypre. Mostly you can soften the oakmoss with huge dosage of jasmine (the way how Coty has softened the oakmoss in Chypre). Guerlain found that C-14 peach aldehyde can also tame the beast (as the rumours says by accident, but who knows). Oakmoss, bergamot and peach made from C-14 aldehyde (lactone) – this is the essence of Mitsouko – a perfectly balanced accord.

Other notes reported in Mitsouko are:

Lemon, Mandarin, Neroli, Rose, Jasmine, Clove, Ylang-Ylang , Benzoin, Woody notes, Cinnamon.

It’s remarkable to notice that Mitsouko shares the bottle with another Guerlain perfume of a very different character – L’Heure Bleu. To explain that they often say that it was the time when perfumers didn’t have an idea that each perfume needed its own bottle – people buy what’s inside. But the rumours (yes, the rumours again) say that there was another reason. After the war, in the time of poverty it was not easy to find a bottle for the new perfume and the bottles from the stock were used.

This is a legend. My personal olfactory experiences with Mitsouko may follow sooner or later.