Frisson DʼHiver

A frisson is a shiver or thrill; it is what I often experience with certain scents. It's like that sensation that you experience when a piece of music of a sentimental song just moves you so. It is when goosebumps rise on your skin from the awe of a passage in a great novel or work of art. This rupture of emotion is often the seed of inspiration. Frisson d'Hiver, for example, is an example of a fragrance so singular in design, it somehow fulfilled its purpose for me. The chill is palpable in its opening, like a cool wind in a strange grove of trees with winter-blooming flowers. It's a blinding lustre of luminous white petals and sweet orange blossom flavored icing that leads to a cloudburst of childhood memories. It makes me feel just a bit sad of what once was, what I once was, some time ago, before the seismic shifts and knowledge collapsed under its own weight. It reminds me of the refuge of imagination, all the way down to its cloudy, blurry blue-gray musk.

the union of jasmine + orange blossom carry this whole frag for me. none of the florals notes are indolic or overpowering, instead everything is lightly dusted with ice shavings, cooled down, slowed down and projecting their scents at a very subtle sound level and encased in perfectly spherical floating water bubbles. kinda ideal then, that frisson d’hiver is definitely what a french laundry soap company would name their crisp icy scent detergent. clean, pretty and interesting floral. this one & sour diesel are the best offerings from serviette imo.

An absolute treat. Icy, sugar glass orange blossom. Then powdered and fuzzy, cozy white flowers. Really well balanced and never takes the turn to being too much as it develops.

Really interesting ice note with orange blossom in the opening, worth experiencing just for that. It’s an aquatic petrichor smell, but it really does read cold. Afterwards it settles into a more typical fruity musk with some vanilla, but the opening is very neat.

I came into a classroom and a kid said "Why does it smell like plants." I borderline love this perfume.

This is the collection’s ace in its sleeve, and the one that clearly carries the most wow-factor in the currency of sample kit first impressions. I found the gorgeously titled Frisson d’Hiver (trans. winter chill) underwhelmingly delicate on paper, but once worn on skin, sprung to life in tones of aching musks and sweet white florals. Lily of the valley, my professed favorite flower of all time, is given centerfold treatment, but it is not necessarily a soliflore. I pick up supporting notes of creamsicle orange blossom a-la the super-sunny masterpiece Fleurs d’Oranger, and a cool minerality described by Taylor as an ice accord. My own mentor Matt Morris noted this before me, but despite its name, this is a deeply summery perfume. To be fair, I have yet to have the chance to wear it on a freshly snowed morning a-la a similar delicate winter floral l’Eau d’Hiver, but today, in freakishly humid Chicago June days, it cools me down like a fresh popsicle hewn from little white flower buds. Underlying the floral notes is an almost milky vanilla effervescence that reminds me specifically of Milkis soft drinks: not super sweet but mellow and almost yoghurt-like. I truly don’t think I could ever get tired of wearing something like this. It’s simple but smart, and brings a smile to my face as surely as spring flowers sprout up from underneath the snow. Other potential references are the viscously underrated Labdanum 18 from Le Labo - which wears like a silken pair of opera gloves, and certainly feels like Maurice Roucel reprising the sensual warmth of Musc Ravageur without any of the spice. Between this and Clue’s Dandelion Butter, I’m beginning to notice a microtrend of DIY perfumers trying their hand at floral gourmands, a type of perfume actually exceedingly rare, despite itself. It is here that I see Trey’s confessed mentor, my friend and longtime NYC-based perfumer Marissa Zappas’ hand most clearly. I am reminded of a similar sort of whipped cream florality I get from her amazing Carnival of Souls. As someone who used to be fairly vocally critical of gourmand notes, I am actually really excited by these types of perfumes. I think a fragrance like Frisson d’Hiver is sweet and inviting, but contains enough complexity to sidestep the body spray allegations and justify its price point.

A shriek, a howl, a prolonged tee hee hee hee; a pause, a champagne hiccup, and everything shatters. A tinkling cackle pealing and slivering like weaponized bells, crystal blades that split and splinter the night. A lake that holds more stars than the sky ever dreamed of possessing - celestial sparklers, myriad, multiplying before your feet, even as your eyes glance upward noting their absence in the sky. What lake reflects what cannot be seen? What ghost swallows its own echo before sound can escape?Scent as the most terrifying Sailor Moon villain who never existed: pale as bone, bright as a blade, each breath is a fragment of a story where you are nothing more than a footnote. Merciless - all razor citrus and winter's exposed nerve. Each breath a weapon, each droplet a fragment flung from some terrible, glittering precipice. Mercy drowned long before you arrived. More stars than sky, more reflection than reality. You're not getting out of this alive.

The orange blossom in this is just perfect, that *smidge* of sunscreen so many of us adore (nostalgia?). This fragrance is so well balanced, a mix of pretty and NY main character in a bottle. I sampled this in the discovery kit, which I was very pleased with all 4 fragrances. I look forward to see what else Serviette puts out.

this is delicious. i've been looking for the perfect sunscreen scent for years, and in this delicate floral with the word winter in its name, i've found it.