Djer Kiss

Can't believe not a single review for Kerkoff "Djer Kiss"? How could this be? Altho I've several hundred different frags..... okay, so actually, I've well over a thousand, lol .... I've only left maybe a handful of reviews on this (or any) site. Why? Welp, it's embarrassing, but the honest to God truth is despite having been a fraghead & collector many years now, I'm COMPLETELY INCOMPETENT when it comes to capability of identifying notes in a frag 😣. I mean really? WHAT could BE more humiliating in being a pretty voracious collector, yet being unable to identify notes IN fragrances 🥴❓ * deep breath * Yet, like George, I cannot tell a lie, ** am also on the spectrum. So of that lying. business, yeah, I ALSO have "issues" lying, lol .... so I'm NEVER the one to ask questions regarding notes. I CAN seem to pick out a (very) few notes such as Iris, amber, cinnamon, incense & maybe a couple more I can't think of right now. Okay, SO anyhoo? One thing I CAN do tho, is determine if/when a frag belongs in a certain genre of frags, that being generally my favorite: Orientals 🥰❗ Djer Kiss IS definitely belonging to the Oriental group! It's just YUMMY & confounding to me why no reviews here? I happen to have a very early release of the pure parfum as I inherited from my elderly aunt's quite large frag collection upon her passing. Bless her heart ❤ that all along her collection journey, she had the good sense to create & maintain notes she kept in a notebook FOR EVERY SINGLE BOTTLE/FLACON, etc. On the Djer Kiss, she noted purchased in 1936 whilst in France on her honeymoon. She noted the purchase of TWO 11⁄2oz flacons of parfum bcuz she was so enamored w/the scent. Lucky for me, one flacon (was) still sealed and so I voukdn't help myself & HAD to open it. I have been bad about unsealed pricey bottles on occasions when I just cannot help it any longer, LOL. I HAD 2C how different the sealed juice compared to the opened flacon might be? Have to say, they are hardly even discernable! Perhaps that info might lend insight for anybody wondering about hunting or.purchasing THIS particular lovely? The bottle itself is antique in appearance: my flacon does not appear 2B crystal, but rather blown glass with a rew air bubbles present, in a typical of the times rectangular flacon which tapers downward & has a ground glass stopper shaped as an arrow & looks like was made in two-thin pieces joined together. The scent is FABULOUS tho! A genuine vintage lovers dream, really! It's pretty spicy, very warm and ambery and although NOT especially dark in color, it IS quite boozy and resinous typical of perfumes much deeper & darker in colour. I never expected this 2b quite as rich and spicy as it is based upon the maybe 'cup of Earl Grey steeped tea' color. Unlike so many almost 100 year old parfums that become very dark w/age & sometimes cannot see thru the actual juice, the juice in this perfectly stored & pristine flacon of Djer Kiss is translucent- can see thru it and the color is not much deeper than a well steeped glass of ice tea even. Which is why I was so surprised at the power & punch of spice this ole gal has & even w/the hundreds of frags I've experienced, didn't expect the power of this lovely ;) The opening is quite bright and fresh - along the lines of how Shalimar upend bright (to me at least?) .... and in the same vein, deepens and becomes more rich, spicy & sultry w/in an hour .... and remains warm & spicy over its time - right up to the ending ... which is still discernable (on me) a good 4 hours - which IS RARE on MY skin. I'm CURSED to have skin that sucks up every molecule of most every frag as if ravenous & leaves me scent-less within a matter of a few measly hours. I've NO IDEA WHY scents just DON'T LAST on me at all compared to others but suffice it to say, if/when I fall in love w/a pricey frag, it's a bittersweet experience: might LUV a scent (like earliest releases of Molinard Habanita or Guerlain Fleur de Feu), but it's a gut-punch to the wallet for THIS needer of frequent reapplications :( THIS vintage is nicely blended, cozy & warm and NOT what I personally would correlate as an authentic vintage. I almost never find vintages to have what many correlate as "old lady" smelling, but I CAN understand what is referenced by such verbiage at times. I'd NOT classify Djer Kiss as such a scent. If you are a fan of spicy chypres & Orientals, then you MUST hunt a bottle of this parfum. You WILL NOT REGRET the purchase! On the