LesNez - The Unicorn Spell

Funny how our mind can make such abrupt changes, no? I was rather into The Unicorn Spell ever since I first smelled it, for reasons you mentioned. It reminds me of walking outside on a very cold day, yet you're surrounded by very distinct and green flowers that you wouldn't expect to bloom right then. That violet note is awesome. I can see how you linked it to Duel, btw. Doyen has quite a clear 'house note'

Not something I'd wear often, but I have been using it this past summer and it works nicely in the heat. Good to hear you're so excited, shifts!

The Unicorn Spell is my favorite from LesNez. A side-by-side comparison with Duel sounds like a great idea, I'll make sure to give that a try!

Re: L'Antimatière (Isabelle Doyen's personal favorite): it remains as enygmatic as ever to me. I wish I understood its appeal. It must be an acquired taste (or one that requires more affinity with perfumery anyway).

I have to agree that Let Me Play The Lion is a really wonderful scent. I own it in bottle size as well as a small sample with a drop or two left in it. I recently had the good fortune to preview the Aftershave version of LMPTL and find it is really superb...with the unmistakable backbone of LMPTL but in a more subdued and shadowy style, certainly suitable as an aftershave. I will buy it when it hits the market.

My sample of The Unicorn Spell is almost spent. I found it to be an enchanting touch of magical green that evoked memory of a slow walk in a green garden. I will be replacing the sample with a full bottle very soon.

My L'Antimatière sample is still in dark, cool storage, awaiting a first usage..

The Unicorn Spell is fantastic! The whole violet, roots and all, green and purple and earth. It reminds me of a beautiful and fresh flower/vegetable, as I get a crisp celery note at the beginning and a very round blossoming of violet.

Now, if they could just do something about that name...

I can't even remember what these smell like, it's been quite a while since I smelled them. I remember not being impressed by any of them.

Perhaps I should resniff TUS, since I love a violet note done right.

I was pretty savage in my judgment of these. I should resmell as well - provided I haven't smashed the vial

Me too! Isabelle told me her original idea for the scent was violets in a frozen, moonlit landscape. So it's no coincidence...

I don't know, I wasn't really impressed by any of the Lez Nez scents. I tried to dig them out for a re-smell, but somehow the bottles leaked inside their little ziplocks and the alcohol evaporated. The remaining oils coat the inside of the tubes and bag, but they just smell off to me. Oh well. I did appreciate TUS's impression of a chilly day, outside in a flower-and-grass filled opening in the middle of the woods, but I just didn't find it to be a wearable scent.

I still have my TUS sample I got from BN when the Les Nez scents were being launched. After seeing this thread, I ran to my little wooden Annayake "sample box" to find it.
I'm one for strange scents.. but this is just intolerably gross!
To wear this would be akin to slathering the juice inside a can of Super Walmart green beans all over my neck and wrists.
I remember the first time I tried to give it a full day wearing. I smelled as if I've spent the entire day toiling over a hot stove cookin up a southern baptist dinner.

I really liked LMPTL though.

OK - now I remember. The 'green bean' one.

I distinctly remember it now. Yes - great description: green bean vapor gas (distilled, watery, transparent and strangely tenacious).

Periodic measurements of my interest level in The Unicorn Spell. The first measurement was taken just before I started reading this thread.

0 - 10 - 14 - 12 - 14 - 15 - 0 - 0 - ...

Can you spot the "green bean" moment?

(To be fair, I should still give this a try. But I get the cooked-green-beans effect all too frequently. It has spoiled Vetiver Extraordinaire and Heeley Fine Leather for me, for instance. So I'm wary.)

L'Antimatière is magic. I got an amazing olfactory experience with it; didn't at first realize what this beautiful sensation was, since it suddenly appeared, some two or three hours after application. Before that, nothing. It's basically impossible to describe; it's just so very warm smell of something, I can't pick any particular notes, but the overall impression is kind of similar to the smell of ink and it also reminds me of someones scarf in which is the slightest trace of a perfume mixed with the odour of his or her own body - all of this might not sound all that tempthing, but it's simply amazing. I will probably buy one more decant or sample of this before going for a bottle since I didn't get to sample it that many times, it disappeared from my sample vial. Only other fragrance that has captured this strange, cool, non-sweet and non-spicy warmness is L'Homme de Coeur. Had to use that oxymoronic expression of cool warmness. I can't put it in any other way.

Let Me Play The Lion was so incredibly average, it's hard to believe they are made by the same perfumer. Unfortunately my sample of Unicorn Spell came to me smashed, but the paper smelled like leaves and ground in fall, atleast here in Finland.

Hello all -
I think this is a good moment to come back to comment on the comments.
Part of the following was written for some other forum in answer to a serious beating we got. shifts must have read it already.

