Eau de Naphe

oh, i so love this! so cozy, like settling onto a towel with the breeze blowing on a pristine beach with - here it comes - an orange push pop! okay, maybe not that candy-ish, but it could never smell like a grandma!!! but i must say, being a lover of 80's scents, it does have that going for it. silage is lesser, the smell is warm and beautiful. almost reminds me of Roberto Cavalli's new fragrance that is out, albeit a lite non-herbal version (Cavalli has a richness to it that i can't even get into here). but would never stick around long enough to be bedmates with her. it smells french...not for the earthy deep musky aldehyde lovers. update: so sad! this lasts for about 20 minutes on my skin! oh well...

Beautiful light floral that would be Aliens little sister in the summer.

Eau de Naphe is stronger than I expected for an EdT. It starts out with a lot of citrusy orange blossom that wafts around, interspersed with an occasional whiff of what I could swear is sandalwood. Eventually it settles down into a fairly strong synthetic jasmine/orange blossom/gardenia type scent with a prominent note of artificial grape candy. The floral-grape scent persists for the remainder of the drydown, pleasant enough, but not one of those things that make me compulsively sniff my wrists. It has fairly good sillage and lasts all day. Pretty and cheerful, but unremarkable.

Alien meets Poison, and soon they become BFFs.

I've owned this bottle of Comptoir Sud Pacifique Eau de Naphe for quite some time, and I rarely wear it. Why? Because I cannot really wrap my nose around this strange combination of grape jelly and jasmine. Wait! Isn't that the recipe for Thierry Mugler Alien????? I realize that the official notes of Eau de Naphe do not list any purple goo-producing candidates, but I could swear that there is something in the opening which smells like bad purple wine (Mogen David?) or maybe sweet palm wine dregs, which incidentally a friend of mine swears is the same as the flavor of Ciao Bella Blackberry Cabernet sorbet. Next the jasmine takes over, seeming quite indolic or perhaps this is a synthetic surrogate? I don't know, but I'll assume that it's natural because it reminds me in waves of both Lush Lust and Soap & Paper Factory Tuberose (both of which are said to be all natural), and also Creed Jasmal, not to mention Alien, which undoubtedly boasts primarily synthetic (alien!) ingredients not sourced directly from planet earth. Eau de Naphe compels me somehow to believe that it is a good perfume, but unfortunately I do not enjoy wearing it very much. It definitely evokes many memories--especially of other perfumes--and provokes lots of debate with myself about what precisely I am smelling. I do heartily recommend this creation for testing by anyone who appreciates Thierry Mugler Alien. This is definitely a vast improvement over the Bonne Maman fruit preserve facsimiles from this house which I have been testing of late. Flowers are detectably present!