Arpege Pour Homme

An Ars Poetica of Fragrance, in the Context of Lanvin’s Arpege Pour Homme As Virtual Boutonnière An iconic Olivier Pescheux floral gourmand, Arpege Pour Homme is a composition in soft, creamy pastels and watercolor notes, buoyant and serene; but beyond the illusions of its surfaces lies endless chasms of darkness. Exactly as I like things. This is my first choice of fragrance in what for myself is a special use category; to act as a virtual boutonniere and let me bring my home and the gardens it is set among into the world with me. The world in which I must live beyond the borders of my refuge is neither beautiful nor serene, and I need both to balance the flaws of our humanity and the brokenness of the world. Here perfume can help us in unique ways, for it immerses us in previous states of being and creates realities, dreams, illusions, and a Wilderness of Mirrors in which we dwell through our unique memories and sensory associations. Fragrances forge an interior space of being within our palace of memories, histories, and identities which we create like the shell of a fantastic sea creature, akin to what Gaston Bachelard called coquilles au parole or shells of speech. Fragrances also work their magic upon us as what Foucault called truth telling or parrhesia, for they bear the power to return to us our true selves in reflection and to reveal those truths immanent in nature and written in our flesh. Always there remains the struggle between the masks that others make for us and those we make for ourselves. This is the first revolution in which we all must fight; the struggle for ownership of ourselves. It is also a sacred calling in pursuit of truth, like all art. All of this lies within the realm of the senses and of fragrances, and one thing more; for fragrances are unbound by the limits of our form, ideas we each of us attach to the invisible molecules which surround us and provoke and disturb us in our ongoing creation of ourselves. Scents inform, motivate, and shape us, but we create through the stories we have lived how we perceive them and construct and assign human being, meaning, and value to our experience. This idea has many names in many systems of thought; Coleridge called it the Primary Imagination, and Jung constructed his idea of the Collective Unconscious on the frame of Coleridge’s philosophy, but the idea is as old and universal as the human capacity to wonder. These include ibn Arabi’s Alam al Mythal, the Bardo in Tibetan Buddhism, and the Logos in Greek philosophy, the Gospel of John, Plotinus, and Neo-Platonists like the novelist Iris Murdoch. Are we not the stories we tell about ourselves, to ourselves and to others? Fragrances as bearers of stories, memories, histories, and identities act as signs and metaphors within the dark mass of the Unseen of which our worlds are but shadows of our own design and making; herein doors open in the heavens, letting angels through, or devils. For myself, such imaginal figures are equally welcome; sometimes we must let our demons out to dance. As Umberto Eco teaches us in his studies On Beauty and On Ugliness, both the beautiful and the terrible can bring us rapture as exaltation and defilement, and seizures of power as reimagination and transformation of ourselves. Of art I ask only that it conveys an authentic human event and potentia in which I can share, though fragrance as an art specifically allows us to interrogate idealizations of masculine and feminine beauty free from the limits of our form. All art, and all truths, defile and exalt us. So for my ars poetica of fragrances; which brings us to my subject today, what is my ideal Garden which the semiotics of Arpege Pour Homme represents for me? This, friends, is the primary question of all perfumes and possibly of all art; what memories and feelings does it bring forth for you, what lived truths does it reveal and represent to you in your uniqueness? First, a universe utterly in balance, a chiaroscuro of warm and engulfing jasmine like the diaphanous embrace of the enormous mink coverlet on my bed in counterpoint with the remote and devastating ice queen of iris. This iris is not the glorious and liberating song of the Ice Queen in Frozen, but the speech of Galadriel on being offered the Ring of Power by Frodo; “All shall love me and despair!” In the balance with this we have jasmine; a narcotic, seductive echo of warm nights beyond the boundaries of the Forbidden and memories of glorious sins. This is the heart of Arpege Pour Homme, a Pandora’s Box which opens with the boldness of its peppery topnotes, temptations which capture our attention like the promise of a lover who declares that whatever you desire and now imagine, I can match it and bring you one step further beyond anything you have known or can now dream, as a sharp pepper and bitter orange versus sweet-spicy neroli and pimento. Heart notes unfold next, the ravishing silken jasmine-powdery iris accord mediated with suggestions of nutmeg and cinnamon hovering on the edge of awareness and layered within the Tango dance of South American yerba mate tea, exotic and intoxicating. A change in stress from the first to the second syllable in Spanish transforms the bitter herbal tea into the declarative, “I killed”; the Brazilian name for the tea, chimarrão, derives from the Spanish cimarrón, meaning brute or feral, which also describes the kind of dance offered us by the transgressive secret side of the delicate and refined Arpege Pour Homme. Behind the cloak of its gorgeous florals a matador lies in wait, fearless and robed in glittering beauty. In the final act the base notes present themselves, having like kabuki theatre stage handlers invisibly set the scene for the main characters who now bow offstage; a creamy vanilla in foreground, gourmand and aromatic like a vanilla liqueur within a bonbon, Tonka beans, hints of deeply resinous patchouli, and honeyed sandalwood. As to similar fragrances, Dior Homme famously recalls its iris heart as a top note versus orange, but Arpege has none of the lipstick associations of its near relative, and Dior Homme replaces the iris-jasmine heart with a rose-leather duet. My direct replacement and second choice in the category of virtual boutonniere is Guerlain’s vintage Apres l’Onde, a near-feminine floral with the singular redeeming quality of having no sweetness whatever. In summation; Arpege Pour Homme, now sadly out of production, is elegant, refined, with a fragile beauty which conceals a wildness without boundaries, and the courage to surrender to one’s own desires. Who could refuse, at least once, to try such a thing and discover where it might lead, and to what new truths? Antonio Banderas - Take the Lead https://youtu.be/6lAKlYTQVKY The Mirror of Galadriel https://youtu.be/WeQDTj1UllA The Poetics of Space, Gaston Bachelard https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13269.The_Poetics_of_Space?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=RB19bvuUls&rank=1 On Beauty: A History of a Western Idea, Umberto Eco https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/790594.On_Beauty?ref=nav_sb_ss_2_17 On Ugliness, Umberto Eco https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/520738.On_Ugliness?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=o7gr1mx4VT&rank=2 "Discourse and Truth" and "Parresia", Michel Foucault https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41591201-discourse-and-truth-and-parresia?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=5XUnEJ3Vig&rank=30 Coleridge’s Philosophy: The Logos As Unifying Principle, by Mary Ann Perkins https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1898852.Coleridge_s_Philosophy?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=P1bVqSKavy&rank=197 The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6454477-the-red-book?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=d9wXRI4nKC&rank=1 Luminous Emptiness: Understanding the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Francesca Fremantle https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/208126.Luminous_Emptiness The Sufi Path of Knowledge: Ibn Al-Arabi’s Metaphysics of Imagination, William C. Chittick https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/157129.The_Sufi_Path_of_Knowledge?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=hYN9Fn0JOq&rank=14 The Good Apprentice, Iris Murdoch https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/234069.The_Good_Apprentice?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=MH9tYaPkmz&rank=23 The Philosopher's Pupil, Iris Murdoch https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11238.The_Philosopher_s_Pupil?ref=nav_sb_ss_1_22 July 2024 Gardens at My Cottage, Dollhouse Park: a photographic album https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1434229447972378&type=3

