July 17, 2013 |
This is the story of fragrance. A story of birth. The birth of a fragrance. In 1984, a fragrance was born. It was called Eau Pour Homme. Water for Man. “The birth of a fragrance is always a mystery. Imagined over the course of a voyage, it blends in its notes the light of a landscape, the fragrance of a flower or a fruit. A fragrance can make can make time stand still. Just like photographic emulsion, it captures the ephemeral; like a musical statement, it brings back to life what seems to have died.” And like a phoenix rising from the ashes, a fragrance has been reborn. Reborn as “the essence of elegance, evoking the magic moment when dusk blends into night”. Reborn as Eau de Nuit. Or to give it its English name, Water of the Night. It is black. Nocturnal. Masculine. And not merely a fragrance, but so much more. A vision of style and alter ego. Think of it as the Mr Hyde to your Dr Jekyll (minus the violent killings). It is “the essence of a dream, at the same time bold and intimate. A journey into the night. A hiatus between dusk and dawn… a real yet magical vision. The fleeting moment when daylight turns to darkness. Both Eau Pour Homme’s twin and its opposite. Dark and profound where its counterpart is luminous. A concentrate of style that resounds with the codes of masculine chic”. Basically, it’s a blend of light and dark. Top notes of bergamot, pink pepper and cardamom are blended together to represent light and freshness. They are the scent equivalent of Dr Jekyll pre transformation. As the fragrance warms on your skin, hints of iris and nutmeg kick in, signifying the transformation to your darker side – “the final glow of the sun shimmers on the already-black surface of the water” – then the darkness sets in with a hit of amber on tonka bean, and the transformation is complete. Smooth and elegant like the glass bottle that houses the scent, with a glint of danger in his eye that flashes in the light, just as the silver lettering set against the dark glass does, your Mr Hyde sets off into the night, looking for his prey in the manner of, say, an American Gigolo rather than an American Psycho. The Armani man is not a serial killer. Murder is a messy pastime. Blood sprays might stain his smoking jacket, and the last time we took our smoking jackets to the dry cleaner they came back covered in white dots. To some, stain removal clearly means removal of dye from fabric, too. If we had wanted polka-dot jackets we wouldn’t have bought ourselves pieces of tailoring perfection from Giorgio. So we’ve come to the conclusion that it’s better to smell of danger than actually be dangerous.
by Natalie Dembinska
