The Black Knight from Francesca Bianchi is distinctly vetiver smoke - the scent of an earthy and well-trodden ground inhabited by knights, horses, and footmen. It’s easy to imagine burnished cordovan leather, horse tacks, and campfire in this distinctly mediaeval smoke - followed with robust notes of patchouli, orris root, leather, and narcissus, finished with a rounded beeswax note. Private Teahouse (Chasing Scents) shifts to Lapsang Souchong for its smokiness - recalling the Wuyi Mountain fog and old wood fires of its provenance - it is a warm invitation to the fragrant sanctuary separate from the daily world, asking us to pause and look through the wall of smoke, to find a complexity played quietly.
Two fragrances in particular draw their smoky inspiration from the idea of combustion and conflagration. In Bois d’Ascese, Noami Goodsir recalls in scent an old shack set ablaze during the Australian bush fire season - with a clear tint of peaty Scotch whisky that nods at her heritage. Labdanum, cedar, amber, and tobacco notes are blended impeccably, forming a striking image of earth and fire. While A City on Fire (Imaginary Authors) shares much of this impression, there is a difference to be detected - it is brighter up top, with a distinct red berry fruitiness that plunges into the smoky body of the scent. One might also think of hickory wood and letting match sticks burn down to one’s fingers. Much more wearable than one expects.
Perfumer Antonio Gardoni may be the master of smokiness - with two expressions in our catalogue. T-Rex needs little introduction, brilliantly laden with spices and floral that have lit up - it’s the searing hot asteroid that not only knocked out the dinosaurs, but all the flowers of the Cretaceous era too. T-Rex is about exaggeration: “volcanic eruptions, forest fires, crazy gigantic flora and fauna”, thick with balsamic floral materials and a good layer of patchouli. Gardoni’s LiTA tones this down: you can enter into its thickest parts and never feel encumbered, and this is its charm but also the source of its marvelousness. Moving amongst this body, you can discern everything. And in its contrast, the white of gardenia, champaca, and jasmine flowers reveal the fine nuances of many tones of black, which are generously strewn across the surface.
