DSH Perfumes Re-Assess painting by Dawn©
From a nearby kitchen a maple and butter smell of pancakes on the griddle seeps through an open window while a serious voice intones about Haydn from a tinny transistor radio on the sill. Warm wood, dust and oiled metal of the carousel; burnt sugar candy and spilled popcorn along the boardwalk. Brushed cotton and a careless slap of Old Spice on everybody’s dad. Wet, mulchy earth and grass that has just been mown sinking into your skin as you and your friends roll down the hill over and over. The sky is dizzy, the bluest blue in the whole world, and the trees open their arms between you and heaven. The scents of our childhood linger deep until they become part of our very fabric. Like movie stills, those fragrances are snapshots of precise moments of life past. They sleep in time and awake when you catch them again, thousands of miles, dreams, heartaches and minutes later.
Dawn Spencer Hurwitz via DSH Perfumes
Lovely, green DSH Perfumes Re-Assess encapsulates that time in childhood when a summer day could seem longer and more wonderful than a thousand birthdays. It was created as part of the Isolation/Meditation series that Award Winning Dawn Spencer Hurwitz started in 2020 as an artistic and personal response to the Covid pandemic.
image via pixaby
“Re-assess was designed just as we were heading into the Delta wave last year,” she explains. “For me, it was like remembering how I felt as a child in summertime, running in the grass and staring at blue skies. I wanted that feeling and I was re-assessing – not just how I was doing to deal with the next wave of covid, but also how I could find a little more time for joy, a moment that felt carefree and happy, and childlike. That’s what Re-Assess is for me: a scent of childhood, the outdoors, sunshine, grass stains, and a lovely, grounding, peaceful feeling from the vetiver.”
DSH Perfumes Re-Assess painting by Dawn©
The pigments for the art that accompanies DSH Perfumes Re-Assess reinforce the sensation of home and familiarity; they were made with plants from Spencer Hurwitz’s Garden and yard and spices from her kitchen: dandelion leaves, lemon balm, basil, turmeric, tea washes, and tea powder mixed with sugar water.
Despite an extensive list of components DSH Perfumes Re-Assess is cleanly constructed around key notes of galbanum, rose, violet, vetiver and hay. Spencer Hurwitz uses a light touch with all the ingredients, giving the composition airiness and expanse; the supporting notes breathe their way into the perfume serenely and in their own time. Dabbing it on, I can almost feel a day unfolding before me; there is bright bergamot, a spike of galbanum, grassy green tea and dried chamomile. It truly feels like early morning for a moment or two. Trotting up behind these top notes is dried hay, warm and crackly, the rooty aroma of turmeric. But it is all happening so tranquilly that I don’t notice the procession of notes the first few times I wear DSH Perfumes Re-Assess. And the sun is shining like it always used to.
Avenue in the Park of Schloss Kammer (1910) -Gustav Klimt
Reaching the heart of Re-Assess is like finding renewed hope. The perfumes changes direction slightly, becoming less energetic and overtly green and settling down into a warmer, more floral mode. Spencer Hurwitz uses two rose absolutes, which add a dimensional, cushiony center. Coupled with violet leaf, which I often think of as a mournful scent, the two flowers play off each for a while, swaying between warm and rosy and cool and velvety. Circling around them like a vine are tendrils of radiant young jasmine and a hint of earthier things to come as vetiver starts to peek through. I become aware that a light veneer of woodsy dust has settled on the composition, an effect, I believe, of turmeric mixing with violet leaf. It is an eloquent reminder that childhood, that scent memories, are of what was.
Blue Sky by Dawn©
But DSH Perfumes Re-Assess does not end on that plangent chord. In its ebbing moments, the fragrance settles into my skin leaving a redolence of crushed green leaves, sweet jasmine and tea. There is a cling of honey, mossy ground, and again, the quiet shadow of violet leaf. I am reminded of the Hundred Acre Wood and all that is both sad and lovely there, and the endless hopefulness of its inhabitants. As Eeyore says, “It never hurts to keep looking for sunshine.” Re-Assess nudges us gently and quite beautifully in its direction.
Notes: Ambrette Seed, amyris, Atlas cedarwood, bergamot, blue chamomile, Brazilian vetiver, Bulgarian rose otto, calendula co2, citrus oils, damask rose absolute, East Indian patchouli, frankincense co2 absolute, galbanum, grandiflorum jasmine, green oakmoss, green tea absolute, hay absolute, neroli, palma rosa, petitgrain, ruh khus, Tahitian lime, turmeric, violet leaf absolute, ylang Nosey Be.
Disclaimer: sample of DSH Perfumes Re-Assess kindly provided by DSH Perfumes. My opinions, as always, are my own.
This is a 100 percent botanical perfume
Lauryn Beer, Senior Editor
DSH Perfumes Re-Assess
Thanks to the generosity of DSH Perfumes, we have 10 ml Voile de Parfum of Re-Assess for one registered reader worldwide. To be eligible, please leave a comment saying what appeals to you about DSH Perfumes Re-Assess based on Lauryn’s review, what your favorite DSH Perfumes fragrance is and where you live. Draw closes 3/12/2022.
This is our Privacy and Draw Rules Policy.
Follow us on Instagram @cafleurebonofficial @elledebee @dshperfumes
We announce the winners only on our site and on our Facebook page, so “like” ÇaFleureBon and use our blog feed, or your dream prize will be just spilled perfume