Beaut'Air

Beaut’Air is a rare truly unique fragrance. The way the ozone and linen notes interpret is stunning. As someone who is repelled by conventional scented laundry products and for whom the statement “it smells like fresh laundry” is potentially a red flag, the way Christina Christie conveyed the feeling of fresh white sheets billowing on a clothesline, sparkling, cleansing sunshine, and the hope and joy that spring and summer can bring is masterful. For a perfume so fresh and clean, the longevity, sillage, and overall performance is really impressive. Beaut’Air sticks around. It’s one of my most treasured bottles in my collection. I can’t stress enough how unique it is, without leaning on intensity or shock value to accomplish this.

Sampling the latest release from Parfums Quartana, Beaut’air (from earlier this year), a fitting portmanteau of a name for the scent’s aims at a beautiful airy scent, a bit of a cross between fresh laundry and the great outdoors, with notes of linden blossom, rose, pepper, mixed woods, and a curious note of soil that grounds (literally?) the fragrance a bit from its brightest aspects. It leans clean but feels like a good balance between fantasy and reality, quite pleasant yet also with plenty of nuance and intrigue. It’s not my favorite of the recent releases but I like how it adds diversity to the house and certainly is a bit of a floral, airy departure from the other recent offerings. Beaut’air is EDP concentration, sold via the house site and great boutiques like Perfumology, and is priced at $215 for 50ml, similar to the other recent releases in the past two years. 7 out of 10

The last of my Quartana samples brings me to Beaut’Air: a soft green floral, with a comforting cashmere-style musk. There’s something certainly calming about this scent, it’s so gentle and subtle and yet envelops you in its presence. The bright sparkle of linden blossom is present, but flattened and made pillowy by a gentle powdery iris, airy musk and a captivating delicate fizzy nuance. It smells like an ambrette-focused perfume, yet isn’t listed at all. However, this linen accord may well be made up of some similar kind of musk. It smells very much like those comforting musks which scratch your brain in just the right way, as Another 13 is famed for. But this is different, quite possibly my favourite from the house

A lovely fragrance. At first it is giving me a very floral, light extremely feminine vibe, which I didn’t care for. After about an hour it settles into a very “salty, marine over floral” vibe, very lovely but light. I was expecting more projection from this, but it’s just not there on my skin. This will be a pass for me; it’s too feminine, too light and a very close to skin scent for my preferences. But it is a beautiful scent. Two more samples to try. I’m hoping for better projection from the other two.

This is beautiful. Not something I'd normality reach for, but I'm so glad I grabbed a sample of this. Clean but not a chemical assault on the senses. Truly airy and bright, and perfectly unisex.

So, let me start off by saying I dearly wanted to love this one. However, after trying it twice, there is a note that develops that causes me to gag. It’s not quite as bad as YSL Libre dying animal sweat bad, but it does turn my stomach and take it from interesting and airy to nauseating. I wish I knew what the ingredient was that I can smell that causes this so I can avoid it ! Because of this, not a blind buy. I do however LOVE, and I mean LOVE WOLFSBANE. The rest of their flower scents just kinda smell all the same to me and don’t really stand out or smell delicious or unique enough. Just a peppery herbal and that’s about it, which is why I was so disappointed that this one turned so yucky with my body chemistry. Try before you buy a full size!

A mix between an airy laundry scent and lemony cleaning products.

Another scent from perfumer Christina Christie. I collect by perfumer and although she has a tenure in the industry I couldn’t find any other perfumer work beyond Quartana and one piece for a winery. Her first Quartana fragrance, Soleil Invisible, was a pass for me. This was after many samplings and discussions with other collectors on their thoughts. They all passed as well and I sadly get it go as one of the first Quartana offerings I was not interested in owning. I was hoping Celine Barel would have created Soleil after her ethereal work on Forest of the Golden Dream. Barel is incredible at creating environments through fragrance. It’s possible my expectation put unfair pressure on the reality. With Beaut’Air I felt a similar DNA as Soleil. Pepper, orris, rose, Guaiac wood potentially? But enjoyed it in this new arrangement. The feel is a nucleus of clean skin, almost soapy but not quite. The edges are subtle and I do find it develops into a creamy well blended scent. There is a dimension, energy and maybe a ‘weight’ that is missing between the description of a ‘breath of life’ and the delivery. But the discrepancy between the description of Soleil and the delivery was far wider for me. Maybe I’m enjoying or understanding her work more with this second creation. I own a bottle this time around. Although it was a gift from the niche perfumery where I work. I layer it with other fragrances to give them a fresh skin base. And also enjoy it as a scent to sleep in. I’ve been collecting a long while but not long enough to say I’ve been following a perfumer since the beginning. I think I’ll start with this perfumer. I’m curious to see what she does next.

Im 10 mins in and so far the soil is coming through very strongly and dampening the fragrance for me, the soil plus the lemon smells like a fresh compost or sticky dank weed on me which is interesting but ideally I hope this settles down into an herbal soap situation