Cabochard

Cabochard (Eau de Parfum) Cabochard (Eau de Parfum) - Grès 9.5 Stubborn, headstrong, persistent, undisciplined and impulsive 1959 is a year that everybody should remember. The world was polarized between Right and Left, Capitalism and Communism, with massive destruction nuclear tested weapons on both sides... and the Cuban revolution began, the perfect drama stage to convert our planet in a redioactive soup. The world as we know could be totally different if an atomic confrontation would begin that year. Gladly the Kennedys, Jack and Bob, were cleaver and big enough to prevent the 3d and final World War. In our western World another event took place that year. The Barbie doll was born and became the playing companion of millions and millions of girls all over our planet. For out of our planet work Nasa presented its first astronauts, including John H. Glenn Jr, and Alan Shepard Jr, and launched the first rocket into outer space. Television programmes included "Rawhide", "Bonanza" and "The Twilight Zone" while movies gave us "Some Like it Hot", "Ben Hur" and "North by Northwest". The Boeing 707 Jet Airliner comes into service... and Cabochard, one of the most significative perfumes ever created, was launched in Paris by the fashion house of Grés. Cabochard is a funny french word. It may be an adjective or a common name and has several meanings but all of them a bit dubious in terms of a person's character. It may be used for stubborn, headstrong, persistent, undisciplined, impulsive and many other synonyms. Cabochard was certainly something we could call to Madame Grés. When returning from a trip in India, where she discovered a new world of aromas like the water hyacinth, Madame Grès decided to launch a revolutionary perfume in 1959: Cabochard! It was an immediate success, a true olfactory message from the 1950s, along with the visuals of red lips, filter cigarettes and black leather jackets. It was elaborated by the perfumer Bernard Chant (from IFF) and was inspired by the stubborn personality of Madame Grès. It became a milestone as a leather chypre female perfume with world wide recognition. It was classic and innovative, smooth and intense, wild and delicate, feminine and masculine, a true scent of contrasts. The perfume opens with an opposition between two ingredients: the green, dry and androgynous galbanum versus the voluptuous, intoxicating and seductive ylang-ylang. Then the ylang-ylang petals are replaced by other precious flowers: the Bulgarian rose and the jasmine of Grasse, both giving a classic facet to the perfume. At the end of the evolution, the fragrance becomes more complex and deeper thanks to the intense effluvia of moss, vetiver, musk and patchouli exuding mystery and exotic sensuality. Along this trail some other notes are used to stress the bold and audacious evolution. It's the case of asafoetida, a spice with an odor profile between leek and onion (!), building an heavy earthy frame for the top notes. A bottom stage with very strong notes of woods, oakmoss, tobacco and a dominant "cuir de Russie" type of leather, giving a manly touch (or should I say punch) to the heavenly drydown of this perfume. Different people have different experiences with this perfume. Overall it may smell like smoking rooms in posh clubs, expensive leather, peppery notes, warm sandalwood, enchanting aromatic flowers... You name it. Such a clean and dirty, vibrant and sassy, complex perfume and with such a sophistication! Just enough to make me feel like a perfect badass! Needless to say that I consider this Eau de Parfum as totally unisex. How does this jewel cope with math? - Scent opening............9.0 (almost perfect) - Scent Dry Down.......10.0 (perfect) - Longevity....................9.0 (up to 10 hours on my skin, with 2 sprays) - Sillage..........................9.0 (sillage of 6~8 feet; it projects for 2.5 hours with 2 sprays) - Versatility....................9.0 (extremely versatile, although not the best solution for summer days) - Usability......................9.5 (just avoid the beach, the gym or any activities where you may sweat) - Compliments..............8.5 (people will notice you as distinct, elegant, sophisticated and sexy but not cute; above average compliments by both genders) - Uniqueness.................9.5 (quite unique; I only remember two perfumes alike: Bandit from Robert Piguet, launched in 1944 and relaunched in 1999, and Azuree from Estée Lauder, launched in 1969; The two of them are exceptional perfumes. Some people claim the classic Aramis to be similar to Cabochard as well due to the strong note of leather in both of them) - Quality........................10.0 (well above average quality ingredients; magnific smooth blending for such a complex perfume; It does present a correct performance because it could become cloyin, with more sillage and projection) - Presentation ..............9.0 (very elegant and very discreet) - Price...........................10.0 (100 ml EDP flask - €19,00 in ShowroomPrivé) - Average:......................9.32/10.00 (wooow!) between 7 and 8 => above average; between 8 and 9 => recommended; equal or bigger than 9 => don't miss it; My conclusion: Fantastic, but try before you buy it. NO! NO! NO! CORRECTION! Excuse me... if you don't like it, buy it anyway. You will have an inexpensive exquisite gift to offer someone with a very good taste and better than yours. Music: Frank Sinatra - "Strangers In The Night"

