Antonio Mora©
Sarah McCartney of 4160Tuesdays is one of my favorite perfumers to work with. So, it was a no brainer to ask her to return for her third perfume collaboration for CaFleureBon’s 10th Anniversary… 4160Tuesdays Dark Queen x CaFleureBon.
photo courtesy of Amazon© Faith Hunter
We began this project about a year ago when I realized there are very few animalic perfumes that I personally wear. I was also finishing up a book by Faith Hunter called Dark Queen, an urban fantasy series based on a character with a dual nature. Literally. The protagonist is named Jane Yellowrock and is a Cherokee Skinwalker– one of the very last, who witnessed the rape of her mother and murder of her father on the Trail of Tears when she was five years old. As the result of accidental black magic, she shares her body with the soul of a mountain lion, Beast.
Photo at Esxence 2019 of Michelyn (holding DSH Perfumes Colorado)© Jeffrey Paul
Dark Queen is Book 12 in the series (you can read the book online here) and after years of fighting against vampires she becomes the Enforcer to the Master Vampire of the City of New Orleans…and his Dark Queen. Jane is bad ass (like Sarah and sometimes like me). Her alter ego “Beast” is a predator, not for fun but to survive but also to protect Jane and those she loves. Beast has heightened senses including her sense of smell. I also thought creating a fragrance around this theme… would give a whole new meaning to the popular perfumista term “Beast Mode”. –Michelyn Camen, Editor-in Chief
Sarah McCartney of 4160Tuesdays
White Queen and Red Queen were both inspired by Alice in Wonderland, the all-powerful queens of the chess board in a mathematical land of logic and apparent nonsense. It’s a place where I’m really happy to work; an eccentric imaginary space, one with which I have a physical connection. I found out a few years ago that the house I lived in from age 11 to 18 was built in the actual Wonderland, the former rectory garden where Alice’s grandfather lived and was so happy I cried. So far no surprises.
For Dark Queen, Michelyn Camen wanted to take me far from this particular fantasy land into another territory, animalic but not white rabbits, dormice and mock turtles: more spirit animals, vampires, inner beasts, wolves and wildcats.
Michelyn asked me to read the book she had in mind, so I ordered it straight away, Dark Queen by Faith Hunter. Well then, this was so many miles away from my literary safe place that I almost fainted.
Dark Queen is very different from my normal perfumed playground, but I do love a challenge so I sought out and revisited materials that took me to the place we talked about in our transatlantic call; styrax and a particularly fruity oudh creation from Firmenich called out to me from the shadows. It had to belong in our Queen series, but instead of a Victorian English garden, it had to drop into the hot dark mysteries of modern New Orleans. I’ve been there, not for decades, but you never forget its feeling, so I aimed for that.
I wanted to make it smell of instinct, wild cat, courage, puma, loyalty, and magic. I don’t enjoy creating notes lists, but I know I must. It’s an animalic amber. Michelyn did not want an oudh, but you can use it without it taking over. It’s like putting rose in a woody fragrance; you use it to create richness not to take over.
Some notes then: Woods, tonka, forest fruits, wild animals, styrax, labdanum and musks.
I almost wanted to dislike it. I was telling myself, “but this isn’t me!” but it is; it’s just a part of me that I usually keep locked up in the basement. It’s a fragrance that made me dig down into areas that I didn’t want to explore. I developed it reluctantly, but I’m so glad I did. –Sarah McCartney of 4160Tuesdays
4160Tuesdays Dark Queen is an exclusive to Perfumology in Philadelphia.
photo by Nir Guy
Thanks to Nir Guy of Perfumology we have a draw for 50 ml of Dark Queen for a registered CafleureBon reader in THE USA ONLY (if you are not sure if you are registered click here (you must register on our site or your entry will be invalid). To be eligible please leave a comment with why you would want to win Dark Queen, if you have tried either Red Queen or White Queen. Draw closes 4/3/2020
$150 ml/$130 and 100 ml $180 quantities are limited.
Now is the time to support our independent perfume boutiques and perfumers. Please… our scented future might be at stake. Here is the link to Dark Queen at Perfumology here
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