Olivier Pescheux has created a gem with this offering! The opening is a wonderful combination (to my nose) of fresh-ground pink pepper, nice neroli (personally, I don't think too much), fresh-squeezed mandarin orange juice with some of the orange rind. Awesome! I absolutely love the top notes here - fantastic, masculine and rich but segueing into a powdery iris within a few minutes on the skin (this is a very particular scent in "where" you spray it.) I love Iris as a note and it blends beautifully with the Jasmine here - along with a dusting of nutmeg (but thankfully, not too much) or we would be heading towards a gourmand. The excellent vanilla, sandalwood and tonka bean drydown is a bit dusty (but another key note, patchouli, sharpens the finish - kudos to the brilliance of the perfumier...again, lifting and 'focusing' the scent). I, personally, don't feel this is uber-masculine throughout its development, and I could see this as borderline unisex at certain times (most notably, the powdery iris/floral middle) - but as an overall scent, it is firmly masculine for the full wearing. This bottle exudes class, sophistication and quality! Here is the key, going back to "where" to apply this. The top note of pink pepper fades pretty quickly on my skin. I actually loved it so much and, poof, it was gone in 10-15 minutes. So, leaving the 3 full sprays rubbed together on my inner wrists (now resonating the beautiful iris and jasmine dusted in nutmeg), I reapplied 2 full sprays to my shirt and...BAM - pink pepper that will stay with the neroli/orange notes for a while (still going at 45 minutes and should be there on clothes for a good couple of hours (much slower evolution in scent, for those of us who love to get the top and middle notes longer). One key, too, is that it does not turn nearly as powdery on my shirt, but you still get the nice iris/jasmine heart. The vanilla is there with the sandalwood, but the patchouli actually holds its own even more on fabric. When wearing this, I will probably apply at least 3 full sprays to my shirt, jacket, etc. to get the effect that Lanvin Arpege gave me today. It also lengthens longevity, as we all know, but it is retaining the notes that is key for me... I am extremely happy with this bottle of fragrance - Lanvin Arpege Pour Homme is very chic and, in my opinion, rather unique. It has similarities, but the pepper/iris accord along with the green patchouli mixed into the vanillic base makes this truly stand-out! My final score: 8.5+/10 and a strong recommendation! I also want to mention that I bought the 100ml EDT gift set with a 150ml all-over body shampoo and a 150ml after shave balm - for those of you who love this fragrance...get the full experience from shower to shave to the wonderful fragrance!

