Scented Snippets New Fragrance Review: DSH Perfumes Rendezvous / Retro Nouveau Seduction

 

Dawn Spencer Hurwitz has had a lifelong fascination with vintage perfumes preceding her art student days at Boston University.

Dawn and Sarah Horowitz [pre-Thran!] had a small boutique together on Newbury Street in Boston called Essence.  It was there that I first made their acquaintance. I walked in and inquired: “Could you recreate Le Galion Sortilège for me?”

Years later, we reconnected through the Perfumed World. I never dreamed that I'd be writing about it, or that loving familiar faces would re-enter my life in such a significant manner.

Call it karma.
 

Rendezvous

Notes:

Top: aldehydes,  bergamot, white pepper

Heart: juhi jasmine absolute, jasmine grandiflorum, sambac jasmine, tuberose absolute, Spanish orange flower absolute, Bulgarian rose absolute, gardenia

Base: French beeswax, ambrette seed, ambergris, African stone tincture, castoreum, civet, costus, brown oakmoss, labdanum, opoponax, Mysore sandalwood, oud, Peru balsam, vanilla absolute
 

I've chosen this font hue because it evokes the richness and warmth of Rendezvous' exquisitely animalic nature – a perfume which I bought blind, in the beautiful bottle [Yes, it was an advance birthday present, money saved judiciously for that purpose; Ican buy blind from Dawndear. There are precious few of whom I can actually say that].

One has to introduce the major players: to this end, Dawn tickles the olfactory palate with shimmering aldehydes, vivacious bergamot, and a potent puff of white pepper.

Very like Germaine Cellier [one of my favorite perfumers], Dawn chooses to overdose in the grand tradition. Too much is just perfect as growling, prowling jasmines breed sanguinely with the fulsomeness of orange blossom, smoldering tuberose and narcotic gardenia. Flower as feral -  that's where we are headed, make no mistake. You just watch your step. It's a jungle in Dawn's garden.

[Where is Rose? Where she often is found: gracefully allying all the other components, smoothing out the rough edges; she's the perfect perfumed playmate.]

The base? It is all about abundance. Every lusciously decadent animalic substance imaginable has wended its way into Rendezvous' formula, sparing no expense. With the exception of civet and castoreum, every other fragrant material hails from the natural world; we are treated to the Golden Standard, Mysore sandalwood - which contributes to the joy of a simmering drydown, erotic on the flesh, both carnal and intimate. I can only speak to the parfum, not the eau de parfum strength – butRendezvous feels very much like a private affair. Unless you deliberately plonk on an inordinate quantity, the perfume exudes a delicious raunchiness which is elegant and worldly.

Over time, it becomes more of a skin scent: a lovely, intentionally willful déshabille. It reminds me very much of an encounter in the early '70s with an immense Danish ex-monastic-cum- photographer at the Rhode Island School of Design, dark hair down past my waist, and a vintage fur coat.

And no other garments to speak of.

A darkly erotic encounter with no holds barred.

Very much a rendezvous défendu.
 

Men may delight in wearing Rendezvous.

I simply can't perceive of blithe neophytes and the pre-pubertal finding this to their taste... YET. <3

Dawn Spencer Hurwitz and Dr. Ellen Covey of Olympic Orchids will be having a trunk show at Tigerlily Perfumery in San Francisco on March 4^th!

I wish I could be there...

But all of you who can, do attend.

It should be a real pleasure.

New from Dawn Spencer Hurwitz: Rendezvous, an Animalic Fragrance

by: Dr. Marlen Elliot Harrison

Dawn Spencer Hurwitz, one of the leading independent US perfumers has launched a new fragrance - Rendezvous. The new perfume is described as a rich, animalic fragrance.

"I let my imagination go to a time and place when animalic perfumes reigned supreme.  Of course, I included the four traditional animal notes: musk, civet, ambergris, and castoreum with added elements of aged oakmoss, and botanical “animalics”; ambrette co2, labdanum, and  hyracium tincture (aka African Stone).  

The heart is filled with indolic juhi jasmine, orange flower absolute, and gardenia balanced by a slightly sharp and spicy white pepper and aldehyde top note.  The result is a lush, provocative, and thoroughly sexy perfume for both men and women...

A super sexy, “retro nouveau” animalic perfume with the kick of aldehydes and pepper in the top, narcotic, indolic florals in the heart, and a super rich, slightly salty, animalic drydown.  Let’s just say that there’s more going on here than a meeting of the minds." -Dawn Spencer Hurwitz

Notes include: Africa Stone Tincture, Aldehydes, Aldehydic, Ambergris, Ambrette Seed, Animalic, Bergamot, Brown Oakmoss, Bulgarian Rose Absolute, Castoreum, Civet, Costus, DSH New Products, Exclusive Perfumes, Floral, French Beeswax, Gardenia, Grandiflorum Jasmine, Jasmine, Juhi Jasmine Absolute, Labdanum, Musk, Mysore Sandalwood, Oppopanax, Orange Flower Absolute - Spain, Oude / Agarwood, Peru Balsam, Retro Nouveau, Sambac Jasmine, Tuberose Absolute, Vanilla Absolute, Vintage Style, White Pepper.

