La Peau Nue

I wasn’t sure how I felt about this one at first. These are some of my favorite notes. Celine is my favorite house for fashion, so I really needed at least a miniature perfume for my collection. So I chose this one to try. Upon first wearing, I thought it smelled very retro vintage, 40s, 70s & 90s a bit green, earthy, with hint of cigarettes. I was getting more citrus, tobacco, powder, a little astringent. Reminded me of a vintage Chanel Cristalle EDP which does actually have some similar notes. I had sampled & did not care for that on me & sold ... However, upon second wearing, I get the ROSE! Red rose to me. & now my nose is making sense of it more as a powdery rose boudoir scent, a little bit smoky, earthy ... & it’s getting sexier & more mysterious. Just goes to show, keep trying it ... I think it had to warm up also into room temp from the cold mail. & then your skin should be warm too to try it. So, I wonder what it will do in warmer season. I like it now for winter though. & I’ve been wearing Putains des Palaces a lot this winter, and this is in the same vein, but no ginger or leather to overpower it, which is nice. and I might like this more with the beautiful romantic rose coming through when I’m in that mood. Sexy, red lipstick, powder, cigarettes. (I don’t smoke.) Less dirty than Putains des Palaces, more clean, creamy. Very French. This seems to sit close to skin. I’m appreciating it more & more. Might even become a fave.

I was excited to try La Peau Nue, Celine's take on an iris skin scent. In keeping with other Celine scents I've tried, this is understated elegance, high-quality and very French in style. The iris here is Chanel-like, powdery and refined à la No. 19 Poudré/Comète/La Pausa et al. It also brings to mind Diptyque Fleur de Peau and L'Eau Papier, and (to a lesser extent) Glossier You. LPN opens with the aforementioned powdery iris, strikingly reminiscent of the head of a newborn, as @Charlie2290 below says. The rice note adds a dry, paper-like quality to the iris as it develops, adding body. Some airy, powdery rose follows after a little while, adding a slight lipstick-y nuance to this scent, the perfect accompaniment to the iris. The vetiver drydown is remarkable, its dry woodiness complementing the iris-rose accord to perfection while making for a seamless progression from the papery rice note. It fades to a dry, powdery skin scent with vetiver lingering until final fade. Sillage is intimate and longevity is moderate. It is a feminine-leaning transeasonal scent. LPN is reminiscent of many other perfumes, but it is a beautifully-executed iris skin scent on a bed of vetiver. Limited price/performance ratio, but one of the nicest examples of the "your skin but better" genre that I've encountered. 4.5/5.

For me Celine have joined an elite group of designers who rarely seem to put a foot wrong with ultra chic, subtle and classical but still not devoid of creativity, perfume. La peau nue is very much in my wheelhouse and a pleasurable, powdery iris floral perfume it is too. There's a woody undercurrent without decending into papery, ionones which even a couple of the best Chanel iris/violet perfumes can have a tendancy to do. I've seen La Pausa in the smells like and without having smelled that in a while I'd say sure, okay, because the chanel synergy (without plagiarism) throughout Celine is evident. I think Polge made some of these didn't he? A minor critisism could be that this is almost too refined, refined out of existance and if you maybe want something which smells more of violet, iris/orris, luxury leather handbags and cosmetics, lipsticks etc... there are other fragrances which fulfill that brief better. That's me playing devils advocate though because for me this strikes the perfect, quiet, unassuming tone, I think it's a lovely perfume.

If this and Black Tie had a baby it might be my dream scent. Where Black Tie is a bit too vanilla forward with not enough Iris ...the Iris here is stunning. I love how dry, fluffy and powdery it is. I am guessing the combo with the rice powder punches up the rooty effect. I was apprehensive about the rose ...but it lends a light dusting of sweet floracy that isn’t too aggressive (similar to Narciso white cube’s rose). I am also not missing the violet that so often accompanies Iris. Sillage is very intimate (even in the opening) and the performance is average making the high price hard to swallow. But it does feel elegant and the quality is apparent. The citrus undertone is very understated and I only picked it up a few hours in where it brings a bit of astringent brightness into the mix. The vetiver is grounding and adds some earthiness to all the fluff. For me this is gorgeous and easily a love...I just hate the price. A beautiful but very pricey powdery skin scent.

Such an enticing, perfect name for this fragrance. La Peau Nue smells like skin that has been freshly bathed and moisturised with an ordinary lotion, perhaps Nivea or Pond's, but it's like a memory of this scene, idealised and romanticised, Vaseline-lensed, the fog still on the mirror. Because of the suggestion of nudity, I find this fragrance subtly sexy, in an intimate rather than carnal way. The opening is my favourite, when the iris smells more rooty and cold, kind of how lotion is cold. The fragrance grows more powdery as it settles, the rose finely milled, lending the lightest pinch of pink. I sometimes struggle with powdery or makeup-y fragrances, but this is quite special to me in that it flirts with the past, yet feels modern. The bottle is beautiful--timeless with elegant, considered details. Maybe I'm just lusting, but I may have to add this to my wish list.