Sure, the eponymous ingredient is unquestionably part of the scenery, but the seams between it and its neighbours are difficult to detect. Here, the idea isn’t to showcase a specific material but to create an aura, a texture, an endless vista of scent. “Perfumery must look to the future,” we tend to say, “there’s no point dwelling on the past, we can’t keep expecting old brands to produce the sort of thing they made decades ago.” But then along comes a retro beauty like this one, and we’re forced to scuttle into a corner like toddlers, waiting to be served a portion of our own high-and-mighty words.Ĭompletely ignoring the current trend for translucency and hyper-legibility, Ylang Ylang is as 1970s in its approach to floral bouquets as every glitter-ball and platform shoe-cliche you can think of. A re-working of the brand’s own Fetiche from 1978, it’s the sort of composition that reduces cynical critics to gibbering wrecks and renders us speechless. Nevertheless, I must bring it to your attention. So for all I know, Coudray‘s glorious Ylang Ylang is now conspicuous by its absence in perfumeries and is doing the rounds of the auction sites and the scent-swap communities. Patchouli oil, the 'anti-perfume' of the 1960s, was sure to keep money out of the hands of corporations and 'the man.' And who could forget the fervor created by the grunge androgyny of CK One? Scent is truly a passport to memory, making this book both a lush treat and an insightful examination of the twentieth century through the most mysterious of the five senses.-Adapted from dust jacket.Usually, by the time I get around to writing about a limited edition release, it’s as hard to find as a shred of maturity in a Quentin Tarantino movie. Est.ư̐ee Lauder created Youth Dew and with it, distilled the essence of 1950s suburbia. There was the patriotic impact of English Lavender during World War I, and perfumes that captured the Egyptomania of the 1920s. ư̐epoque through the swinging sixties, to the naughty nineties and into the aughts, Ostrom brings intelligence and wit to this most ravishing of subjects.

Join Lizzie Ostrom, the nose behind 'Odette Toilette,' as she examines one hundred perfumes and scents in all their fragrant glory, revealing a fascinating social history along the way.

Signature scents and now-lost masterpieces, the visionaries who conceived them the wild and wonderful campaigns that launched them the women and men who wore them-every perfume has a tale to tell.

An olfactory adventure that explores the trends and crazes that have shaped the way we've spritzed over the past century.

Perfume by Lizzie Ostrom