Après L'ondée (1906)
by Guerlain

I don't have the perfume vocabulary to describe Apres L'ondee, nor can I think of where to start without sounding pretentious. I'll simply say that, to me, this smells like my mother's herb garden early on Easter morning: damp, chilly, clean and quiet, light and beautiful.

I'm not a "perfumista." I don't have a wardrobe full of fragrances, and I truthfully don't care for most perfumes I encounter. Every Chanel I've ever smelled reminds me of unwashed skin; most modern fragrances are too sweet for me, or too strong, or too something that gives me a headache.

All that being said, I have fallen in love with a few Guerlains. I love Herba Fresca. Oddly, I love L'Heure Bleue. I cannot stand Champs Elysees, and the modern Geurlains (Insolence, the other Aqua Allegorias, etc.) fall into the headache camp.

But Apres L'ondee smells of spring and dew and young flower petals, and my mom and her garden. And home.

And, oh my God, I love it.

10th December, 2011.

Edt hardly there on me and disappeared in a few minutes- sprayed it into unfragranced body lotion before putting the lotion on and it was still happily doing it's thing after 4 hours. So, good tip from the Guerlain rep there. Unfortunately once I could actually experience it I realised it was not for me. Such a pity, I so wanted to like it.

23rd October, 2011.

Oh, dear. This had such raves from Turin and Sanchez, as well as everyone here on Basenotes, that I feel like the ugly stepsister when I say that, within minutes of spraying myself with Apres l'Ondee, I was transformed into an elderly woman wearing a chubby and stone martins. Then again, I don't love much of Guerlain (no, not even Vetiver pour Elle), so I guess my reaction to this should come as no surprise.

On another subject, does anyone else besides me know that -- as it related to the games in ancient Rome -- "thumbs down" meant "let him live"? So it's actually a positive response.

14th October, 2011.

This isn't bad, but it pretty much just comes out smelling like licorice/anise on me. I'm not really getting the powdery floral notes it's supposed to have. I don't really dislike it, but I definitely prefer Shalimar and Mitsouko. Also, my mom says she doesn't think this perfume smells that great on me. She actually thinks it smells pretty much like the air in a hospital waiting room (air freshener?) So, unfortunately, Apres L'Ondee will probably not end up ever being my signature fragrance.

11th October, 2011.

Fresh, clean, flowery and powdery. As ingenuous and natural as can be, APRES L'ONDEE has no hidden, inner, subterranean depths to penetrate, and thus differs rather radically from my concept of classic Guerlain--especially from compositions such as MITSOUKO and L'HEURE BLEUE. Yet this perfume is beautiful, too, in its own way. My distinct impression is that Prada was trying to capture something like this aesthetic in its Infusion series, especially INFUSION D'IRIS edt, the most recent launch, to which violet has been added. The INFUSION trio is also very clean, but it is far more woody and, in the case of INFUSION D'HOMME, soapy as well. There is no soap in APRES L'ONDEE at all. The cleanness of this scent is that of fresh rainwater-washed purple flowers, no more and no less.

Although APRES L'ONDEE features key notes--violet, iris, heliotrope and anise--in common with a number of other more recent perfumes, here they are presented in an unsweetened state and without other components which tend to muddy the waters somewhat. There is not a single speck of dirt anywhere to be sniffed in APRES L'ONDEE. For that reason, some people may find this perfume simply too simple, more like a nineteenth-century violet soliflore than a masterpiece. However, those who seek out high-quality notes such as are featured in the sometimes simple perfumes of niche lines are bound to appreciate APRES L'ONDEE. In my case, the appeal is overdetermined: I love niche-quality notes, in general, and violet, iris, heliotrope and anise, in particular!

My understanding is that this perfume has been discontinued, and I'm thinking that maybe that's not such a bad thing, since at least if I manage to acquire a bottle it will not (I presume) have been disastrously reformulated.

13rd September, 2011.

(EDT) A wonderful wonderful fragance, sleek and posh, an amazing iris that opens with a sweet and quiet anis (or maybe almond).

Bears some emblance to Lheure bleue, which to my nose, is stuffier and sweet/greasy to the point of being cloying.

21st August, 2011.