Anaïs Anaïs (Cacharel)

Ignore the unremittingly girlish packaging for Anaïs Anaïs, seriously, because it has no bearing on the appropriate gender for it. Although I should point out that the white bottle and prosaically floral imagery of the EDT accurately suggests something at home in a white-tiled bathroom, or perhaps a sauna. Taking into consideration the dearth of convincingly unisex white floral fragrances on the contemporary market, the fact that this thirty-five year-old masterpiece is still in production should be considered a gift from god. As far as fresh florals go, you'd be hard pressed to find anything better.

What makes Anaïs Anaïs so resolutely perfect is not just its luscious, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink bouquet of every white cultivar imaginable, including natural (hammy-smelling) lily, hyacinth, tuberose, jasmine, honeysuckle, orange blossom, ylang, and muguet. It's the tension of these snowy petals against a steamy haze, redolent of a tiny bathroom after a forty-five minute shower, that makes it. Something in Anaïs Anaïs transports me back to a hilariously vulgar, el-expensivo hotel I stayed at, just one block away from St. Peter's Basilica. I remember seeing its Roman vases through luxurious billows of steam, top-heavy and perched precariously on Carrara marble to greet me whenever I stepped out of a scorching Visentin wash.

There's more to it though, something carnal, of its time, a precious burst of brightness in the shady industrial era of the late seventies and early eighties. It is a romantic purity, a tender gloss, the championing of simple pleasures, the act of pulling your nose aside for two seconds to sniff quickly at something gorgeous in the lobby of a big firm before an interview. It's eerie: there are times when I think the mysteriously humid wildflower accord in the heart of Kouros is modeled directly off Anaïs Anaïs. Cacharel found a way to bottle a timeless fragrance without sacrificing a certain "essence" that was intrinsic to the decade from which it came, so that every application is like misting my skin with Stevie Nicks' voice - orotund, a touch smoky, utterly wonderful. If Vicki Anderson wore fragrance, there's little doubt it was this one.

Amor Amor (Cacharel)

It's time to take a look at one of perfumery's unintentional "creepy" perfumes, this one by Cacharel. It's none other than Amor Amor, an off-beat fruity-floral that I suppose qualifies as some sort of "lipstick floral," due to the waxy sweetness it exhibits in its heart. Bearing in mind that perfumistas take a generally dim view of fruity-florals (it's hard to say exactly why), expectations were rather neutral when I tried this scent. I liked its suggestive red bulb-bottle, wondered a little at the bloody looking rose-like flower on the box, the gothic lettering, and in the seconds before that first spritz, figured I was probably in for a standard sweet 'n sour aquatic. And then I spritzed, and smelled, and took a few minutes to think about what was on my arm.

The scent bears little relation to its packaging, which seems rather disturbing and industrial, and instead opens up as an unabashed fruit salad, with sparkling notes of mandarin, apricot, and apple. It's fairly well done, very fresh and light, with identifiable components. Eventually it blends into a chewy-sweet cherry, with darker berry and rose elements. The rose is synthetic and shrill, but tamed by the one-track mind of a scent that does "red fruit notes" as exclusively as this. Here they jockey loudly for the role of soothsayer, rounding roughly-hewn chemical contours with emphasis, not apathy. 

At the tail end is a sheer vanilla base with a dollop of cheap musk. Obviously intended for young women, I can't help but think this would go well on a sixty-something woman whose body has forsaken the concept of time, and bestowed upon her the gift of eternal sexiness, but I'm just extrapolating known variables from subjective experience.

LouLou (Cacharel)

I rarely get defensive about a fragrance, but with this one I can't help myself. LouLou gets an unfair rap, particularly from adult men with better-than-average noses. The boys on basenotes toss some pretty tough words around:

"Think of this as the floral female version of Joop! Homme, very very loud and strong, with florals, spice, and heap-loads of sweet vanilla and helotrope."

- Scentimus

"Too much sugary and mellifluous for my taste."

- Darvant (I forgive your grammar because English isn't your first language - nice use of "mellifluous" by the way.)

"It’s “in for a penny, in for a pound” with LouLou. To enjoy it you’ve got to love the kind of retro, “perfumey” scents that granny wore, and you must feel no shame flouting your love."

- Off-Scenter . . . and ouch!

"... maybe this is a fragrance aimed just for attracting men . . . my friend also smelled it and said it was like vomit, a cheap fragrance she remembered from University."

- F_Frez . . . and double ouch!!

You get the picture. Dismal opinions on poor LouLou. And I'm not sure why.

LouLou is one big '80s floriental. The jasmine, tuberose, violet, rose, balsam, cedar, incense, and ambergris explode off skin in a harmony not seen in current feminine fragrances. It's all so thick and lush that, by today's standards, it could be masculine. Vanilla quickly washes into the fray, adding a sweetness to the woodsy and floral mix. Eventually the sugar from the vanilla dominates, and the entire affair melts into a sweet, warm, and powdery aura. 

Like most '80s boudoir masterpieces, this fills the air around its wearer, and follows her everywhere. It's not a subtle or subliminal scent, and I'm the happier for it. Who needs another sweet-but-meek white musk whisper these days? Enough already, I'd be thrilled to meet someone wearing LouLou, if only to engage her on the topic of what makes a strong woman in today's Live and Let Die world. A woman wearing LouLou knows exactly what it takes to conquer the men and women around her.

My point is that LouLou is Kouros for ladies. It's brash. It's sexual. It's vibrant, complex, colorful, dark, attractive, intimidating, magnetic. I could see LouLou on a man (not so with Kouros on girls), but that doesn't take away from its majesty. Few men would even notice it nowadays, and those women who remember it could either be tired of it, or lulled into thinking it's too "big" for common use. Nothing could be further from the truth - it's exactly what we need. Women are strong, usually stronger than men. They're capable of childbirth. Surviving Menopause. Living to be 98. I think it's time we guys admitted that, as the stronger sex, women should wear stronger perfumes.

I find it intriguing that Thierry Mugler's canon of super-sweet gourmand perfumes get a healthy dose of positive attention, while the Grand Dame LouLou gets second fiddle. What's wrong with a scent that smells sweet, like Joop! Homme? Everyone likes sugar, and I've yet to find a definition of "mellifluous" that makes the term sound cheap, or undesirable. "Perfumey" granny frag = Liz Taylor's White Diamonds, and there is no comparison. And how exactly is a fragrance meant "just for attracting men" a bad thing?

Here's my review blurb, take it or leave it:

"This is the sort of perfume that truthfully hints at the contents of its wearer, like the jacket cover of a Dick Francis novel. She who wears LouLou in the post 9/11 cityscape is, by default, deeper than her peers."

- Enough said.