Pre-1984 'Cabochard' is surely something I inhaled off les épaules of older women when I was young. It's also something I'm realising I've not smelt in decades. I say this because, having recently acquired most randomly & happily an EDT splash of some considerable age, upon sniffing I was instantly overcome with an extremely nostalgic, familiar scent. What I have in my hand seems, after some difficulty in ascertaining its exact age, a bottle from pre-1990. It's post 1984 repackaging, and yet also lacks a barcode (and green dot)... but the only list of Grès batch codes I managed to come across after two days searching didn't help much as there was nothing older than 1990 listed. Obviously not original formula by a long shot, but neither belonging to the massacred iterations, or so I glean from many a blog, which I'm led to believe began to appear in the years just prior to the turn of the millennium. This is potently beautiful enough to evoke something I do very clearly recall from young childhood whilst also, I would assume for anyone never acquainted with any 'Cabochard' ever, splendidly proposing a picture of the days before casual Friday became casual everyday & twice on Sundays. 'Cabochard', at first, has reminded me of the ladies in my youth who changed into something nicer in the afternoon or evening... just because. No night out. Nothing special. It's cocktail hour and dinner will be served, and there was etiquette and no one thought anything of it and, in retrospect, even the middle-classes inhabited a more refined, more "civilised" existence it seems. 1990 'Cabochard' may be far from the elevated heights of its first incarnation, and if you go by L.T. you'd think anything post-'84 is not worth throwing a farthing at. But I humbly disagree. And in a century increasingly defined by the loud, the crass, and the belligerent (ironically bathed in the pinnacle of insipid) and the glorification of the least common denominator, an older box of 'Cabochard' is a blessed sight indeed! Did I mention I paid all of £13 for it? I'll take that to be a lucky number. Absolutely chuffed I picked this up on a whim. Gosh, but the original must have been something lush! As a lady of legendary, exacting standards, Madame Grès would surely turn in her grave were she to see the state of fashion & perfumery today. But, for what it's worth, and what we've got, we thank her and celebrate the expression of that age of elegance we've lost that she left to us. There's something so classically, self-assuredly, robustly rich & sexy in this that by banal & bizarre 2020 standards it feels nearly baroquely lavish & risqué. And yet, it's simultaneously decadent & restrained... beguiling & proper. It never occurred to me before, and strikes me as revelatory now, that a fragrance I would have associated with matrons 30 years ago (cue Mrs. Robinson) should manifest itself as quite decently erotic and feasibly "masculine" now. Madame Grès famously spoke of long walks on deserted Indian beaches in this - a tantalising image I keep trying to see. But I smell... sophistication. And confidence. Dressed-up eloquent dreams. And romance. The glow of the good life you chose for yourself which, on an evening out with someone special, can never fade... like the heady poise of being in love. Is 'Cabochard' the "headstrong" implacable belief of lovers in love?... a time when we knew our place and the future seemed rewarding & secure. I suppose the most beautiful thing about beauty, like romantic love, is its fragile, ephemeral nature, really, though its essence is beyond time. A reverie. And don't we love perfumes for their "time capsule" capabilities? Here, in 'Cabochard' 1990, the remembrance of beauty is an echoing, velvety shadow preserved for the dream of a renaissance... the return of Romance. ★★★★☆

- a digression - Cabochard - FOR HER: A FEW WORDS FOR SAFELY HIDDEN FEMININE FRAGRANTICIAN I bet that right now here is some young woman - a fragrantician, too - who is reading all the reviews about Cabochard and thinking: “Oh, this one isn't for me, because here is more than few times stated that Cabochard is kinda masculine. Or unisex.... I don't want THAT.” And this comment is for her, as a balance to comments in which Cabochard is pronounced to be unisex, “almost masculine”. Cabochard is a woman's scent. Some men would bend to it and wear it, of course. But, as I'm concerned, it is not other way around. When I sense the man wearing Cabochard, I feel like it bends the man on a feminine side, and at the same time that doesn't make the scent less feminine. Also, as a scent originally made for woman, Cabochard really doesn't need to be labeled as made for certain kind of woman's personality. I don't think that Cabochard was made for strong, tough woman, or that its vibe attributes masculinity, or some “vamp” or “bad-girl” attribute. Many traditionally feminine women wore Cabochard in the past. Not just “vamps” or “masculine” feminists, but also nice, quiet housewife with children. Tender nurses. Pleasant, mildly tempered teachers. Ultrafeminine secretaries. My mom, who is warm, quiet, tender, very classicly feminine and everything but tough, stubborn or authoritative woman. It is as misleading to believe that women for whom the Cabochard was originally made and who wore it in the past were by default strong and independent, or stubborn, as it is misleading to believe that among today's candy-scented population there are not some tough, strong willed, independent or in any other way a bit “cabochard-spirited” / “vamp”, “masculine” women. Let's not apply unnecessary stereotypes over the perfume. Let's rise above it and go beyond that kind of stereotypes, or fashion, or overly protective correctness. My mother would have certainly never wear Cabochard if it was in her time repeatedly labeled as “unisex” or “almost masculine”. It would have been a pity, and I wouldn't have the childhood memory of this beautiful scent on a commonly feminine, tender, polite and traditional woman. I'm sure that woman with my mom's way of thinking still live among us and read the reviews here. And just because they rightfully aspire not to be differently feminine from many of the first ordinary users of Cabochard (the housewives or ultra feminine secretaries or nurses, or my mom), the “masculinity” label could divert them from trying beautiful and different kind of warmth from woods, flowers, tobacco and leather. My personal experience with Cabochard is that it draws compliments from persons (both genders) whom I find open minded and willing to ignore any kind of “labels” as equally as overly protective correctness, and who concentrate on individual quality of the fragrance on my woman's body. And that is: On a general level - Cabochard is a women's scent because it was originally made for traditionally feminine women, not for men. And that is a fact. On a personal level - Cabochard is womanly because on me it smells feminine. And that is fact, too. So, here's the message to the young fragnatician safely hidden in genderly non-questionble sweets, but who is wondering how does she as a woman fits to the scent which is today described as “gender bender”: There's no fashion, dominant opinion or political correctness which should divert any woman from experiencing the scent made for woman on her woman's body. Cabochard is a scent for woman. That is proven so many times that it made it woman's classic. And if all of these sounds politicly incorrect - well, I'm also sometimes overly protective and I'm certainly willing to speak up what I think. You can freely downvote it.