Lanvin is not known for beeing a great fragrance house nowadays but it's definitely one of the greatest for his history. Arpège, My Sin, Scandal, Rumer, are very important releases. Unfortunately I never smelled any of them. In the masculine isle, there's nothing groundbreaking and, the only one still available is the 97 Morillas creation simple called L'Homme. Basically 212 without the green cut grass. But in 2005, the same year of Dior Homme, Olivier Pescheux created a iris based scent for men, but for some reason, this became a shadow of the Dior and was discontinued a couple of years later. This starts off with a fresh mandarin note mixed with the iris. A bit sweet and fresh. Different from the Dior which starts more powdery. The structure is different and don't expect this as a similar experience rather a different side of a coin. This became more creamy and sweeter, and also more floral bit due to the added neroli. The drydown is more about tonka. Dior is woodier and drier, and the bergamot makes it more fresher in the opening. This is more about a creamy Tonka with a sweeter opening (not cloying neither a contemporary sweet bomb) and a slightly powdery and defined floral iris-neroli. Fantastic and remarkable, but overshadowed by the (superior) Dior Homme, which is a masterpiece and a must have, although, I think this is an example of a good iris scent and it's a pioneer of this genre along with Dior, so, for that reason, and because it's damn good, I recommend it, if you can find a bottle for a good price, like I did. Usually this one is not very pricey in the online second hand market and it's a great addition to your collection, so picked it up. Longevity is ok. I get a moderate projection and 6-8h of longevity. The quality of the composition is fantastic and the bottle is cool. There's nothing wrong about this scent, only that is discontinued a long time ago. But you can still find good deals on it. A pioneer of masculine iris based scents, and brother of Dior Homme with a different facet that needs more attention

A soft, seductive oriental... why discontinued? Why discontinue something like this? Arpège pour Homme is a wonderful soft oriental for men that is a mix of tonka bean, iris, pink pepper and vanilla... with touches of jasmine, sandalwood and amber in the base. It's so soft and sexy, I can't see anyone who wouldn't like it! Right from the beginning I get Mandarin Orange and Pink Pepper... followed by jasmine and settling into iris and tonka bean (a lot of tonka bean), before turning into a sandalwood & vanilla combination. I think it's innovative and unique enough to stand out from many of the male fragrances... it's sexy in an edible, yummy way (like you almost want to eat it)! When I wear this I think of one thing... smooth Jazz music! Imagine being in a blue-lit underground jazz bar with a smooth, cool sound playing in the background... a little Miles Davis perhaps? There's a guy sitting at his table, enjoying a cocktail with a female friend... the band keeps playing, never too loud. They are enjoying the company, the conversation, the soft mood, the unique atmosphere of the place... and I think this is a fragrance that would create that atmosphere. Some have said it's similar to Dior Homme ... well I would say there is a 60-70% similarity, but this is more "oriental" (it has more tonka bean and vanilla). Also the pink pepper makes a nice touch which wasn't in Dior Homme. The main difference is the leather that was in the Dior which is absent here. I actually find this one more similar to L'Instant de Guerlain pour Homme in the "soft oriental" category. A lovely, pleasurable and non-offensive, seductive fragrance. Why was this discontinued? We may never know. Smooth, soft and sexy. R.I.P. Arpège pour Homme !

Today was a good day - the rain fell in sheets, the wind blew ever so sweetly, and a gentle chill settled throughout the land...these are my truly favorite days. Often, in the wind and cold, I find myself looking for answers to questions I have held for nearly a decade and a half - most concern the meaning of life, love, and the curiosity of connection (to music, to scent, to people, to places, and so on). I spin through these questions and thoughts endlessly only to arrive where began - such frivolous toil! I chose a strong companion to aid me in this brief journey - Lanvin Aprege Pour Homme. This is another stunning beast in my collection - and one that is sadly discontinued... Well, it is very potent to start off with - a sharp citrus laid over the rich heart of spiced iris and nutmeg and the always present base of a thick, musky vanilla and honeyed amber. This is truly narcotic - I cannot smell myself enough and it brings me such resounding joy when I catch wafts of it in the air surrounding me....it is a gentle yet powerful beauty - much like the perfect woman (or man). I catch whiffs of a peppery iris now and again accented with a honeyed woods and resins - some of my favorite notes in gourmand fumes all playing a beautiful harmony. This fume takes me to the arms of the perfect lover I never had - it illicits extreme joy and profound loneliness - a truly unforgettable experience that I couldn't do without! May you all find the answers to your burning questions and may you have a true love to cozy up to on these cold, rainy days! Day 14 - The search for meaning Listening to: Agnes Obel - Under Giant Trees