jtd's Review of Fleur de Peau by Diptyque

Dyptique's Fleur de Pear was released about a year after Le Cri de la Lumière and is also based on an ambrette accord. If I had to characterize the difference between the two, Le Cri stems from the overlapping of its notes and accords and Fleur de Pear is build from a sequence of consecutive musk accords that appear one after the other. Convergence. Divergence. Two different approaches to ostensibly similar accords.

Fleur de Peau moves very differently than Le Cri. Wearing it is like strolling from room to room in a large house. Each musk is joined to the next in a chain. The top note is a papery iris. Then a starchy musk à la Mugler Cologne. Then a grainy pear, then shoe polish, then waxy skin. No accord goes away entirely, but they don't merge. They just reappear periodically. This olfactory junket is captivating in that it's so meticulous and methodical. It's not just the aromas that oscillate, it's the tones. The iris is cry and crinkly, the rose is sheer, the pear is grainy, the skin note is fatty and waxy. The accords maintain their edges and don't bleed into each other. They simply rotate.

Diptyque's ambrette is more animalic than Perfume d'Empire's and it's very human. The Diptyque ventures much further into the sweaty-skin facet of ambrette, which can make the perfume seem a bit odd as it moves from sweat to laundry soap to floral bouquet. If you tune in closely to the perfumes fluctuations, though, it's compelling.

The specificity of the composition creates an interesting opportunity for perfume critics. The fluctuation of the perfume, its progression through distinct olfactory territories creates the opportunity to consider composition without referring to formula per se. It can be described in terms of its qualities and can be analyzed based on its dynamics. Any perfume can be viewed this way, but Fleur de Peau lends itself particularly well to this approach.

from scenthurdle.com

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