Le Chèvrefeuille (2002)
by Annick Goutal

Annick Goutal’s “honeysuckle” is all sweetness and light: crisp citrus, lively greens, and the most delicate, transparent floral notes imaginable. It’s really too green, too tart, and too effervescent to smell much like honeysuckle blossoms, and what I pick out instead are tomato leaf, lemon, cardamom, a moist, crystalline green jasmine, perhaps some anise, and a touch of hay or narcissus. This blend may not mimic honeysuckle, but it succeeds in setting a bright summer morning mood that’s perfectly consistent with honeysuckle. It’s devastatingly pretty, but completely innocent, ebullient, and weightless.

In fact, Le Chèvrefeuille smells so bright and buoyant that it seems to have no base notes. Defying gravity in this manner exacts a price in longevity, and it should come as no surprise that Goutal’s Le Chèvrefeuille endures for no more than two hours on the skin. Thing is, this smiling scent is such pleasant company while it lasts that I really can’t bring myself to knock it. Instead I think I'll just put on some more.

I fell in love with it at the first sniff. Later the fragrance gets softer and round, it emanates fresh and light breeze coming from the green garden with a touch of fruit. It kind of elates and lights me up.
I purchased it despite the feminine dedication - once it's good enough for my nose it's good enough for my maleness :)

I plough through the Goutal range, trying to find a new favourite but I find myself drawn to this scent every time. Its blatantly obvious; the joy of it flows out of me and Im beaming uncontrollably. I thought I liked flower scents to smell just like the actual flower but to me this is more interesting because it is 'fizzy'. As if someone placed a handful of honeysuckle flowers into a bowl of fizzy water and then thrown in a few Refreshers sweets! It lends it an ethereal, dreamy quality which I find appealing in a fragrance though I wish the sillage could be improved. If they could invent a Chevrefeuille Soir or a twin sister for it, Id love to see if it could be perhaps a bit less transparent.

The opening is a singing, fresh olfactory image of a flower stem, goes a little grassy and then transforms to a bitter citrus (like the skin of an unripe white grapefruit). Absolutely refreshing, very, very nice - though not really a lot like actual honeysuckle (at least not like the ones I'm growing). I find that the real honeysuckle tends to have a honeyed, milky element in there. There is a slight downer about this scent; the longevity is poor.

This honeysickle worried me before I consented to try it because indolic scents usually do not behave on my skin. However, it quickly settled into a fairly nice straightforward floral. White florals are typically not my thing for the above reason, but this is well done and it definitely didn't go funky on me like most do, which is quite an accomplishment in my opinion. I wouldn't purchase it because it doesn't suit my personality, but I do appreciate the quality.

I really like honesuckle. I liked this immediately when I tried it for the first time. It is light and fresh, great for humid days. The honeysuckle note is also noticeable to me in Pure White Linen but it is a much heavier fragrance than this. Even though this is marketed as a feminine fragrance it is not too floral, so I agree with MonkeyManMatt that it can definitely be unisex. Being an EDT the longevity could be better but it is definitely bottle-worthy.