Fleurs de Sel (2007)
by Miller Harris

The arrestingly dry, dusty green opening of Fleurs de Sel smells to me like a variation on the aggressive vetiver theme of fragrances like Vetiver Extraordinaire or Etro Vetiver, but soon turns toward the floral arrangement promised on the label. The sharp, rasping opening accord continues to cut like a bone knife, even if it’s concealed in a bouquet of wildflowers.

There is a beautiful, if somewhat forbidding, austerity about this stage in Fleurs de Sel’s development that keeps me mesmerized even as I cringe at its starkness. Like Yatagan, though by very different means, Fleurs de Sel’s first hour paints the olfactory equivalent of some parched, desolate landscape. In the case of Yatagan it’s an arid pine forest, while Fleurs de Sel conjures up barren, windswept dunes, sparsely sprinkled with seaside grasses and a smattering of stalwart scrub.

Unfortunately, this phase does not endure more than an hour, by which time the floral elements take over. The result is a more conventional sweet green floral scent, albeit one distinguished by a crisp, dry woody-aromatic foundation and a mysterious wisp of smoke. The projection is limited and the sillage quite mild, so that Fleurs de Sel functions mostly as a skin scent. Its lasting power is more than reasonable for so light a scent, and I’ve gotten a solid four or five hours’ wear out of it.

Two details of Fleurs de Sel’s composition stand out to me. One is the way the normally volatile and relatively fleeting aromatic notes are retained well into the development, and the other is the success with which this fragrance manages to evoke the seaside with nary an aquatic note or a drop of suntan lotion. While the drydown lacks the bracing novelty of the opening and heart accords, the scent is always beautiful. Hats off to Lynn Harris for composing "beach" scent that avoids all the hackneyed gestures that mar this overexploited genre!

Fleurs de Sel smells like a very good, aged whisky, which might be very nice for some, but unfortunately I hate the smell of whisky. I think the smoothness and artistry in this fragrance is clear, so I'm going neutral, purely for appreciation purposes.

This is a remarkable scent, beautiful and unique. The only other fragrance I've sampled that attempts to recreate the smell of salt is Sel de Vetiver (which I do like), but this nails it so much more convincingly. It really does make me feel as if I'm at the seaside, surrounded by herbs and flowers.

I can't say much to add to flathorn's excellent review--I agree with every word, except that I crave this scent, not just in the winter, but all year long. That "fresh, salty bewitching air" is habit-forming, and I've come to find that I need a regular fix. I hope more people try this under-appreciated beauty and buy it so that it stays in production.

At first I dismissed this as interesting rather than pleasing and not really me, and thought Sel de Vetiver was the only salty fragrance I needed. But I've been on a salt kick this summer and they're different enough that I'd like bottles of both - SdV wet and green, FdS dry and brown. It's herbal, but not in a green way, more like scorched herbs on scorched earth covered by a layer of salt. The salt is very pure - just salty, no scary seaweed or fake aquatic notes - and refreshing. I was a bit wary of the sage, a note which normally doesn't work for me, but this is not a dense and bitter aromatherapy-style herbal/aromatic scent, instead it's a "natural and wholesome" theme rendered in an elegantly transparent haute perfumerie way. I love thyme and rosemary and I'm always looking for herbal scents which truly smell like the living thing rather than turning sour, sharp and stale on my skin, and this is it, only with a heap of salt on top! I don't feel the "fleurs" except as a hint of tastefully restrained sweetness, but I do feel the wood and vetiver in the basenotes, which combined with the salt smell more like driftwood than any deliberate "driftwood accords" I've come across. Or like a herb garden surrounded by a wooden fence in a seaside town. This is a wonderful alternative for those looking for a summer scent that is not synthetically "cool" and "clean".

Notes: Red Thyme, Rosemary, Clary Sage, Rose, Narcissus, Iris, Ambrette, Vetiver, Moss, Woods.

I haven't tried all the Miller Harris line, but this is my favorite so far. It is herbal, salty, twiggy, and grassy, while possessing enough well-integrated floral to recreate the sense of small wild flowers in a salt marsh.
From red thyme and rosemary it gets the bracing freshness of ocean marsh. From clary sage, moss and vetiver, it gets both a moist earthiness and grassy dryness. From rose it gets a light lilting summer note - a rose not damascena, but rugosa. The narcissus is a bridge between the more floral rose and the earthier elements. Ambrette and iris soften and diffuse the medicinal herbs enough that they play nicely with the florals. I like that this fragrance didn't cop-out and throw in token citrus notes to 'freshen' it. It went for uncompromising blooming salt marsh, preventing the sameness that results when you let citrus predominate in the opening of a fresh scent. All in all, it has a fresh, salty bewitching air.
I thought I would like this best in summer, but I like it better now in winter, perhaps because it recreates a fresh summer quality my nose craves in the dead of winter.