Tabac Blond (1919)
by Caron

Top- Leather -- Middle-Leather -- Base - Leather/smoke. Nothing really that softens -- amber will just intensify -- this is the edp version. I think you would need to walk through a mist of it to make it tolerable. I can appreciate the innovativeness, but is really much too potent for me and as stated, very linear.

Kaern

This review is under revision.

This is all about class, it is so chic that it stands out.
I feel I put on the courage of the flapper girls of the 20th when I wear it. It's comforting and audacious at the same time. Dark,unpresentable,overly and overlt chic.It is that tipe of fragrance that tells, well Baby I am who I am, like it or leave it, but if you like it, we could be...
nonchalance brought to excellence. Tabac Blond is perfection in balance but with that little touch of neglection that doesn't permit it to be overdone. It is like the french mentality. They do a marvellous coat with the most delicious hand-embroidery you have ever seen... and then let one button hang lose...
is is all about doing something extraordinary and then leave a touch of it hang lose ,just as if sth too precise would disturb the grandeur. if it all was perfect, it would not be chich any longer.
I adour this

I appreciate the history of this scent... but...it wore me, and wore me out. I felt smothered and choked by a leather-clad biker in a sleazy bar, tables and floors stained with decades of spilled booze...

Tabac Blond is not discontinued; it's just only available now in the EDP from the urns at the Caron boutiques:
http://www.parfumscaron.com/FR/les_parfums_et_poudres/les_parfums_fontaine/tabac_blond.html.

I would go further than saying this is unisex--it is of course very sensual on the right woman, but it is a classic gentleman's scent for autumn. Made for damp leaves and tweed (or black tie and Plymouth martinis), and just as sexy, if the responses I've received from women are any indication, on a man. I know several men of taste who wear it in season. It's too heavy for warm weather, which also brings out the sweetness too much, but in the right circumstances it is simply without peer. In very cold weather I shift to Bel Ami by Hermes, which in absolute terms can't challenge TB, but whose spice notes create a compelling feeling of warmth for wearer and intimate both.

**This review is of the EDT**

Notes:

Top: Leather, Linden, Carnation
Heart: Iris, Vetiver, Ylang Ylang
Base: Cedar, Patchouli, Vanilla, Amber, Musk

Said to be launched to celebrate the liberation of women in the 1920s a movement which allowed them to vote and mate without male consent, wear skimpy bikinies and take care of that ever growing bikini line, and ofcourse smoke in public. The name might be a misnomer, but there's not an iota of smoke in Tabac Blond's performance - this is a crystal clear display of excellent perfumery skills.

Tabac Blond opens with a fresh blast of a sweet citrus note conjoined witha bright floral spicyness of carnation tinged with the barest hint of leather. Its an inviting opening and only hints at whats to come next. And that hint only grows more and more obvious over the next few minutes. The castoreum-based leather heart of Tabac Blond grows in prominence and starts dominating...and what a leather note it is! It shares some similarities with the turpentine-like leather note in Knize Ten, but unlike that motor-oil mechanic juice note, is never harsh or overly chemically (probably due to the iris and ylang ylang, which smooth out any rough leathery tones). Its smooth and as well-balanced as a leather note can be, and although I don't smell much tobacco or smoke, there is a general underlying smoky feel enveloping the heart notes. The leather is impressive in its longevity - this sublime note lasts for a good 4 hours, before the fragrance transitions to a smooth resinous vanilla-amber base, which surprisingly smells cool (is it because of the enduring musk and cedar notes?) compared to the leather action in the heart notes.

Tabac Blond is Carons' flagship perfume, and even in its EDT form, is a fragrance which very few, if any, leather fragrances can claim to compare to. The movement between the three notes phases is dynamic, the leather note is substantial yet never overbearing, and the vanillic-amber-cedar-musk base finishes off the leather powerhouse display with a rich melange of temperate and sensual notes which provide a frore contrast to the leathery warmth. Tabac Blond was a fragrance way ahead of time; its time though has come. The time is now. This is a fragrance for bold women, women who find the fruity florals littering the malls insubstantial, inchoate and insulting to their driven motivated interior. Women who have had enough of the vanilla-amber-laden sweet bombs. Women now lead Fortune 1000 companies, are career driven, and play an equal hand in marriage. I can easily see such independent women do Tabac Blond justice. Its also a clearly unisex juice, although Mr. Moms might be better off with the generic aquatic. Tabac Blond is smokin'.