I currently own one bottle of EdT, recent, and an older EdP, to my joy :) They're quite different beasts, clearly from the same family, but different. Happily, I love them both, for different occasions. First, the commonalities. Both are totally unisex, timeless, delicious. Both have notes of leather (different interpretations, though) and vetiver and oakmoss. And both are comforting to me, in a way that makes me feel strong and capable, but warm and cuddled. Now the differences. The EdT is moderate in strength, elegant, just a little leathery and soapy and vaguely powdery and floral with a hint of citrus and maybe a promise of something dry and herbal, in a completely gender-neutral way. Discreet strength and warmth. It's, for me, an everyday scent with a twist, something I feel is not out of place anywhere or at any time, but simultaneously a scent not of this time. Dries to something powdery, neutral and vaguely dry herbal/woody, probably the vetiver bur reminding me of pencil shavings and dry grass. With leather in the background still. The older EdP, oh my God... It's strong, dark, shamelessly leathery and, even though it is not on the list of notes, to me it smells also like an animalic soap. This may sound like a contradiction, but the thing is that the fragrance morphs in my sensation of it. Maybe the formulation is complex and my brain cannot apprehend all the notes at once, maybe it's some technical prodigy, but I feel the fragrance change before my nose. It's soapy, then it's almost fecal in its animalic notes, then it's leathery, then it's dry and almost almost floral, but not quite because the leather comes back again... Wouldn't wear it to work or to a serious function, cause I would get distracted, but it's a treat I enjoy. As it dries, wood enters the rotation as well. Amazing and dizzying, in a good way. I love them both.

Cabochard is hated by many because it doesn't "deliver" what they usually look for in a perfume. It's brutal and serious, it's not playful nor delicate, it's straight forward and that can be annoying to some. It's very cold, present but distant and somehow arrogant. A bit strident, it seems tactless at first glance, yet it remains reserved throughout the approximately 10 hours of longevity. In terms of construction, it's dusty, it doesn't bring that creamy leather, but instead you get the harsh, dry version. It also has something that reminds me of the Duru soaps of the past. Overall, I smell moss, tobacco, aldehydes, vetiver, patchouli, sandalwood, spices and sage. It's not necessarily a bad boy, but if the resemblance to Bandit is justified (I haven't sampled it), both names assigned really go hand in hand (cabochard = stubborn). I tried Aramis Aramis instead and can confirm they are very much similar. Cabochard reminds me of an O de Lancôme deprived of the effervescence of the citrus notes, somewhat lacking in freshness. A pile of dusty old leather-bound books, over which someone has overturned a pot of aromatic plants, soil and leaves everywhere. A gust of sand in the middle of summer, which, however, does not announce any hint of a storm. It has personality, but without being cheeky. I see it worn to complete an outfit made up of a pair of Dr. Martens boots, boyfriend jeans and a classic shirt to which a vintage brooch has been attached, maybe a cameo. Definitely unisex, but not for men who prefer sweet-gourmand aromas like Black XS. I wear it usually in a combo layering with Ma Dame by JPG which amplifies its otherwise almost imperceptible rose note and gives it a sweet-sour boost that softens its aridity and takes it out of the darkness by giving it that spark it lacks. Ideal for rainy weather. In drydown it's really adorable. 🎀