In a minute there is time / For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

INeKE Field Notes From Paris

I'm back in Portland. I've been back six days, but immediately collapsed into a chest infection celebrating the shift in weather and the seventeen straight hours of driving it took to get me here. I'm still unpacking my car, slowly, so I apologize for being behind on reviews.


Luckily, today's mail came with a solution. Amidst the bills and letters and flyers and other detritus was a package from INeKE. I've spoken at length about how much I enjoy the creations of San Francisco, California-based perfumer Ineke Rühland, so I was thrilled to my toes when I received a sample of her newest creation Field Notes From Paris.

The beautiful packaging, which references T. S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," saying the scent "is inspired by Ineke's halcyon days studying perfumery in Paris and Versailles." A "woody Oriental," Field Notes from Paris "captures the romantic, nostalgic feeling of sitting at a cafe and writing in a journal while lingering from hours over a cafe creme." The notes are listed as top notes of coriander seed, orange flower, and bergamont; middle notes of tobacco flower & leaf, patchouli, cedar, and bottom notes of tonka bean, leather, beeswax, and vanilla.

Field Notes from Paris is a truly lovely mix. On application the orange flower and bergamont hit the nose first, but within five minutes the middle notes jump in as well as the tonka bean and vanilla, creating a tango of sweet, smokey, woody deliciousness. I can't decide if I want to nuzzle the scent or lick my arm because it manages to be both cozy and delicious. I love that there is citrus playing into this because it creates a sophisticated and unique mixture and creates a much classier citrus smell than you usually get. This is truly lovely, a great scent for fall, and would work well for a man or a woman.

When I think of Eliot and the woman he cannot confess his love to, throwing a shawl over a lamp or turning to or away from him, when I think of the long and lonely walk home after while he rationalizes his own cowardice, I can imagine this scent clinging to hunched shoulders, floating through his memory of the friendly embraced they shared on his way out. A lovely scent for the contemplation, not of love lost, but love never quite begun. A longing that hangs in the air, like the last unresolved note of a mournful song. It is Nina Simone in "You Can Have Him." It's Bogart and Bacall in "Casabalanca." It is Prufrock and his angst. It is sweet and bitter like orange rind and smoke drenched jackets and the one that got away.

Available in a 75 ml for $88 direct from the perfumer. Also, I've said it before, but it's worth noting again: the beautifully made sample box of six 1.5ml sprayers for $25, which can be applied towards the purchase of any of the scent bottles is an incredible gift, either for yourself or someone else who likes perfume. It's definitely some of the best money I've spent, perfume wise, because you get such a lovely variety of scents. I highly recommend it.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
- "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," T. S. Eliot

Want more reviews? Try...
~ review from Perfume of Life
~ review from Pink Sith

For my reviews of other INeKE creations, you can find them here: After My Own Heart, Balmy Days & Sundays, Chemical Bonding, Derring Do, and Evening Edged in Gold.