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Jewels and the perfume connection...

post #1 of 16
6/4/10 at 10:49am
Thread Starter 
With what does a man of pleasure and consequence shower his mistress?

Answer: jewellery and perfume! (We won't discusss racing studs and real estate...) Jewels and perfume are in close connection: expensive little nothings that serve only to adorn and please the senses. Some are very, very expensive.

The great courtesans of the 19th century flaunted their sex appeal by displaying their priceless jewels, the gifts of adoring lovers: Cora Pearl (mistress to Napoleon III and others) was known to have had opulent pearls, and was said to have had a pair of shoes soled in diamonds; the English actress Harriet Howard, introduced to the Emperor by the Comte d'Orsay, pawned her jewels to fund the coup d'etat of 1851; much later on, La Belle Otero supposely indecisive about picking out a piece of jewellery her lover could buy her, was delighted when the lover bought the entire store case of jewels for her.

Emperor Franz Joseph gifted both his beautiful wife AND mistress Katharina Schratt with opulent jewels.

I hasten to say these women themselves were like jewels to their lovers, to be the ultimate "arm candy" mistress, to be flaunted like a diamond breastpin on a cravat, or the the jewel-encrusted gold cap of a gentlemanly cane. (The Comte d'Orsay even had an umbrella handle encrusted with jewels...)

I am interested in the perfume/jewellery connection: Parure, Avon Rare Rubies, White Diamonds, Avon Topaz, Avon Rare Pearls.

What of the jewellery houses? Asprey, Boucheron, Cartier, Van Cleef & Arpels, Tiffany?

What is your take on this? What are your favourites? Likes or dislikes?

As for me, I like:

Original 1980s Tiffany: an opulent rose scent. I still enjoy this.

Van Cleef & Arpels First: aldehydes and jasmine, with civet.

Van Cleef & Arpels Tsar: a floral men's scent.

Cartier Delices: very sweet, I like the bottle better than the scent.

Boucheron Trouble: my most recent discovery. A summer oriental. Not able to clear rooms like Poison, but a warm citrus/vanilla/amber.
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post #2 of 16
6/4/10 at 11:24am
Jewels have a good deal more resale value than perfume, and I daresay the wise mistress made her gift wishes accordingly!

It's interesting how many of the jewel-named perfumes are on the cheap side, isn't it? Avon and Elizabeth Taylor. I've heard really good things about the Boucheron frags, including Jaipur.

I'm sure I don't need to ask whether you've read Colette's Gigi -- I just love her grandmother's tirade about "artistic" jewels. I would love to have any of the pieces she singles out for scorn!
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post #3 of 16
6/4/10 at 12:36pm
Thread Starter 
I am thinking that Amethyste by Bulgari is not cheap...

I forgot to add Bulgari to my list of jewellery houses!!

I have not read "Gigi," but I really should some day. I am barely getting past Balzac and Maupassant....
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post #4 of 16
6/4/10 at 1:16pm
you would adore Colette -- all the gaudy glory of the Belle Epoque, tartly yet lovingly observed. She did a series of stories called "My Friend Valentine," in which she chats with a friend who is a lady of fashion and a slave to trends.

I, on the other hand, need to read more Balzac.
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post #5 of 16
6/4/10 at 3:27pm
I'd rather be showered with quality time and marital fidelity, but that's well enough as it is - I'm not in the mistress industry, and would be in low demand if I was.

Jewels have never done anything for me. I understand the visual appeal, but don't really understand why they're better than glass except for the harder ones resistant to chipping and scratching. That being said, I love a beautiful bottle, simple or elaborate.

JAR has an interesting reputation for being hard to buy, hard to sample, and requiring a little occult ceremony to smell ( you have to walk three times widdershins, renouncing Chanel, before they mummify every part of you but the nose, so you can sniff unbiased - or something like that ). It even has The Perfume With No Name which gets called Bolt Of Lightning by perfumistas due to its bottle.
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post #6 of 16
6/4/10 at 4:55pm
I love love gemstones jewelry suites ,anything gold - I am a magpie ...and I LOVE pearls - South Sea and Tahitian.

My favorite houses are Asprey and Garrard ,for personal reasons. If only Asprey released a really good perfume, I would be sure to buy it- Garrard too.
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post #7 of 16
6/4/10 at 5:02pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sugandaraja View Post

I'd rather be showered with quality time and marital fidelity, but that's well enough as it is - I'm not in the mistress industry, and would be in low demand if I was.

