Kilian Day 10: The Devil attracts you with honey and sugar

Being a copywriter I give more than a little attention to the names of fragrances and I have a profound allergy to clichés or arbitrariness. So this…baam. I would buy it just for the name maybe. You have to agree with me that the name is outstanding. So let’s not perform a semantic dissection on it. Let’s just embrace it. Sweet Redemption – The End.

For obvious reasons I should have taken this one as the last fragrance of my Kilian-process, right? But I am also allergic to over-ordering things so, no. I have one left now. Over to the fragrance. It is very unusual. Definitely a very sweet very dark. For some reason unfortunately you cannot find the formula on Kilians web as with the other fragrances so I have searched for other sources of information. According to Basenotes, the top notes are bergamot and bitter-orange leaf, middle notes are orange blossom, myrrh and frankincense and base notes are opoponax, benzoin and vanilla. 

My feeling wearing the fragrance is that the orange and frankincense are dominating. It is very sweet even if a dark kind of sweet and also a bit powdery, like the perfumes from the 1920’s. The sillage is very strong so you can’t really wear it on a low key day…

When this fragranced was recently launched it was indeed the last (10th) fragrance of the L’Oeuvre Noir line. In this article Kilian Hennessy describes the inspiration for Sweet Redemption – The End, “What came to mind was Goethe’s Faust. He already has a great deal, but he wants more. He accepts the Devil’s deal. The Devil attracts you with honey and sugar. Sweet Redemption, the top notes, had to present this battle of good and evil.”

The nose behind the fragrance is Calice Becker, who has created the majority of the fragrances of L’Oeuvre Noir. She describes the creation as “love without sexual tension“.

Kilian Day 7: Iscious

Fragrance no 7 is described with these words by Kilian, “An inspiration from the Marshmallow. A pure sensual treat.” I didn’t read it however until today (I wore the fragrance yesterday), and it makes me smile. The description feels more than adequate as I felt a bit like this the entire day. Or no, I did not feel like this, but I felt like I smelled like this.

Holy Sweet, Stockholm

The roses, honeysuckle and the caramel are like a romantic embrace. There is something about the feeling that this fragrance creates that makes you think of women like in the old movies. Of blushing cheeks, soft skin, light red anticipating lips, blossoming cherry trees, skirts that swoosh on a summer’s day and crushes. Total utter impeccable sweetness. And… as much as I love seeing it and it makes me smile and fills my heart with marshmallows…it’s just not me. Well, ok, it is a part of me… Yes. But not enough parts to define me in a way that I am comfortable with so not a fragrance that I can “stay” in.

However…there is a person that is the embodiment of all the things mentioned above. Also she of course has many many other sides and is a more complex person. But. She has that very very very special kind of romantic sweetness that you find in so few people these days. You have met her before on this blog, Karin. Karin can carry blush, blossom, swoosh, caramel and rose with a credibility and contemporary touch that no one else that I know can master. So, my Love. don’t be shy-sample now belongs to her, it’s  a really lovely match. Perfumes like this are made for women and womanisciousness like Karin.

Day 2 with Kilian: A Day of Encounters

It is a man. I am sure of it. A tall man with integrity in corduroy. He has the fingers of a pianist and speaks of politics. It is a fragrance of an intellectual man, sharp and keeping the world at a distance. Not someone you hug. Someone you would really want to discuss the world with by a fireplace with some incredible cognac though.

Two hours later he is gone. He has left a veil of something that makes me think of Santa Maria Novella or a meeting between the clergy and herbs. But the man is replaced by a woman with strong attitudes and sharp features. She takes over a room. 

She stays for about an hour. Then enters a different person. Someone more subdued but confident. Much softer though. I envision a baroness from Veneto in masculine clothes and unruly hair. I like her. 

As day turns into evening the herbs are gone. Also the sharpness. What remains is a soft warm velvety vanilla. Where did they all go?