Sneak Preview of the New Serge Lutens : Fourreau Noir and De Fille en Aiguilles
Today I got a chance to sniff the eagerly awaited – as always – new Serge Lutens launches. Only on strips, so this isn’t a definite opinion and certainly not a review, just a couple of first impressions which I may have to swallow back once I’ve done a real test. But here goes…
Des Filles en Aiguilles is a pun on the French expression “de fil en aiguilles”, i.e. “from thread to needle”, meaning “one thing leading to another”, except that here, “fille” means “girl”.
Ok, now that that’s cleared up, what about the juice?
Well, pine and incense sums it up pretty neatly. Add some vetiver, fruit and spices… This is, Lutens doing Lutens in a less balsamic interpretation of incense than Serge Noire. Nice, but nothing I’d swap my Bois de Violette for…
Update: In case you were wondering, the pine essence is absolutely not of the Pinesol type...
Fourreau Noir – i.e. “Black sheath”, as in dress or scabbard – was, or would’ve been if I’d tested it on skin, my definition of a scrubber, for it contains my most rabidly detested material, dihydromyrcenol, ubiquitous in all modern fougères et quite a few aquatics: the citrus-metallic-lavender stench (to me) of default-setting male fragrances. And it’s got lavender on top of it. Other notes listed are tonka bean, myrrh and incense, but I admit the DHM-lavender combo swallowed them up for me. The only available review for the moment is Elisabeth de Feydeau’s, and it’s extremely positive. So clearly, I may not have grasped the whole picture…
Second update: Someone who has smelled this on their skin tells me the dreaded accord is much more discreet when worn. Which is a relief. But still... I'm a little wary.
Des Filles en Aiguille will be available some time before mid-July, so I’ll return with a proper assessment. Fourreau Noir is released in the fall, but I can definitely live until then without re-encountering it.
Nathan, I'm actually pretty sure than De Fille en Aiguilles will be a lot more interesting on skin. But I was kind of burned by Serge Noire, which I found very beautiful at the outset, bought a full bottle of, and never really wore in the end, because it didn't seem... flesh-friendly. Fourreau Noir I actively loathed, a first with me and Serge. But people who love fougères might think it's the first Serge they can wear.
Hi! Wonderful pictures, as usual. I am craving to try the filles en aguilles: I would love to smell like a church buried in a pine forest ;)! Really. Can't wait. For the fourreau, I hope the vanillic base to be just barely detectable... Thank you fopr the sneek preview!!!
Zazie, you're making De Filles sound a lot better than it felt, but then again... skin test. Fourreau Noir was a no-go for me because of the fougère. I didn't detect the vanilla!
Thanks for these sneak previews, D. I'm still cautiously optimistic about De Fille En Aiguilles, but your impressions of Fourreau Noir do not bode well for my liking it. On the other hand, Elisabeth's reviews were quite lovely (and an enjoyable read, although it necessitated some exigetical research on my part to start to understand the literary allusions...)
Ah to do a pine scent that doesn't smell like a cleaning product... it seems to me that pine needs a Geranium pour Monsieur treatment done to it- when I heard that SL was doing this, I was already putting all my eggs in his basket...
Jarvis, I respect and admire Elisabeth (and like her), so I'm thinking other people may like both much better than I did. I'm still quite curious of the pine-incense, which might fare much better on skin.
Hello D - how would you compare the Fille en Aiguilles to CdG Zagorsk? The Fourreau Noir sounds ghastly... thankfully I will have no opportunity to smell it for quite some time, so I'll wait for more reviews to come in and see which way the wind blows....
Tara, hi! I haven't smelled Zagorsk since it came out... I was an Avignon girl! But all through the day I couldn't help thinking of CdG Hinoki... the Serge is a little thicker, I'd say. I'm waiting for a skin test to utter my final pronouncement on Fourreau noir, but on paper, it's the first Lutens I hate.
I am a writer and translator based in Paris, as well as the perfume editor for Citizen K. My book The Perfume Lover, A Personal History of Scent has been published in the UK by Harper Collins. It will be launched in early 2013 by St. Martin's Press (USA) and Penguin (Canada). The perfume linked to the book, Séville à l'aube by Bertrand Duchaufour for L'Artisan Parfumeur, will come out in July 2012.
Je suis Parisienne, écrivain et traductrice, ainsi que journaliste parfums à Citizen K. Mon livreThe Perfume Loverest paru en GB en version anglaise en mars 2012. Il sera publié en français début 2013 aux Presses de la Cité. Le parfum dont il narre le développement, Séville à l'aube de Bertrand Duchaufour pour L'Artisan Parfumeur, sera lancé en juillet 2012.
Email: graindemusc at gmail.com
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14 comments:
Fabulous names, both. I want to love & wear them just for their names. Alas, the juice does not sound very appealing.
Is it just me, or is Lutens releasing frags at an increasingly-furious rate?
Thanks for taking the bullet for all of us. ;)
I was hoping the pine and incense bit would have been a little more intriguing than "a less balsamic interpretation of Serge Noir."
Amy, it seems so to me as well... In fact, some people closely related to these releases think so too.
Nathan, I'm actually pretty sure than De Fille en Aiguilles will be a lot more interesting on skin.
But I was kind of burned by Serge Noire, which I found very beautiful at the outset, bought a full bottle of, and never really wore in the end, because it didn't seem... flesh-friendly.
Fourreau Noir I actively loathed, a first with me and Serge. But people who love fougères might think it's the first Serge they can wear.
Hi! Wonderful pictures, as usual.
I am craving to try the filles en aguilles:
I would love to smell like a church buried in a pine forest ;)!
Really.
Can't wait.
For the fourreau, I hope the vanillic base to be just barely detectable...
Thank you fopr the sneek preview!!!
Zazie, you're making De Filles sound a lot better than it felt, but then again... skin test.
Fourreau Noir was a no-go for me because of the fougère. I didn't detect the vanilla!
Oh dear...sounds like neither of these are for me. Lutens using cliched 90's aquatic synthetics??? So very strange.
Thanks for the heads-up!
Thanks for these sneak previews, D. I'm still cautiously optimistic about De Fille En Aiguilles, but your impressions of Fourreau Noir do not bode well for my liking it. On the other hand, Elisabeth's reviews were quite lovely (and an enjoyable read, although it necessitated some exigetical research on my part to start to understand the literary allusions...)
Ah to do a pine scent that doesn't smell like a cleaning product... it seems to me that pine needs a Geranium pour Monsieur treatment done to it- when I heard that SL was doing this, I was already putting all my eggs in his basket...
Dane, Fourreau Noir isn't aquatic at all. It's an oriental fougère of the La Nuit de l'homme type. Still, quite a letdown for me.
Jarvis, I respect and admire Elisabeth (and like her), so I'm thinking other people may like both much better than I did. I'm still quite curious of the pine-incense, which might fare much better on skin.
Alexander, as I wrote above, I'm still thinking that the pine one has potential... Definitely not Pinesol, very very dry... I'll keep you posted!
Hello D - how would you compare the Fille en Aiguilles to CdG Zagorsk? The Fourreau Noir sounds ghastly... thankfully I will have no opportunity to smell it for quite some time, so I'll wait for more reviews to come in and see which way the wind blows....
Tara, hi! I haven't smelled Zagorsk since it came out... I was an Avignon girl! But all through the day I couldn't help thinking of CdG Hinoki... the Serge is a little thicker, I'd say.
I'm waiting for a skin test to utter my final pronouncement on Fourreau noir, but on paper, it's the first Lutens I hate.
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