Jewels have never done anything for me. I understand the visual appeal, but don't really understand why they're better than glass except for the harder ones resistant to chipping and scratching. That being said, I love a beautiful bottle, simple or elaborate.

JAR has an interesting reputation for being hard to buy, hard to sample, and requiring a little occult ceremony to smell ( you have to walk three times widdershins, renouncing Chanel, before they mummify every part of you but the nose, so you can sniff unbiased - or something like that ). It even has The Perfume With No Name which gets called Bolt Of Lightning by perfumistas due to its bottle.

LOL! Suga, I think "it's a girl thing!"

"A kiss on the hand may be quite Continental,
But diamonds are a girl's best friend."

I think jewels in all cultures carry either financial or mystical significance as status symbols or religious amulets. Think of all the mystique over the Hope diamond, and legends/novels (Lord of the Rings, for one) written about powerful/magical rings and gemstones. I doubt that even the perfume bottle of Marcel Duchamp's Rrose Celavie, sold a year or two ago at Christie's, could approach what the Hope diamond can command.

Anyhow, the marriages I mention in this context were contractual marriages of noble and royal houses, not love matches. The Comte d'Orsay married his bride when she was fifteen; they each took lovers shortly after the marriage, and the countess remarried within a month of her widowhood twenty-five years later. It's all about titles, money and bloodlines.

And men, as they do now, will want trophy women of great beauty...be it wives and/or mistresses. And what better way to show off such a woman than drape her with jewels, wearing the rarest and most exclusive perfume?
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post #8 of 16
6/7/10 at 1:03am
Chanel #18 - is devoted to jewellery store (pl Vendome, 18)
Cartier L`Heure Folle - is devoted to Tutti Frutti jewellery collection of Cartier
Elizabeth Taylor - well, a lot of: Diamonds and Rubies, etc.
Solange Azagury-Partridge - Stoned and Cosmic were named after her jewellery collections too.
Van Cleef & Arpels - Feerie the scent and Le Songe d`une Nuit d`Ete the collection (there were some watches too)
Olivier Durbano - you know it.
Comme des garcons - 888 - the scent of gold.
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post #9 of 16
6/7/10 at 9:18am
I like the original feminine Boucheron and Sabi, by jeweler Henry Dunay. Both are fragrance gems, IMO!

I also find Sonoma Scent Studio's Opal to be an aptly named fragrance!
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post #10 of 16
6/7/10 at 9:21am
There are the Sage Machados, too - she's a jewelry designer, and all her fragrances are named after gemstones.

I want the Solange Azagury-Partridge scents just because the bottles are stunning!
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post #11 of 16
6/10/10 at 3:43pm
I love the jeweled caps of the Estee Lauder Private Collection fragrances. Below is Tuberose Gardenia, but I really like the similar Amber Ylang Ylang with its tiger eye, agate, and quartz (http://www.esteelauder.com/product/i...ER_311x311.jpg).


And I guess an honorable mention should go to Jivago 24k.
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post #12 of 16
6/10/10 at 5:27pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Heartwood View Post

I love the jeweled caps of the Estee Lauder Private Collection fragrances. Below is Tuberose Gardenia, but I really like the similar Amber Ylang Ylang with its tiger eye, agate, and quartz (http://www.esteelauder.com/product/i...ER_311x311.jpg).


And I guess an honorable mention should go to Jivago 24k.

Those Estee bottles are divine...and I like the compact solid perfumes with the jewel cases.

BTW, I wonder why Luca Turin slammed Boucheron Trouble so hard? It's certainly not as bad as he says.
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post #13 of 16
6/11/10 at 6:39am
Again, I almost missed out on a great thread. I guess that, historically speaking, the connection between the romances of female aristocrats/royals or the high-end courtesans of the day and the fragrance and jewelry received from the men in their lives, as a sign of appreciation of the latter far beyond just the physical attraction/the trappings of some temporary flings, goes as far as Antiquity. So yes, there is definitely an undoubted, historically substantiated connection between these two worlds of ultimate luxury and the illustrious ladies adding to the mystique and fascination of this exclusive and elusive market segment. On one hand, the strictly physical or chemical answer would be that jewels and/or precious stones are odorless, but, on the other hand, so far I have been blessed with friends and acquaintances (especially here on Basenotes), who often associate a frag, irrespective if female, male or unisex, with the following descriptions like "this frag reminds me of a lady from the Russian aristocracy with long, heavily jeweled fingers", so the magic of certain subjective, poetic connotations always tended to find a common ground within the jewels and perfume connection.
By the way, have any of the ladies on Basenotes also tried Van Cleef and Arpels pour Homme, because I know that the gentlemen of Basenotes love it, and if yes, would you consider wearing it? Yes, the powerhouse notes and the heavily, nearly overpowering, leathery-animalic drydown may be deterring to the female wearer, but, as the scent progresses, the profuseness of floral and lush balsamic notes are actually the ultimate fragrance-related equivalent to jeweled splendor, as well as additionally, warm and sensual enough, however not a neither raunchy nor corny way, to be considered unisex
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post #14 of 16
6/12/10 at 2:09am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Primrose View Post

