Darren Alan Perfumes Songes à Fleurs- courtesy of the brand

 “To dream is to create beauty.” – Perfumer Darren Alan

 Welcoming the gentle warmth and vibrant colors of spring brings to mind the traditional ways we have celebrated renewal across the generations. In the early 1980s, the children in my neighborhood led the festivities of May Day by gathering wildflowers, weaving floral garlands, and setting up a Maypole (inevitably with the help of someone’s grandma or grandpa). The entire month of May was full of weaving May Baskets and leaving wildflower bouquets on doorsteps around the neighborhood. These were the days when children were largely unsupervised and romped through streets at will. While today’s parenting is much safer, remembering and celebrating these classic traditions is great fun, the new fragrance by artisanal perfumer Darren Alan captures the free-wheeling spirit, gentle sunshine, and floral generosity of my GenX youth. Darren Alan Perfumes Songes à Fleurs is a perfect fit for the spring season.

spring flowers, wiki

Darren Alan Perfumes Songes à Fleurs opens with a joyous burst of sparkling aldehydes that bring to mind white linens hang-drying in the sun and the particularly bright twinkle of newly unfrozen spring waters. Sweet orange wraps a warm hug around the elegant bergamot note as tarragon and wormwood add sweet grass greenness and an anise bite to the blend. The complex beauty of geranium bourbon with its rosy undertones leads us to the beautiful floral heart of Songes à Fleurs.

 Darren Alan courtesy of the perfumer

Darren Alan is an American artisanal perfumer who has made a 7-year deep study of perfumery’s classical genres, including materials often used in classical perfumery. Darren brings these materials into his fragrances with an eye to vitality and modernity. Darren describes his Nouveau Vintage style as a kind of search: “if I were living and creating fragrances back in the Golden Age of Perfumery, what would my fragrances have smelled like back then?” Indeed, his fragrances express the discipline and materials of classic genres in an exuberant and vital form today. When I want to know what my cherished bottles of vintage perfume might have smelled like in their prime, I often look to Darren Alan’s creations for an idea of that elite craftsmanship and disciplined production. Darren also leverages contemporary knowledge and know-how, “it’s not just a matter of recreating fragrances in a vintage style, but also bringing my modern experience to the formula as well. This process gives my fragrances a vintage throwback while still feeling relevant to the modern nose.”

May pole via wiki

A soft and luminous floral accord brings springtime to life in the heart of Songes à Fleurs. This particular bouquet blends a fresh floral accord (lily of the valley, carnation, heliotrope) with a rich bouquet (rose, jasmine, gardenia, genet, orange blossom). Rose and jasmine lead this opulent cordon intertwining spicy carnation, green lily of the valley, and creamy gardenia. Heliotrope adds its delicately powdery vanilla and marzipan aspects with licorice edges. Genet (also known as broom) echoes the vanilla aspects of heliotrope and mirrors the heady floral facets of orange blossom. Altogether, this floral bouquet makes a refined abstract impression in such a fresh and vivacious way, in my opinion, not seen since the old-world masterpieces of Coty or Guerlain.

Into the dry down, Darren Alan Perfumes Songes à Fleurs reveals it’s vintage style with a classic amber accord that is warmly smooth and sweet. East Indian sandalwood further adds to the plush softness of this springtime jewel. A perfectly judged oakmoss note will delight any vintage fragrance fan and Darren’s reconstructed Mousse de Saxe accord is a resurrection of perfumery’s past glories. A vintage deer musk accord hints at spring yearnings. Songes à Fleurs is an extraordinary evocation of all the best parts of perfume history in a manner that is bursting with contemporary life. It is a call to get outside and soak up every second of spring sunshine we can.

Notes: aldehydes, sweet orange, bergamot, tarragon, wormwood, geranium bourbon, rose, jasmine, muguet, carnation, genet, heliotrope, gardenia, amber, East Indian sandalwood, Mousse de Saxe, vetiver, ambrette seed, vintage deer musk accord, oakmoss

A bottle of Songes à Fleurs was kindly gifted to me by Darren Alan Perfumes; opinions my own.

~ Rachel K. Ng, Senior Contributor

My review of Darren Alan Perfumes’ vintage style Chypre No 1 here and Jonquille here. Enjoy Darren Alan’s Profiles in American Perfumery

courtesy of the brand

Thanks to Darren Alan we have a 50 ml bottle of Songes à Fleurs for a registered ÇaFleureBon reader 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 quality comment on this site with what sparks your interest about Rachel’s review. Draw closes 4/4/2024

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