Photo: Tama Blough
It seems sometimes that having an enthusiasm that is slightly off the beaten path can create a sense of isolation. We sit surrounded by the objects of our desire and wonder if we are alone in the world. Thank heaven for the miracle of the internet! It has brought people of all stripes together into communities heretofore thought unimaginable.
Diego Rivera created a series of murals for the San Francisco Institute of Art
So it is for those of us who love perfume. Thanks to blogs, facebook, online forums and the like, perfumistas have created a worldwide community, and frequently strike up online friendships that are very close. But as fun and heartwarming as online friendships are, there is still nothing like meeting (and smelling!) your virtual friends in person.
A couple of years ago I decided to put out the call for Bay Area people interested in joining me for a day of sniffing, and the SF Sniff was born. It has been a marvelous opportunity to bring perfume collectors together – I have had participants from Canada, Santa Barbara, Portland, and New Orleans along with locals. Each event has been interesting and along the way, I have made wonderful new friends. I have had the good fortune to strike up acquaintanceships with a few local perfumers, who have shared their art with us. On October 15th, the 4th semi-annual Sniff took place.
The day started with a presentation by Ineke Ruhland. Already the successful creator of an eponymous line of fragrances, she recently introduced the Floral Curiosities line at Anthropologie, and was happy to share them with us. She explained the different accords she uses, and let us smell the finished product plus the individual accords
Photo:Tama Blough Ineke Ruehland and Scott
Ineke expressed that she enjoys talking to perfumistas, because we are genuinely interested in what she is doing. There were not many bottles of these delightful fragrances remaining on the shelves when we left. My eternal gratitude to Scott, the manager at Anthropologie, for allowing us to take over a display table on a busy Saturday.
Our group of about sixteen, with some new faces added to the usual mix, headed over to Barney’s. Barney’s has been very gracious to us from the beginning, often scheduling perfumers to come in for the day, and creating special gifts for us. This time was no exception, with a marvelous presentation by creative perfumer Yosh.
She sprayed her creations into small glasses, explaining that it gives a better impression of what the scent would be like on skin, and explained her artistic and intuitive thought processes behind each scent. The highlight was her presentation of her newest fragrance Sombre Negra, as yet unreleased at Barney’s. Using an adorable paper moustache on a stick as a testing strip, she gave us all a laugh, and more than one of us put our names down for a bottle of the glorious, sensually smoky scent.
There are no local stores carrying our final presenter’s line, so I had to improvise a meeting place. Fortunately, we had perfect weather and were able to meet indie perfumer Shelley Waddington of En Voyage Perfumes out in Yerba Buena Gardens. Some of us stopped to get a snack or beverage, and it was fun to get some fresh air along with the beautifully scented air created by Shelley’s perfumes.
This was Shelley’s first presentation, and she was received with admiration and open arms by the perfumistas. Most people there were unfamiliar with Shelley’s line, and everyone was impressed and happy to have been introduced to a talented new perfumer.
Downtown San Francisco has a pretty wide-ranging variety of perfume destinations, from the old-school offerings of Jacqueline Perfumers, to the high-end Chanel and Hermes boutiques, to the surprisingly intriguing perfume department at the iconic Gump’s, along with Neiman Marcus (and their full Guerlain boutique) and the small but mighty counter at Saks. We had a couple of hours until dinner, so we split up and roamed in smaller groups to make sure we had each smelled what we wanted to smell, and made our purchases.
Dinner was as much about swapping as it was about food. The six remaining diehards commandeered a table in the and got the stink-eye from neighboring diners as we dumped bag after bag of samples, decants, and bottles on the table and started rifling through.
One amazing Sniffer made little bags of samples divided by perfume genre to hand out, which we all thought was fantastic and generous. Never wanting to seem greedy, we nevertheless managed to empty the table without taking back anything we had brought.
New friendships were forged, old bonds strengthened, we smelled good, and were exhausted. Our noses could take no more punishment, so we staggered home, to build up our strength to get together again in the spring.
We have an amazing draw for you! Three winners will win one of three prizes:
A sample set of Ineke’s Floral Curiosities line
Generous samples of En Voyage Peche Noir and Carmel Boheme
A huge bag of beauty , skin care and perfume treats courtesy of Barney’s.
Leave us a comment telling us about your experiences meeting other perfumistas, or a perfumer you would love to see give a presentation. Draw ends October 25, 2011
We announce the winners only on site and on our Facebook page, so Like Cafleurebon and use our RSS option…or your dream prize will be just spilt perfume