Gelsomini Di Capri by Carthusia

Here is a strange combination that grabbed me and demanded that I thinkreally thinkabout it. At first, I thought, aldehydes? Then, no, nail polish? No. Its too pretty for that. The actuality was unexpected: the crazy combo of geranium and jasmine. Boy, are those two contrasting notes! Geranium is clean, minty, slick, and unsweet. Jasmine is blowsy, sultry, banana-sweet, and narcotic. Its as if two unalike sisters met: One is a prim school-marm, and the other, an ultra-femme belle in a frilly dress. Kaboom! Thats Gelsomini.

I expected this to be a 'pretty' fragrance. Loads of floral elements. A slight shift, I find it quite handsome. The florals are vaguely high-pitched (jasmine, orange blossom, ylang-ylang) in the top-notes, but are all are all reigned-in by a leading geranium note. Into the heart, there's a good bit of a dirty, sweaty feel, but this point seems more like an inflection of the floral, and not stand-alone skanky. Wonderfully, the sweetness fades in the heart, and a rather earthy, though not vulgar, floral tone (again, lots of the geranium still in play) carries the day. It's a very outdoorsy floral feel, more like a garden than a bouquet, and the underbelly notes (indoles, a sweaty feel) grow without ever becoming overwhelming. While not a chypre, Gelsomini becomes a down-to-earth scent, finding a well-worn feel similar in tone to the green/leather chypres.