If you read to the end there will be a little surprise - so please hang on.

1. The Unicorn Spell

Agree with you on some of the the aspects of this perfume as some of the points you make are OK (natural violet is used stronger than the "nice" methylionone and gives it the little "slap in the face" Isabelle wanted.
Nobody guessed the essence of petitgrain I think. The little similarity with Grey Flannel is ok. Call it "contemporary perfumery" if you like. The times of the fully rounded and beautifully balanced perfumes are over. Dissonances have always been present in perfumes, but they will be stronger in the future.

2. Let me Play the Lion

The strength has been an issue from the start. I have heard "weak-ass" and "long lasting" in the same thread on BN. But generally I think its a polite perfume with no intention to shout down the sniffing public at twenty paces.
Most of us work in the service industry and our perfume should speak whenever we say nothing, not the other way round. I just don't see everybody wearing loud perfumes.
About the notes: nobody seems to find the coffee. Try Macassar by Rochas if you want a good undervalued perfume with a strong voice.

3. L' Antimatière

OKOK I heard you. How can you work ten years on a perfume and come out with "NOTHING"? I can understand the point.
The artist is not more creative as he puts more things in his work. One meaningful word can express an idea clearer than pages of adjectives in a poem.
The artist, at one point in his career, starts to take away things because he knows clarity and simplicity will provide a new point of view. In the context of perfumery this seems to be strange. L'Antimatière turns things on the head just by being simple.
One of you said "the emperors new clothes" - this is totally wrong. If you remember the tale; the emperor thinks he as new clothes although the people see him as he is - naked. L'Antimatière is the other way around the wearer thinks he has no perfume and many people around him smell him strangely and magically perfumed.
Its lasting power is disputed? ok In my opinion its limited only by the next shower. It keeps weeks on clothing, particularly woolen sweaters
One of its ingredients is a little unpredictable. Grey amber is almost like a living organism. it changes with humidity and other outside factors.

We have tried layering - like a painter who gives the canvas a color before he starts working on a painting - giving the painting character because it shines trough the top layers of paint. To some perfumes L'Antimatière ads volume and power. I have tried Bigarde Concentré and Jardin sur le Nil. Here it can bring volume and body to Mr. Ellena's transparency.
Isabelle puts Mitsouko on herself and l'Antimatière on the headrest in her car. So much for layering techniques ... and you may have read about Isabelles style of driving in Marcellos article.


Now for the little surprise

The launch of the new perfume will take place sometime in January/February 2008. The perfumer, by the way, Is Sandrine Videault, last student of Edmond Roudnitzka. As we could not send away samples like last year - the customer list in our online shop will serve as the mailing list for the free samples. If you go to lesnez.com/shop and register as a customer with full postal address (click on "New Account" - you needn't buy anything for this) you are on the list for the samples.

Thanks for reading - all the best and keep going ...

René Schifferle / LesNez / EauxM

Hey EauxM, that's wonderful news

And great to get a reminder of these fragrances, I still have about half of my samples left!

When I originally got the samples, I absolutely loathed the Unicorn Spell, it seemed just so not for me with the violet overdose and super-sharp green feel. But now, after reading about shift's experience I'll dig it out and certainly give it another try.

Let Me Play the Lion was the nicest at first, although not very ground-breaking. Thoroughly pleasant mild woody-spicy warmth.

And I love L'Antimatière. Reading Johnny_Ludlow's message in this thread I can just say "Ditto." to almost everything he wrote (except I haven't tried L'Homme de Coeur). A bottle will be mine in near future...

I also feel that L'Antimatière has a very different kind of sillage-feel than most fragrances, and it's kinda in the same zone as the smells that "stick" on a person from stuff like shower gels, fabric softeners etc and I feel that these kind of "base" smells easily shut it off from perception.

I have to say... I laughed so hard reading this post I nearly peed my pants. LOL!!!!!!
I may not be that conversant in redneck, but I'll take a stab at your little quiz.

a) (whew.. thats a good one) 1. I'm thinking its a biscuit or cornbread, best eaten with gravy or molasses.. 2. An alcohol (almost like corn likker/liquor) fermented with marijuana?
b) I have no freakin clue.
c) Bacon grease...in the biggest Crisco container you can find, (with the label peeled off) on the top of the stove next to a can of fish grease and a can of chicken grease. lol
d) Neck-bone. (also..salt-pork/fat-back, bacon or ham-hock.)
e) Apple.


Green beans (preferably the "french cut" style) are almost like a staple in the African American diet. I grew up on them.. so to speak. So yes... as a young black man who has consumed more than his fair share of "stringbeans" in a week than some people have in their lifetime, and having my ancestry deeply rooted in South Carolina and Georgia, I think, just maybe, I might know a little something about Southern Baptist - Pentecostal (even worse) dinners. lol.

