Eau des Îles (1988)
by Maître Parfumeur et Gantier

I'm sure there's more going on here than I seem to think, but I'm going to attempt to explain the overall impression I'm getting. Eau des Iles (my keyboard don't got fancy French stuff) is a brutally arid woody fragrance. It's just as dry as can be, like wood that's been left out in the sun in the desert for years. There is also a strong coffee note accompanying this dry wood, and in the background there's a wee bit of leather. There's also some more beautiful subtlety beneath the layers, but it's just seems like highlights and shading.

This is a wonderful masculine that I cannot recommend highly enough. It never approaches the offensiveness that other masculines can (even though that offensiveness is often part of the pleasantness) and it also never tries to be gourmand. I only mention the gourmand part because when I learn that a fragrance contains coffee notes I usually assume that it's going to be gourmandy.

27th July, 2011.

A very scary pyramid! Eau Des Iles opens with a strong smoky / coffee accord that immediately brings to my mind of tear gas and tar. Breathtaking. After an hour or so I detect a very hidden floral note (Ylang-Ylang?) screaming for some help beeing surrounded by an huge cloud of smoke. Beeing tenacious as hell, the tiny "white" floral note finally blends together with all the other "scary" ingredients giving birth to a sort of "the beauty and the beast" drydown.

I've not decided yet wether I like this composition or not but for sure I can say that Lisa Kirk has invented nothing with her "Revolution" and Maitre Parfumeur Et Gantier is one of the most consistent outfits around.

18th May, 2011.

You've got to hand it to this perfume house: whatever they do, they do it big! Eau des Îles is shockingly bitter and smoky when it first goes on, just like a strong, bad cigarette. After a few minutes I can tell there's some very dry leather under there, and just a hint of really burnt coffee.

These elements never fully integrate on my skin, and I'm left with something reminiscent of a filthy ashtray full of coffee grounds which, having been soaked in lighter fluid, burn to leave a twisting column of acrid black smoke. One of the few bold masculines from MPG that I do not enjoy, despite many a revisit.

23rd December, 2009.

Maitre Parfumeur et Gantier Eau des Iles

I used to spend my summers on a sailboat in the Caribbean instead of going to summer camp. When we would tie up in a local marina my friend Buddy and I would untie out bicycles from down below and be ready to go exploring. I can always remember my legs astride my bike looking at a new island and taking a deep breath. I would smell the flowers indigenous to the islands, usually there would be bags of spices to be shipped somewhere, the smell of smoke drifting, and somewhere the smell of roasting coffee. That was the smell of exploration for much of my young life. Thanks to a very generous Basenoter I have rediscovered this smell in Jean Laporte's 1988 creation for Maitre Parfumeur et Gantier, Eau des Iles. The top of this is the smell of myrtle and tarragon the mix of light floral and light spice is exactly what the breeze would bring. As we move into the heart, a beautiful coffee accord becomes evident along with a smoky incense, that is more smoke than incense, and the floral character deepens as ylang ylang adds to the myrtle from the top. The coffee accord deserves mentioning because this is an accord of the oily roasted bean, slightly woody and very aromatic. The base is a classic Laporte mix of patchouli and vetiver and this is the herbal kind of patchouli which mixes well with the green sharpness of vetiver. Eau des Iles is one of those scents that seems to last forever on my skin as I always detect it the next morning. Eau des Iles also was a scent that took me multiple wears for me to finally be able to wrap my head around it. Which, on reflection, is only appropriate for a scent which reminds me of my days of exploring new things.

3rd August, 2009.

Opening reminiscent of Aromatics Elixer from Clinique. Drydown is a wood/musk mixture similar to Muscs Koublai Khan from Lutens.

7th March, 2009.

Next to Route du Vetiver, the most incredible fragrance ever composed is probably Eau des Iles...

Unfortunately, after MPG's dilution of its recipes, it seems the only thing mildly equal to EDI is l'Artisan Parfumeur's "Eau du Navigateur", created by the same man, Jean LaPorte

7th October, 2008. (Last Edited: 9th June, 2010.)