BTW, I wonder why Luca Turin slammed Boucheron Trouble so hard? It's certainly not as bad as he says.

"Out comes the most manifestly and comprehensively wrong fragrance in recent years,
the truly dire Trouble. The fact is, even the greatest artists need an editor that says
Nah when they screw up, and if you ask the same marketing people who selected
second-rate copies to choose adventurous fragrances, youre in Trouble. Its the
same with grinding tools: too much polishing and you cut a hole in your parquet
floor, too little and youre walking on planks.
...
It smells like Soviet-era chocolates made late on a Friday."

I don't get chocolate, but I guess I get what Turin is saying there. I haven't read The Guide (I know, and I call myself a BNer!), so I don't know what else he's had to say. It's a sort of burnt sugar, boozy scent. I like the opening a lot, but after many hours the burnt sugar sweetness is all that's left and I'm ready to wash it off. Still, that's after a good four to six hours. I'd been on the fence as to whether to keep my bottle, and I'm glad this thread inspired me to wear it last night, which was a cool evening. I should make myself wear it more this fall. I definitely don't find it to be "dire" or "wrong."
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post #15 of 16
6/12/10 at 7:49am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken_Russell View Post

Again, I almost missed out on a great thread. I guess that, historically speaking, the connection between the romances of female aristocrats/royals or the high-end courtesans of the day and the fragrance and jewelry received from the men in their lives, as a sign of appreciation of the latter far beyond just the physical attraction/the trappings of some temporary flings, goes as far as Antiquity. So yes, there is definitely an undoubted, historically substantiated connection between these two worlds of ultimate luxury and the illustrious ladies adding to the mystique and fascination of this exclusive and elusive market segment. On one hand, the strictly physical or chemical answer would be that jewels and/or precious stones are odorless, but, on the other hand, so far I have been blessed with friends and acquaintances (especially here on Basenotes), who often associate a frag, irrespective if female, male or unisex, with the following descriptions like "this frag reminds me of a lady from the Russian aristocracy with long, heavily jeweled fingers", so the magic of certain subjective, poetic connotations always tended to find a common ground within the jewels and perfume connection.
By the way, have any of the ladies on Basenotes also tried Van Cleef and Arpels pour Homme, because I know that the gentlemen of Basenotes love it, and if yes, would you consider wearing it? Yes, the powerhouse notes and the heavily, nearly overpowering, leathery-animalic drydown may be deterring to the female wearer, but, as the scent progresses, the profuseness of floral and lush balsamic notes are actually the ultimate fragrance-related equivalent to jeweled splendor, as well as additionally, warm and sensual enough, however not a neither raunchy nor corny way, to be considered unisex

Ken, thank you for the recommendation. What a visual image you have quoted. I will sure have to take a sample of this at some point. (Faberge? Faberge was a favoured jeweller of the Russian royalty during the Belle Epoque. Oddly, Faberge was also a fragrance company during the 1960s and 1970s in the U.S.)

Heartwood, I agree. I also do not get chocolate. I get citrus, flowers and vanilla, for the most part. Trouble is not an olfactory masterpiece (and masterpieces, as fragrance reviews, are in the eye--or nose--of the beholder), but I certainly don't think it worthy of such strong condemnation.
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post #16 of 16
6/12/10 at 10:20am
I'm a big fan of JAR (despite the ceremony. Loved the funny description above). I find all of his creations exquisite but the one that really connects with his jewelry is Diamond Water. This perfume sparkles on skin. It's a white floral with a touch of green sweetness and carnation that keep a cool feeling (instead of warm/creamy). Hard to describe, truly worth sampling.
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