Rememberance Day Perfume

Poppies, a photo by Ayala Moriel on Flickr.

In honour of Remembrance Day today I’m wearing my red and white poppies, and - FlowerbyKenzo, which incorporates the symbolic poppy in its bottle design and supposedly has notes of Himalayan blue poppies (a place I'm yet to climb to). 

FlowerbyKenzo is a rather young (12yrs) blockbuster if to judge by it's rather steady place at the top selling perfume lists in Europe. The bottle design must be a big part of this perfume's success - I think it is beautiful and well-designed and the marketing campaigns for it, including installing entire fake fields of poppies in various urban destinations, are brilliant and thought provoking (the main thought being: wow, they sure invest a lot of money promoting this fragrance!).



It has a soapy, sweetpea-like scent, with violet, rose and cassie notes, wild hawthorne, Himalayan poppies, opoponax and most of all - loads of heliotropin and musks. It begins begins a bit peppery and is slightly reminiscent of Parfum Sacré, with the juxtaposition of spice and powdery, sweet musk. Yet roses do not play nearly a big role here as in Parfum Sacré, and neither does the incense (whcih is very muted in FlowerbyKenzo, but still there with an underlining smouldering effect).

Once it's dried down it's a rather linear powdery, sweet musk scent that does not offer much of a surprise. There is an element in it that runs though most of the Kenzo scents that I've tried - a certain almondy, floral yet fresh note. I think it's an accord that incorporates cassie absolute and heliotropin. I can detect it in SummerbyKenzo and also in KenzoAmour. To keep a continuity in a fashion designer without an in-house perfumer is not an easy feat, and I think that alone is what gives Kenzo it's edge and visibility in the highly competitive fragrance market. 

FlowerbyKenzo is not something I'd normally wear - although it shares some elements and qualities with some of my favourites scents -  it is a tad too powdery and perfumey to my taste, and if I'm after a spicy powdery musk - Parfum Sacre gives that without all the powdery almondy fluff. And for the cassie notes I'll get much more of what I'm after from Farnesiana or Fleur de Cassie. 



Top note: Pepper, Cassis, Bulgarian Rose, Parma Violet
Heart notes: Wild Hawthorn, Cyclosal, Hedione, Cassie
Base notes: Heliotropin, Bourbon Vanilla, Opoponax, White Musk, Incense