Accord Chic

My Perfect Iris. I am so enamored by this scent. It stole my heart from the very first moment I sampled it, so I went online and ordered two bottles straight away. This is unlike any iris scent I've ever smelled before in that it's not at all too sweet, for one, and this scent is also a little different to your usual run-of-the-mill iris scent because it contains zero noticeable rose or violet notes - as far as I can tell. I have never smelled NU by YSL, though it's been in my wish list for an eternity, I have still not procured a bottle from the great, stinky cosmos. Therefore I cannot make any comparisons with that, but if that smells half as good as this, or if this smells half as good as that, it really can't be half bad. So I'll keep dreaming of owning that, while in the meantime remaining happy enough that I have this. This is green. It's almost transparent. It's at once a thick, translucent, indolic, heady floral and at the same time mellow, light and green, almost invisible to the naked nose. The only thing like this that I have ever smelled is a staple in my facial cleansing routine - Ultrabland by LUSH, which also contains iris. My best friend smelled "red berries" here, and it came as a shock to me that the official paper writeup about this made mention of berries while I could find no other indication of said berries mentioned anywhere on the Yves Rocher site, nor in the notes here! This is natural smelling. 100%. This is the real deal for me. It makes me foam at the mouth. Lasting power is impressive and projection is a warm, fuzzy, intimate caress.

I love Yves Rocher cosmetics and toiletries, and I've also enjoyed quite a few of their fragrances. I must stress that their scents can be rather uneven in terms of projection and longevity; namely, some of them are quite fleeting, however, there are also some collections that are very well made and offer great silage and longevity, while remaining very affordable. I recommend their collections Secrets d’Essences, So Elixir and Monoi for the best price-performance ratio. Accord Chic is one of the latest additions to the Secrets d’Essences line. As its name suggests, it is très chic - a beautiful and elegant fresh-balsamic everyday scent. There is nothing loud, tacky, sweet, fruity or bubblegummy about this fragrance; it is the olfactory equivalent of neutral colours and of understated elegance in general. On my skin it opens fresh-spicy, with pink pepper as the dominant note, supported by resins. A soft iris note adds just a touch of powderiness, however the overall impression remains fresh-balmy. Unlike other reviewers, I don't get any prominent smoky components (and, believe me, I know my smoke-bombs, having worn MFK Absolue Pour Le Soir and Guerlain Shalimar extensively!) To me, Accord Chic smells quite Chanelesque, somewhere between the balsamic goodness of Coco Noir and the peppery sparkliness of Chance. Moreover, Accord Chic does not fall too far behind Coco Noir or Chance in terms of performance, yet I only paid 20 euros for a 50ml bottle, which is really a bargain. I will be wearing this beauty quite a lot during the long summer months.

Okay, then I want to pull together my bad English and try a decent review on Accord Chic: This is a beautiful autumnal fragrance - if it had a color, it would be silver gray with sparkling golden spots. If it were a mood, it would be a break after a soothing bath with mild bathing foam. And then you would be well rested to go to work, realize your goals in serene grace. In warm air or on warm skin it is balsamic and creamy with a little sweetness, in cooler air it becomes more powdery with a more pronounced iris note. It is really chic and also one of my perfect iris scents (as the reviewer chimidoro said), airy, earthy and soothing, it has a meditative atmosphere. But beware: the scent needs some respect. Coincidentally, I was wearing Accord chic today when I tested Gucci Bloom on the other arm, and in contrast to the creamy floral scent, Accord chic became totally unfamiliar, like incense, and reminded me of Catholic churches. After all: like high-quality incense sticks, by the way. I think it's that kind of scent that you have to get involved with if you want to get to know it properly. All in all a nice, adult fragrance, soothing and not like too many other perfumes on the market. Very elegant, I understand the comparison to older Guerlains. And as dear Ladylva said, it's totally unisex - but it melts on the skin in a way, that it becomes feminine on mine. So for me it's a great deal and I grab it at days, when I cannot stand to much sweetness. Thank you for your helpful reviews.

This has become a stable go-to fragrance for me since I got it two months ago - one that I know I can always reach for when I'm on my way out and have to make a quick decision on which fragrance to wear. (At least in the autumn/winter weather we have had - and I would guess that these are the best seasons for wearing it*). It's balmy, resinous, semi-warm, and just creates this comfortable good-smelling aura around me then I wear it. It lasts most of the day on me, and while I enjoy it all the way through, I just think it gets better and better through the different stages. The opening is powdery - a bit starchy iris, which together with the resins results in a powdery-creamy make up smelling accord. As it dries down, the balsamic sweetness becomes more apparent, and the overall feeling gets a bit warmer, and the starchy-ness fades away. But these are nuances - the scent doesn't change hugely. It's important to say that it's not a loud scent, and I call it semi-warm because it maintains a certain powdery lightness and spicy-freshness (from the elemi and pink pepper). I would actually categorize it as a my-skin-but-better fragrance. I find that Accord Chic fits nicely into the the Secrets d'Essences line from Yves Rocher, which I percieve as high quality fragrances for a low price, well made, good smelling, and easy to wear. *Edit: It's equally great in spring!

I sprayed this after showering this evening. Instant love. This is VERY good - it's spicy and unusual (in the sense that it bucks the sweet fruitchouli trend. I am not being negative, snobbish or disparaging about scents like LVEB, Flowerbomb etc. - I have flankers of the original fragrances and love them). Chic Accord smells expensive and I think it's unisex, despite being marketed as a woman's perfume; it could easily be worn by a man and I think that Yves Rocher have missed out on a wider market by not marketing it as such. It reminds me a little of SJP Stash, DK Black Cashmere and TM A*Men, all of which I love and wear. I'm not suggesting that Chic Accord smells like any of them, but it has that sort of vibe. If anything, I think Stash and A*Men smell a bit sweeter. Highly recommended for lovers of warm, woody, spicy oriental scents AND it is a bargain for its price. Sillage moderate - not sure on longevity yet, but I suspect this will be very good, especially on clothing.