Grasse and I have had a long term love affair.

It began years before I’d ever heard of Peter Mayle, or before it became tony.

I was a teenaged girl traveling on her own steam in the early ‘70’s.

I slept in barns with livestock, bathed in lakes and rivers.

I had long been obsessed with aroma, atmosphere, language, culture, and anything wild and untamed;

Provence, with its Roman vestiges and rocky terrain, its rich history and langue d’oc,

appealed to me.

I felt as if I had come home at last.

 

 

I loved a little pension named Paradis, which overlooked a very hilly landscape; from the windows I could smell the goats as they grazed, the wild thyme [serpolet], rosemary, marjoram they nibbled and trod underfoot… 

 

 

Daily wash hung out to dry, children laughing and playing in the stony gardens- and the city of Grasse right below me, unfolding like a carpet of greens, browns, peppered with riots of glorious blooms, scrubby lavender, palms, and the striking yellow of the occasional mimosa.

I would return, again and again, as if summoned by the Sirens.

 

 

Winsome Dawn describes her  DSH Perfumes Parfum de Grasse quite simply : A Hymn. And, in the full force of summer heat and humidity, it recalls my heart’s wild waiting for the mistral- Surrounded by the quintessential aromas of Grasse which filled me with a singular joy.  The phrase *floral chypre* /categorizes /it, but it doesn’t begin to reveal the seamless loveliness and abundance of which this fragrance sings to me. Like many chypres, we tickle the senses with bergamot up front; fortunate ones, we get neroli and mimosa , into the bargain. The heart is every bit THAT- plenitude of spicy carnation, voluptuousness of Rosa Centifolia, essential Jasmin de Grasse.

 

Orris concrete evokes those fields so loved by Van Gogh- his painting /Irises /[1889] materializes before me. Then comes beeswax.

 

 

If you want to add sweet expansiveness that makes love to your other materials, this would be it.

Like a mellifluous harmony, it marries these iconic florals of great beauty, adding its own honeyed, haylike fulsomeness in the process.

The base – bearing Brazilian vetiver, moss and sandalwood- anchors all and contributes an indelible earthiness and solidity that isn’t weighty in the least.

It’s a mysterious, deeply soothing subtext, like an underground stream.

 

 

I wear DSH Perfumes Parfum de Grasse with increasing frequency- whether to work (where it BETTER be good-or I’ll hear about it), or for myself alone….

To bed, at sunrise  Miss Pamina, my guinea pig, loves to nestle up in the cleavage where I lavish it . 

*(For the curious among us all, and the love of transparency: *
No,* my opinions can’t be purchased, /not for any price./ )
I buy, and use up- all my own bottles …) 

– Ida Meister, Senior Editor