other hand: I've also a splash bottle of Djer Kiss Toilet Water my Aunt wrote (in marker) on the bottle "1948 Rexall Drug, Islip, NY". The scent of the parfum IS present for certain. However - and this may well be due to the fact I typically (very) rarely use less than Eau de Parfum formulations - the scent is non detectable within n hour on me (this is a problem I have with MOST lesser formulations 😔) and the EDT never seemed to quite get down to the level of cozy richness as does the parfum. Apologies I cannot speak on the notes here. I just wanted to leave SOMETHING about this parfum in case anybody was looking for SOMETHING on it maybe if came cross this scent while on the hunting journey themselves ;) In a nutshell: it's DEF a spicy Kiss this one ! A crisp, refreshing spicy lady whom grows deeper, richer & more cozy w/the hours & which WILL be prsent w/you for several hours. My mom told me she still smelled it on her skin in the morning .... AFTER I had sprites her to try at ~6pm the evening prior. Perhaps THAT longevity speaks to more of the average wearer's ability? Ima picky fraghead I suppose when it comes to rating a frag, (lol) but that is because I build a certain factor into my rating system: that being cost. If I like a frag & want to rate it high, would the cost to replenish a supply of it be justified? THAT ALL being said? On a scale of lowest to highest being 1-10, Kerkoff Djer Kiss gets a 7 from me. I'd prolly give it an 8-8.5, but a quick eBay search for the pure parfum TODAY seems 2b over $100 for 1⁄2ounce and only 2 available. If u love a great vintage? DO hunt a bottle! You'll NOT be disappointed!

It's dated, but you can see why this was a crowd-pleaser and used as a face powder scent. The bottle I used was sealed for close to a century before I was able to unfuse the stopper. Thankfully it has been pretty perfectly preserved. It's the same bottle style from the other review and, from my research, that style of bottle dates to 1930. So just shy of 100 years. As for the formula and performance, I got 4 hours from it, with good projection. (I think most people nowadays are so saturated with perfumes that they have become noseblind and don't know how much perfume is enough. No one is supposed to smell perfume unless they're within two-three feet of you. It's not supposed to announce your presence from afar or stick in your nose or mouth long after. That's just rude.) This scent is detectable from a few feet for a couple hours before wearing down to a skin scent that will last through a shower - a hallmark of synthetics. Thankfully, the early synthetics used here aren't toxic or overwhelming. They likely will not offend anyone. I notice coumarin, but mostly the base and drydown is mostly amber. The entire composition is nicely blended, making it difficult to pick out certain notes. However, this is a pretty linear honeysuckle/amber blend. It retains that scent pretty much the entire time. I'm unsure which synthetic would be responsible for the honeysuckle/ever so slight jasmine note. This is predominantly composed of natural sources however, and comes across as a very sweet, gentle scent. It does very much remind me of the original Moonwind by Avon (less woody), but perhaps another few of their perfumes from the 40s-60s. Perhaps Occur! or Rapture. Personally, I don't detect the wood notes. Wood notes are my favorite base, especially genuine sandalwood (santalum album) and douglas fir resin. If wood notes are present here, they are either very minimal or they are so well blended into the base that I can't pick them out. I agree with the oriental category, however it does seem to lack any spice notes except for the immediate rush of top notes that disappear almost immediately. As for the style, it's a bit dated in that it triggers olfactory memories of antique shops and grandma's attic. If you can get past that and appreciate the creation for what it is, you'll probably like it. It's not ground-breaking or very memorable, but you can see why it was an American standard for so long. By the 1920s Kerkoff's beautiful watercolor fantasy ads for Djer-Kiss (pronounced "dear kiss" apparently!) were firmly entrenched in most women's magazines across the English-speaking world. For women who couldn't buy Chanel, but didn't want rosewater from the drugstore, this was a nice middle ground. Since Kerkoff was a Paris-based company, it allowed women to afford real french perfume. At least that's my understanding of it.