Summer of Patchouli Love 2011: Peace, Love and Patchouli. Pick #3

The summer of 2011 has been a distinctly different event– sort of a blend of peace, love and great music along with floods, storms, and triple digit temperatures that have yet to break. The stars have realigned in wicked configurations and mercury is in retrograde if that means anything to you and that points to some wild times Perfume Pharmer Monica Miller came up with this amazing idea to have select fragrance afficionados AKA “Patch Test Bunnies” test drive a group of 13 scents all created around the singular note of patchouli. These scents are all extremely unique– but the only thing that ties them together (though it would be very hard to tell that they are related) is the ingredient patchouli.

The Summer of Patchouli Love: Peace, Love and Patchouli was a smorgasboard of patchouli scents created by 13 natural perfumers who blended natural, 25% (min) patchouli perfumes that would turn even the most ardent patchouli-haters heads. The result is the Summer of Patchouli Love 2011 and the Patch Test Bunnies (I was lucky enough to be selected to be amongst this august group) chose their top 3 favorites.

The perfume “Patch Test Bunnies” are bloggers and fragrance junkies like me– and many of them are more well known in the fragrance world than I am. (The list of the Patch Test Bunnies is at the end of this post- and will be featured on the 2 subsequent posts) Not to say I don’t know my fragrances or understand the process of creating something that is visual, tactile and olfactory as well as emotional.

I am one of the last to post about my favorites and this was really hard to do because all these little bottles were numbered from 1-14.. (we skipped the number 9 because it’s just like the number 6) so there were 13 scents to test. I am one of those people whose nose and body chemistry changes daily– and maybe even during the day. Emotionally, physically, mentally– each scent can affect me or smell differently on me — particularly as it evolves. I am more eclectic in style in beauty, fashion, music and food– though I always have my favorites– there are times when girl has to change up her style and this was one really hard test to get throug because each was so unique.

At one point I was numbering them on my arm to figure out which was which — 4 at a time. We had to pick out our three favoritee and after I finally picked out one (that was hard enough), I had to go through it again for scent #2 and #3– each of which will have their own post.

PLAP fragrance #13 was the third choice choice for me was created by noted perfumer Opus Oils– named aptly Wild Child.

TOP NOTES – Saffron, Cabreuva, Blood Cedarwood, Peach Tree Leaf, Clementine, Yellow Mandarin, Wild Orange

MIDDLE NOTES – Honey, Milk Accord, Black Currant Bud,Tuberose, Peach Accord

BASE NOTES – Patchouli, Sandalwood, Dark Amber, Ambergris, Vetiver, Vanilla

While you look at these notes (ok when I look at these notes), I was overwhelmed by the different tweaks and blending that Kedra Hart put into this. Some of them seem anti-thetical together but then once on the skin– voila- instant change. Given that my personal chemistry tends to change a lot with my moods and what I am doing (along with the weather which by the beach it’s overcast sometimes and then other times it’s breezy and still others it’s plain HOT), the fragrance changed on me a lot. I was swinging a lot on whether this placed. Not that the fragrance wasn’t amazing– all 13 were amazing but some were more in tune with me than others which is the nature of fragrance. Wild Child kept hanging in the mix as I went through the elimination rounds. For example I applied this about 20-30 minutes ago and it’s sharp on me at first, the opening of the notes is startling yet turns smooth, silky, even risque based on your mood.
For a longer term review on this- it’s now seven hour later and the scent is still alive, well and kicking up it’s heels. I sort of feel like it’s carmelized turbinado brown sugar with some serious doses of tobacco and spirits (aged scotch and bourbon come to mind if that makes any sense). I love the smokiness as it dries down and it becomes one truly wild child that makes you feel like maybe you should indulge in more of this behavorior as I see it seems to be affecting my mood of pushing that envelope far beyond what is expected. It has both a vintage feel with a modern, contemporary even futuristic presentation that means this could be one of those eternal fragrances that you wear. I certainly will. My big question for Hart is that if you can get this in alcohol base or coconut oil base, which is the more potent and I can see the oil being almost lethally sexy.

Thank you to Monica Miller, Perfume Pharmer and to all the other Patch Test Bunnies and Patch Test Creators for their patience and their assitance on this review. The interesting part of this is that I wear very few fragrances wehre the operative note is/was patchouli. This has me totally rethinking what I should be wearing.

I was checking my favorites again– the box is open in front of me as I type right this second. (I so need to start using that dictation programn DRAGON.. I talk way too much)

Photo Credits: photo of Perfume Pharmer design banner is designed by Katlyn Breene(mermadearts.com) and Summer of Patchouli Love 2011 banner is designed by Elizabeth Whelan (elizabethwehelanillustrator.com)

Stevie Wilson,
LA-Story.com

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