Rendezvous is vailable in the following formats: 3 ml deluxe spray Voile de Parfum sample, 5 ml Voile Parfum Antique Presentation, 60 ml Voile de Parfum spray, sample vial – Voile de Parfum, .5 oz Antique Presentation Perfume Extract Flacon, 1 oz. Eau de Parfum, 10 ml Eau de Parfum spray, Bath and Body- Organic Shea Butter Body Creme – 4.5 oz., individual sample vial – EdP, individual sample vial – PERFUME

Scented Snippets New Fragrance Collection: DSH Giverny in Bloom — Impressionism Illuminated

by: Ida Meister

Dawn Spencer Hurwitz, the Painterly Perfumer [as we might well now call her] has just refined her eighth collaborative multi-sensorial event with the Denver Art Museum. It will open on July 19th, entitled In Bloom: Painting Flowers in the Age of Impressionism.

This time, Dawn has provided the scentscape en plein air which accompanies this panoramic vision of Monet's beloved gardens in Giverny through painting and perfume: the damp, soil-infused verdancy of the garden [Le Jardin Vert]; the blue-violet beds of iris, lilac, violets [La Danse des Bleus et des Violettes];  the peonies, old roses and scented carnations [l'Opera des Rouges et des Roses]; and Giverny in Bloom—a symphonic culmination of the mad, riotous profusion of blossoms actually painted by Monet from his original gardens.

One will wander joyfully through the groupings of his paintings while being able to immerse themselves in their lovingly imagined aromas.

[There will even be a "scratch and sniff" card for exhibit visitors to take with them]

Where shall I begin?

These fragrances are so unabashedly, unapologetically floral that they fairly revel.

I was sent earlier scent sketches, then the refined, fully-fleshed ones.

They leave me breathless.

[And, like you, I will have to wait until July 14th (an auspicious day, don't you think? ;-) ) in order to place my purchases.]

Water Lilies and the Japanese bridge, 1897-1899

LE JARDIN VERT
[The Green Garden]

This is a wonderful place to start!

Do you share my adoration of the intensely verdant, freshly-turned earth, complete with the sap of bruised green leaves and stalks, the tender floralcy of blossoms gently warming to the sun's gaze?

Then this, dear heart, is for you. Inhale the morning garden, green, soil-infused. Its freshness is indeed a virtue; it is not a piercing hawk of green, but that of nascent growth, joyful and full of light.

I love that it is both floral and green without bitterness or glaring aldehydes. <3

Water Lilies and Reflections of a WIllow, 1916-1919

LE DANSE DES BLEUS ET DES VIOLETTES
[The Dance of the Blues and Violets]

Limpid Impressionism: this perfume is entirely different, celebrating the sweet shyness of the soft palette of watery, hazy soothing tones so dear to Monet's heart and eye. Dewy and humming with the sweetest flowers, we are swept into the painter's daydream: irises, violets, seringa, lilacs, crocus all populate this corner of the gardens as we follow, entranced. I sense the movement of butterflies, bees, and the few clouds which dapple a brilliantly clear sky above. There exists a dolce far niente quality in Le Danse.—

To be alive is excuse enough. <3

House Among the Roses, between 1917 and 1919

L'OPERA DES ROUGES AT DES ROSES
[The Opera of the Reds and the Roses]

You don't have to sing opera to be smitten by this particular perfume; you merely need to love life on a Grand Scale.

Everything red- or pink-hued is depicted with an adoring sense of drama. L'Opera is the Grande Dame of the collection: spicy, blowsy with glorious roses and scented carnations. I am a confessed admirer of the carnation, and an avowed rose lover; I couldn't be happier.

Dawn includes the slightly medicinal, camphorous whisper, too, for that element of uncertainty.

This perfumed lady suffuses her scent wherever she billows, resplendent in her primary-colored finery.

A paltry brush of her crinolines is enough to bring you to your knees.

Hers is the passion to inflame the senses mercilessly.

So be it; her will is my will. <3

In the Garden, 1895

GIVERNY IN BLOOM

Millefiori and soil; sun, water and sky.

This is what plenitude smells like when Nature bestows her cornucopia of gifts.
All our elements are present and we can smell them for ourselves.

Earthiness weds the ethereal. Soil and sun, narcissus and daffodil, hyacinth surely are evoked as I inhale this heady fragrance. It lingers despite apparent transparency.

The florals feel moist, your nose would know when you reached down to experience them, tempted to pluck. But you musn't be greedy: Giverny belongs to all, and we have no business filching the flowers. Dawn has given them to us in this perfume, generously enough. We want for nothing.

And we are grateful for all of it, in good measure.

I won't be able to fly to Denver, sadly.

I doubt that many of us could.

But through her delicious collection of Impressionist-inspired perfumes, we can share in the experience with delight.