women

Happy Birthday Olivia Giacobetti!

Posted on by elemonated

Ms. Giacobetti is 49 years old today. She is my newest woman crush that I should have high-lighted a long, long time ago.

Olivia Giacobetti is an amazing French perfumer who has created fragrances such as Frederic Malle’s En Passant (my favorite Frederic Malle), Diptyque’s Philosykos and Ofresia, a whole host of L’Artisan fragrances including the infamously difficult to get Tea for Two (my favorite L’Artisan!), and fragrances for Hermès, Guerlain, and Penhaligon’s. I love her for her delicate simplicity and the subtle way she crafts her fragrances. I have loved everything she has touched that I have smelled so far, and can’t wait to smell more.

The L’Artisan website claim that she was inspired by the depictions of perfumery in the film le Sauvage which means I need to seek this film out with English subtitles in a hurry (or learn French. I feel I have more of an incentive to learn it than even mandarin.) She trained from the age of 17 at Robertet, a huge French distillery known for developing new ways of obtaining natural raw material from its distillation sources before opening her own firm Iskia, which I unfortunately couldn’t find any information about. And she does all this while staying oh so effervescently lovely.

She is currently working as creative director at one of the oldest perfume houses, Parfum Lubin.

I Will What I Want – Under Armor

Posted on by elemonated

I’m loving those new Under Armour ads. They’re a perfect follow up in the theme set by the Always #LikeaGirl Superbowl ads; crazy excellent women doing crazy excellent at the things they do. Misty Copeland, especially struck me as a a great model for this particular set of ads because I have experience with the dance and performance industry, and the voice-over used in her video really struck a chord. Under Armour especially does a great job expressing an emboldening message, while making their products look fantastic.

Any profession where the body is used as an outward vessel for expression incites criticism of the vessel. Calls for an idealization of the vessel that makes it so that expression through it is exclusive. Modeling is the same way, though Giselle Bundchen’s ad focuses on a slightly different issue. There’s this odd tendency in all visual arts, from videography to photography to writing to watercolor to etching to dance, that dehumanizes the subject, and concentrates them down to that moment. At best, art gives a summary. We can’t forget that there’re always more to the story.

By Kilian Addictive State of Mind – Light My Fire

Posted on by elemonated

“Here, Heracletus, did you build of fire
And changing stuffs your prophecy far hurled
Down the dead years; this midnight I aspire
To see, mirrored among the embers, curled
In flame, the splendor and the sadness of the world.”

– Princeton – The Last Day by Scott F. Fitzergerald

Light My Fire
Wet: nail polish remover, tobacco
Dry: tobacco, patchouli, vetiver, maple syrup

Really it just smells like a fragrant chewing tobacco, or the basement of a Chinese restaurant reserved for smoking and cards and gangster activity. Like a good chewing tobacco, which I have only been exposed to a few times and have never tried myself, it’s a little floral, but it lacks the sourness that tobacco can have sometimes. It smells like gangsters, but during Sunday mass or attending their sons’ graduations; whichever culture you want to use. As if they washed and scrubbed themselves and their suits clean, but the scent lingers, just like the consequences of their actions.

By Kilian Addictive State of Mind – Intoxicated

Posted on by elemonated

“So are you to my thoughts as food to life,
Or as sweet-seasoned showers are to the ground;
And for the peace of you I hold such strife
As ‘twixt a miser and his wealth is found.”

– Sonnet 75 by William Shakespeare

Intoxicated
Wet: ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, gasoline, patchouli
Dry: speculoos, lapsang souchong

This one is really yummy. I love speculoos cookies and the spread more than I love Nutella or peanut butter. And the dry down smells like speculoos served with lapsang souchong, a smoky black tea from Fujian, and it’s so nice. I know it’s unisex, but I can’t really see a guy wearing this. It’s very sweet, and it makes me want to lick my wrist, even though that’s a terrible idea. It reminds me of a girl I know who’s incredibly beautiful and warm, and she’s the only one who comes to mind when I try to think of a character profile to fit this fragrance.

