Kiss Me Quick(ly)

im the first person here yayy well let me tell you, this perfume is a complete and utter one of a kind. i have never smelt anything like this before, and you probably haven’t either. i had been extremely curious to try this for months. i was contemplating what size bottle to (blind) buy, but opted for the tiny 15ml one just because i was a bit sceptical about the cotton candy and toffee apple notes. i do not like candy notes. now i wish i bought a bigger bottle. it’s hard for me to describe or break down the smell. it’s one of those perfumes that smells more like a place than a perfume.. which makes sense because it was initially created for an exhibition/‘celebration of the seaside’ event. here’s an excerpt of Sarah’s description; “Using the aromas of a past-its-heyday funfair in around about 1972. Round the back of the dodgems once the sun’s gone down and the children have left the funfair. The aroma of hot metal, old leather saddles on the carousel horses, toffee apples, candy floss, a brisk sea breeze, roll-up cigarettes and straw hats. ...a fond tribute to reluctant teenage seaside family holidays, the last ones before we set off by ourselves.” in the opening, i can very much smell hot metal and rolling tobacco. it’s kind of startling, but in a good way. then once it settles down, i pick up on the salty sea breeze, leather and toffee apple. much to my delight, the toffee apple and candy floss are not very prominent. they’re there, but very faintly floating around in the background. after 1+ hours of wear it’s slightly salty, straw hat and worn-in leather with traces of tobacco and toffee apple. i like the name and think it’s fitting because it does have a young, optimistic quality to it. there’s not much else i can say because sarah’s own description of it perfectly sums it up. like many of her creations, this one has a very unique, very fun ( & very british) concept behind it, and the execution is wonderful. i don’t know how she did it, but she did it, and did it very well. this is certainly deserving of a lot more recognition and praise. it’s not for everyone, but anyone who hasn’t smelt it should smell it. it’s a wonderfully peculiar fragrance, with a great longevity too.

on a still, hot, summer afternoon you find a long abandoned fairground. You climb through a hole in the fence to explore, and come across an old carousel. You sit on one of the chipped, worn horses when suddenly the carousel roars to life. Toffee apple and fairy floss pop and burst like bright lights that burn out as quickly as they sprang to life. The old gears grind hot metal as it judders forward, throwing you into the cracked leather saddle. Somewhere in the background, you smell the chewing tobacco of the long dead operator. The carousel wheezes sound for a couple for slow revolutions before the ride fades away again. You climb down of the horse, make your way back through the dry, dead, overgrown grass, back through the rusted chain link fence, back to the real world. You want to go back, but know that place is not for you. I really wanted this to like me. Sadly, it does not. It's a fantastic piece of storytelling magic, but just doesn't want to come to life for me. I think it's the sweeter gourmand notes. I'm finding that things like toffee apple, strawberry, fairy floss, spun sugar, berries etc from this house just don't work on my skin.