Florascent
Florascent
289 votes
A unique visual signature based on accords, character, and seasonality
Honeysuckle's syrupy floralcy collides immediately with something murky and vegetal—the malodor note reveals itself as composted greenery, damp and slightly funky, whilst citrus oils spray sharp and bitter across the top. Jasmine enters with its indolic undercarriage exposed, no polite powder in sight, creating an opening that's simultaneously lush and unsettling.
Coriander's aldehydic sparkle cuts through the floral density like metal on porcelain, whilst orange blossom unfurls its full narcotic weight, waxy petals bruised and sweetly decaying. Ylang-ylang adds its characteristic fuel-like sweetness, that slightly medicinal banana-custard quality amplifying the composition's peculiar vintage character, as the chypre skeleton begins to assert itself through increasingly pronounced green-mossy textures.
Sandalwood and patchouli settle into a dusty, slightly austere woody base that feels more ascetic than sensual, the kind of woods found in forgotten apothecaries rather than spas. The iris finally reveals its full powdery-rooty duality, dried flowers pressed between pages, whilst lingering traces of that early strangeness—the malodor's earthy funk—persist like a ghost note, ensuring this never quite resolves into conventional prettiness.
Eau d'Iris opens with an arresting dissonance, the sort of calculated discord that marked late-1950s avant-garde perfumery. Vincent Marcello's 1959 composition dares to frame iris not in powdery gentility but in verdant, almost feral territory—honeysuckle's indolic sweetness crashes into a peculiar malodorous undertone that reads like the green-black scent of crushed stems and mineral-damp earth. This isn't iris as cosmetic comfort; it's iris as botanical specimen, roots still clinging to soil. The citrus elements feel more like torn leaves than zested peel, whilst jasmine arrives with its skatole-rich shadows fully intact.
The heart reveals Marcello's masterwork: coriander's soapy-metallic spark illuminates orange blossom's waxy narcotic quality, whilst ylang-ylang adds a peculiar rubbery sweetness that shouldn't work but does, creating a kind of retro-futuristic floralcy. There's something profoundly strange about how these elements orbit the central iris—never quite merging, maintaining their distinct personalities like guests at an awkward dinner party. The chypre structure emerges gradually, its mossy greenness amplified by what one assumes is a robust patchouli base (that mysterious "Zarquon" note aside). Sandalwood provides creamy relief, though never enough to fully tame the composition's spiky character.
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