V / Visa
Robert Piguet (1945)

Visa was the second leather chypre by Germaine Cellier. It's very different to Bandit, and with a peachy floral it comes close to Femme de Rochas. But Visa has an orange flower dryness and a particular feel - which is very different to Femme.

An old cardboard suitcase filled with perfumed clothes and shoes, there's also lipstick and powder, and a balsamic sweetness to the baseline.
It recalls a time when people packed a bag and travelled by train. An era when everything wasn't plastic and still had a 'natural' smell to it.

[Vintage Parfum]

This is based on a sample of the 2000's reformulation, old enough to still be called Visa instead of just V.

It lives in a space halfway between Hermes Ambre Narguile (fruity, ashy pipe tobacco over pie-spiced gourmand amber) and Chanel's Coromandel (Old fashioned resinous amber with sour greens). I can see how it has its fans - this is a good combination - but I think it has issues. The ashy note and the sour greens team up to smell kind of nasty, like a really amazing gourmand with a blob of unpleasant weirdness on top. It's also oddly minty, which doesn't seem to match up with anything. The whole thing feels like it could be improved by leaving out a few ingredients.

That being said, it pulls itself back together with a truly wonderful brown sugar cinnamon base. In all, I'm going to split the difference and vote neutral.

Sweet & slightly sour fruit opening.
Orange blossom & ylang ylang appear.
No rose yet.
Lovely immortelle.
Vanilla present.
Later - patchouli, benzoin, and vetiver.
Still no rose.
Overall, kind of a gentle sweetness like others I own.
Surprise! Way later it resembles cinnamon. Hmm.

A well-done women's fragrance, but since I don't like peach, I can't say that I like it. It opens with a mixture of fruit, pears, peaches, plums. Well balanced with woody tones, and something chypre-like subtly in the background.

Stardate 20161214:

Current Vintage:
It is oriental. It is Floral.
A nice feminine leaning fragrance.
Like chicken soup on a cold day - Warm and fulfilling.
Recommended.

This is a beautiful floral oriental with an abundance of wonderful fruit notes. I love opulent perfumes that carry me back in memory to the pre-IFRA days, and Visa - while it has been reformulated, like every other fragrance - fills that bill. It's warm, gracious, enveloping and inviting, sweet but not smarmy. I think it's lovely.