La Haute Route

In my ever-growing disenchantment with the state of fragrance-related social media content, I am finding refuge lately in opting out of it as much as I can. What was once a vice with nicely-molded seat for my posterior now seems more like a thorn in my side by the day. The ever increasing swirl of carousel posts with vacant LLM-generated text, Claude-takes, Gemini dumps, spon con, smell slop, performative drivel, rage-bait; I am fatigued from pretending to care about so much of this artless and shallow parade. I just feel fortunate for the few of you who actually read what I put down, because that is what is really all about for me. The most rewarding part of this is that connection I have with the readers. I save the kind notes that many of you have sent to me and I go back to them now and then when I am feeling a little blue. Sometimes I think all I need are you who read and the perfume, and that is enough. While wearing the enchanting La Haute Route ("The High Road") this week, the reflection I felt almost took me back to when perfume exploration felt like new frontier and the noise surrounding it felt more...sincere. I could almost feel the tinging sensation before the calluses formed. Perfumer Isabelle Michaud channels fortitude and grit through the unconventional beauty of experiencing cold mountain air and the low-growing flora above the tree line. Armoise, wintergreen, and menthol feels frosty, and there's just a bit of that trigeminal sensation (what makes our nerve sense "cool"). This leads to a stoic incense accord, somewhat woody and stark, as if cleansing the air in a time-worn cabin at this high elevation, where I meditate. I meditate. This is what I need right now, this High Road, this place elsewhere, to find myself again, to find what really matters most, to restore my vision, as it were. Perfume, in spite of it all, still inspires.

Very unique and interesting fragrance. Fresh and crisp in the opening, and dries down into woody, smoky incense. Leans a bit more masculine. Definitely a well crafted fragrance, but not really for me. It reminds me of an old musty wood cabin. Although I find it unique and interesting, I don't want to smell like musty wood all day. Performance is very good. Scent - 7/10 Performance - 7/10

The opening of wintergreen is really nice and invigorating. As it dries down it transitions beautifully to woody incense. I love a good incense fragrance!