By Kilian Addictive State of Mind Series – Smoke for the Soul

Posted on by elemonated

“Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunwards I’ve climbed and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds – and done a thousand things”

– High Flight by John Magee

Smoke for the Soul
Wet: pepper, cardamom, marijuana, tobacco, citrus rind
Dry: lemon rind, marijuana, tobacco smoke, medicinal herb, leather

Spicy, herbal, woody like an apothecary, except without that weird salty hit that you find in some places. The only non-apothecary smell is the citrus, and that really lightens it up where the other two are heavy and rich. Acts a little like the orange on a Blue Moon or a squeeze of lemon on some salmon. This one I think smells the most like leather. It reminds me of a young, attractive businessman at the airport lugging their expensive tote and their frequent flyer miles and their ability to turn their tiredness into disdain.

The Rise of the Gourmand

Posted on by elemonated

https://www.yahoo.com/beauty/heres-why-women-want-to-smell-like-dessert-100766803358.html

Here’s Why Women Want To Smell Like Dessert

You might not know the term, but everyone’s smelled a gourmand before. Just step into Bath and Body Works for titles like “Warm Vanilla Sugar” and “Winter Candy Apple” to get a sense of the category. Gourmands are fragrances reminiscent of sweet foods, like desserts.

This category is still a fairly tween/teenager-run show, but I haven’t necessarily seen a big change in what people like as I’ve gotten older. Now I buy Philosophy gifts for my friends instead of Bath and Body Works sets, but they still have names like “Vanilla Birthday Cake”, “Almond Glazed”, and “Sugary Cinnamon Icing.”

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Asian Women are Submissive!

Posted on by elemonated

I love David So!

Anyway, I won’t write that much about it because he certainly covers all of the areas I’d focus on, but frankly, all of the women in my mom’s friend group are hard-working ball busters who are managers and senior accountants in their respective companies with real influence over their shit. My mom owns her own business with my dad. My cousins are all making bank whilst holding down the house. Man, exactly how much evidence do you really need before your eyes are crossed from having to ignore everything in front of your face?

Plus, anyone who’s dated me knows the title statement is hilarious.

Surrender to Chance – March

Posted on by elemonated

March: CB I Hate Perfume Black March Water

Wet: cut grass, wet leaves, moss, sandalwood?
Dry-down: cut grass, moss, pink flowers, rain, orchid
From far: Nothing really; the floral notes
Lasts: Not long at all. It’s gone within an hour for the most part

This is so interesting. It starts out like taking a drink from a fountain with rain and twigs and leaves in it or walking through the woods during, well, March, on a cloudy day. I don’t even think I can get over it; it’s so delightfully fresh. It’s almost like I’m sinking my teeth into the ground and instead of tasting disgusting the way eating dirt really does, it tastes like what I feel like it should taste like. It’s how dew or rain on a head of hair should smell.

It legitimately makes me feel happy in such cold, unforgiving weather. And then it fades into a liquid flowers smell, as if you took a bouquet of mostly honeysuckle and orchids and a rosebud or two and submerged them in water. A little like what rosebud tea would smell like if it were mixed with violets and a peppercorn or two (and now I have to go make tea. Thanks a lot, designers at CB.) The end scent has a lazy, warm, sunny element to it, as opposed to the beginning’s chilly, cloudy day.

Honestly, I’m in love, and I’ll have to stash this for a rainy spring day. I see this being worn by someone wearing a navy or red trench coat, holding a non-descript umbrella, wearing some knee-highs boots on a wet road. If this all sounds overly pretentious and poetic, I apologize. These are just the images that have been making an appearance in my head.

No seriously, it’s kind of insane how much I like this. I keep sniffing it and audibly sighing.

I’m done now, I swear.