So yeah... (back on topic)
EauxM, the fact that you've responded in such a gentlemanly manner in the midst of enduring the "serious beating" and so on..speaks volumes about your good character. I admire that. It almost makes me feel bad that I feel the way I do about TUS... but it is what it is, I guess. For obvious reasons I stated above, I can't seem to shake the "boiled green beans with the faintest whiff of fried chicken" association.
I think I still have some L'Antimatière left in my sample. I remember smelling alcohol... then nothing... then an hour later, the faintest trace of something very soft and sweet..but very nice.
I'll have to revisit.
LMPTL, I liked the most. I remember likeing it.. and that it was "dusty"...but in a good way.
I'm looking forward to sampling the new launch.

a) Pot likker (liquor) is the delicious juice that's left in the pot after greens (mustard, turnip, whatever) have been cooked slowly with pork. You sop up your pot likker with cornbread or biscuits if you know what's good for you -- and yes, we actually say "sop" without giggling.

b) Larruping (larrupin') means delicious. Example: "Hot damn -- that's larrupin' good, Mama!"

c) Ah, sweet bacon grease -- the breakfast of ex-champions! My Southern grandmas and mama put it in everything except desserts . . .
and most of those called for LARD. (How I ended up an ovo-lacto vegetarian with good arteries I'll never know.)

d) Neckbone? Yup -- best soupbone on the porcine anatomy. (Fatback and jowls also acceptable, and yes, ham hocks, of course.)

e) Apple??? APPLE??? Nah, it's gotta be sweet potato or buttermilk, with pecan right up there in the Holy Trinity of Southern pies.
*****
But back to the olfactory topic at hand.
Johnny_Ludlow posits that "L'Antimatière is magic."
Well, it was magic on me, too, J_L -- it vanished right in front of me.

But your question was "which one do you most likely reject.." In that context, my answer is correct. No?
A favorite dessert in my family is Peach Cobbler. And yes, my grandma always used lard in her desserts that called for a golden crust.

I called my mother about "pot likker". Strangely, she knew exactly what it was. Her answer even included the word "sop". lol!!!
I am STILL ROFLMAO at "larrupin'". What is this short for? Why can't they just say its "delicious" or "good"? LOL!!!
-----------------------------------------------------------
I've decided to go back to The Unicorn Spell for a micro-visit. I'm trying just a little bit on the top half of my index finger... so as not to interfere with my SOTD, Patou PH.
After an hour.. and sniffing and re-sniffing... its not as bad as I thought it was. I mean yes, I do get something very vegetal.. but now, I'm getting a very soft floral.. and something that smells like tea. I don't like it, but I'm no longer repulsed by it either. Actually, I can't stop sniffing it. The whole time, I tried to keep TUS's concept of transparency and frost in my mind. Nothing in this scent conjurs up those images for me though.
My biggest fear is that I'll like it.. and wear it, only to be told that I smell like a larrupin pot of green beans.

Yup -- you're right -- I remembered the question incorrectly. Re-calculate that guy's score and give him a bottle of Unicorn Spell!

These are three very well made perfumes.
My wife has worn LMPTL almost exclusively for a year or so, it has become her very refined signature. She is on her third bottle now.
L'Antimatiere is a fantastic, subtle perfume with lots of natural ambergris which is very beautiful and interesting. It is not for everyone because it takes a while to tune the nose to ambergris (the reason why some smell nothing). It is not for those who want a loud announcement of their presence but for another kind of perfume user.
The Unicorn is a stark, natural green violet, with a cool impression. Unusual as a "cool green"

I enjoy smelling them all but feel they are better suited for wearing by women.

Very interested about the new release.

"cool green"

Hirch_duckfinder nails it with that term.

That's great news, René! btw... this past week I've worn The Unicorn Spell several days in a row, it really is a marvelous fragrance.

Sorry to revive a very old thread...but I tried The Unicorn Spell today for the first time and I was smitten. Green (maybe galbanum), violet leaf, dry and bitter, iris, soft florals, sweet musk in the drydown. I did not smell green beans at all--I smelled outdoorsy green, like the area where field meets forest and spring-time wildflowers grow. After wearing Chanel No.19 all winter and craving more bitter greens, this really hits the spot. And it STAYS green the whole time, unlike something like Sisley Eau de Campagne which lost the galbanum-green within minutes on my skin.

Yeah, this one is REALLY good. It's my favorite in the LesNez line and I've been meaning to buy a decant or bottle but I've been pushing it off.

Great name for a fragrance

I've been missing Let Me Play The Lion. I must decantize it soon