A Taste of Heaven

We will travel here one last time - shed your mortal coil and step through the gateway to the unending beyond...one last time. That familiar white light suffocated you - your vision goes crimson, lavender, black...you're lying in a plain of billowing lavender swimming in a sea of the sun's white light. Your breath holds the lingering poison of absinthe - you had too much to drink on your afternoon frolic. The wind carries the scent of cinnamon and civet - the scent of your lover....where is she? In a state of slight panic, you race toward the edge of the woods. Geranium crunches under foot, thorny roses nip at your clothing, and orange blossoms float gently across your path guiding your steps. Whispy hands of oakmoss reach toward you, almost as if to stop you....the dress of your lover whips out of reach as you stumble toward her, the scent of her ambery musk teasing you. The vast emptiness swallows you - you pass through the threshold into purgatory. Your skin is lit aflame permeating the air in musky tonka and earthy patchouli. This is where you belong. Hand in hand, you dance with your lover - two pale vanilla skeletons dancing across these infinite spaces...forevermore. Day 65 - Old World Listening to: Dead Can Dance - All In Good Time Notes: My perception of this scent has shifted over time - this fume is either a perfect recreation of a few fumes or an originator of them. This starts with a beautiful, yet fleeting, lavender and geranium accord mixed with a very potent wormwood (it's real as I've smelled it in EO form many times). The top gives way to a vibrant rose and orange blossom which are swiftly overtaken by a potent and cozy cinnamon and musk with an intermittent civet keeping your nose on alert. The heart is weaved into a multi-faceted base of ambery vanilla, honeyed oakmoss, and a nutty tonka. I understand why people relate this to Caron Pour Un Homme as the lavender/civet/vanilla relation is undeniable. This fume also creates some of the vibe in Musc Ravaguer with the cinnamon and musk combo, the lavender and tonka of SL Gris Clair, and the honeyed oakmoss of many modern and vintage fumes. Even though this sounds like a lot, this fume is the best of all the aforementioned and creates a delightfully unisex entry into oriental fougeres that lasts comfortably for about 8 to 12 hours! Definitely warm and inviting!

Take Caron Pour Un Homme and put a bunch of money into the ingredients and this is what you'll get. A Taste of Heaven features a robust, bright lavender note supported by a sturdy, yet soft vanilla base. Absinthe provides its spicy-green edge and gives it all a bit of a twist--just enough to keep things interesting without interfering with the main theme of the composition. The fragrance follows a fairly simple plot: It opens with the lavender strong and upfront, and as the lavender settles the absinthe and vanilla become more apparent. Eventually the vanilla and lavender achieve a balance and the fragrance takes on a very mellow, peaceful feeling for the remainder of its life. Despite its simplicity, ATOH smells wonderful, and the quality of ingredients are beyond reproach--the vanilla is smooth and rich, the lavender bright and lively, and the absinthe green and pleasantly mordant. Projection is solid to strong and the longevity is superb. This one lasts on me for 12 hours every time. There's really no need to go heavy with ATOH, 2 or 3 sprays should do you just about right. I find A Taste of Heaven very calming and that it creates a friendly, tranquil aura. It doesn't dominate a situation, but it does not shy away either. At the same time, it's not demanding of its host or audience. It's easy. Appropriate for all but the hottest months of the year, this is a fragrance that can be dressed up or down and wouldn't be out of place at the movies or the opera. A Taste of Heaven is something I will always enjoy and it occasionally finds itself on my "Top 5" list. Definitely worth sampling and sniffing out to see if it works for you.

I remember the smell of wormwood. It smells at once green and bitter, like something which, if ingested, would make you pretty sick, pretty quickly. Which is basically how wormwood works.... so yes, it smells of wormwood. I get that pretty high in the mix. It's also got hits of lavender burnt on a charcoal briquette, of oakmoss, and I do detect the bergamot in there, though it is chained into submission by the vanilla and tonka. Never 100% sure about combining the puddingy gourmands with the fruit course, but it is here, mercifully, Wormwood, in all itt's grating glory, holds the big stick. So... why do I love it so? Because it smells like this. Here's the picture. A dark, dark, rainy night in the city. There's screams (of mirth or anger, it matters not), raised male voices, a car door slams. Rain drops fall into the puddles in the roads and pavements, leaving ever growing ripples which merge into each other as the rain gets heavier. A gentleman of the road huddles in a shop doorway, muttering profanities as he draws his cardboard bedding tighter about his body. Stiletto heels click and clatter by. A spliff moves swiftly by, trailing it's smoke which gently strokes your nostril and hurriedly chases after it's origin again, like a dog that momentarily halted to pee on a lamp-post and got yanked when it's owner tightened the leash. Neon signs, reflected in the puddles, upside down, back to front "GIRLS XXX", "TROCADERO" "BENNY'S BAR". To me, it will always be a strong, no-nonsense witchy woman, who isn't afraid of the dangerous dark, because she owns it and doesn't freak out when the rain falls. Something beautiful.

Oh man, I'm in love. *swoon* First off, I'm not sure why this is marketed merely as a men's fragrance as it's quite sweet.Yes, it does start with a shaving cream-esque scent, but after about half an hour or so more of the vanilla and tonka peek through. I can definitely tell there's more than one kind of lavender in here as it's not the flat clean body-wash lavender one tends to get but a plush, complex lavender. The spikes of wormwood, oakmoss, and geranium add an intermittent sharpness that keep this Taste of Heaven from being too sickeningly sweet. The patchouli here is thick and languid, far from the hippy-shop funk or boring clean-patchouli one tends to get in more mainstream scents. While A Taste of Heaven lacks the anisic notes of actual absinthe, I believe it conveys the *idea* of absinthe perfectly. Sillage is strong without being cloying, and three hours after application it's pretty much the same strength and scent as when it first started drying down. Taking all notes into consideration I truly feel the inspiration behind this, the gloomy Victorian poet in thick absinthe-stained velvet furiously scrabbling words with knotted brow and ink-stained fingers. A Taste of Heaven is definitely unisex, but despite the sweetness I wouldn't dare call it comforting; it's the scent a dastardly man leaves on your pillow long after he's left the next morning, of the dangerous woman who boldly parades around in your shirts that she posseses as fully as she does you. Familiar, but with a throb of anguish and passion fitting for any Byronic hero.

Joining the chorus of folks who lament that this beauty is no longer available. I bought my original bottle way back in 2012, not long after its release. It was and still is the densest lavender I've ever found, highlighting both the crisp, green aspect of the herb and the smooth vanillic facets. People are quick to compare this to Caron Pour Homme. And while that perfume was clearly a strong influence, this one amplifies all that's good about the Caron to stratospheric heights. With the possible exception of another Caron perfume, Le 3eme Homme, this is my favorite lavender-dominant scent of all time. I also love Mem by Bogue, but that's a rather different take on lavender that would round out my top three in this space. I've repeatedly begged the folks at By Kilian to bring it back. But they are now far more interested in producing trashy scents that smell like weak martinis than developing products of real depth and artistry. Can't imagine I'll ever buy another perfume from this house. Just another tragic and unnecessary loss of a truly lovely concoction.