Thirty-five years ago, the bedrooms of many burgeoning gay boys were filled with the incense-like fragrance of patchouli, the hold-over hippie scent from the 60’s, thanks to Madonna including it as part of the packaging for the ‘Like A Prayer’ album. For perhaps the first time, a musical artist was pushing the notion of the artistic listening experience into one that went beyond sound and sight and included an actual scent. It was a powerful moment for me – not only being my first brush with patchouli (contrary to popular belief, I was not alive in the 60’s) but also my first experience with how an artistic project could be so powerfully immersive for the consumer and viewer. It was also a lesson in how scent can be one of the most power memory triggers, bringing us back to a time and place more effectively than any other sensory stimulus.
Since that time, patchouli has held a special place in my heart, though these days it’s in a more refined form, such as this delicious fragrance from the House of Guerlain Paris – ‘Patchouli Ardent’. Here, the patchouli runs through the fragrance arc, its golden threads shimmering at each stage of development, while a magnificently rich rose note works a velvety floral into the mix. At the start, some pink and black pepper brings a spicy accent to an almost-fruity and figgy voluptuousness, while a woody smokiness lends echoes of Tom Ford’s ‘Oud Fleur’ and Frederic Malle’s ‘Portrait of a Lady’ (both of which I adore). Meanwhile, layers of leather reveal themselves as it settles down, taking it blessedly further from the edge of sticky sweetness (the danger zone of many a rose and patchouli duet).
Taken together, this is a powerful perfume, perfect for these blustery days that feel more like winter than spring, when you need a little richness in the arid and barren landscape. The patchouli is prettily present throughout the story, bringing its years of memories into my mind, taking me back decades to a world that feels enchanted, as much by the rose-tinted-glass frame of time as by the sweet innocence I held onto as a thirteen-year-old boy.
