Mona di Orio Domaine courtesy of the brand
Maison Mona Di Orio Creative Director Jeroen Oude Sogtoen and in-house perfumer Fredrik Dalman have created a most affecting homage to the late Master Perfumer Edmond Roudnitska and his famed laboratory which opened in 1946 – initially named Art & Parfums, it continues the tradition today under the appellation Accords.
Photo of Mona di Orio with Edmond Roudnitska July 1987, the first meeting when she was only 18 years old, courtesy of the family of Mona di Orio©
Their new Mona di Orio release, Domaine – is truly a Scented Skein which binds Monsieur Roudnitska, the late Mona Di Orio, and perfumer Fredrik Dalman to one another in a marvelously lyrical manner: via olfaction, history and tutelage. Perched high in the Alpes-Maritimes, in the picturesque village of Cabris – Monsieur Roudnitska’s Domaine Sainte Blanche is where Mona spent fifteen years in apprenticeship with the master, and Fredrik received his first briefs as a junior perfumer. Of La Domaine, Edmond Roudnitska engraved in stone: “Je ferai fleurir les pierres et chanter les oiseaux” – “I shall make the stones flower and the birds sing”. And that he did.
Michel Roudnitska’s photo of his father’s garden in Cabris courtesy of Michel Roudnitska©
Mssr. Roudnitska’s immortal 1956 creation Diorissimo is the reigning paragon of photorealistic lily-of-the-valley (muguet) as most of us know it: melodic freshness, crisp and ever-vernal in its floral verdancy. It captures a delicately animalic note, the moist forest floor, stemminess. Mona di Orio Domaine presents us with a very different visage, as viewed through a gauzy romantic lens – that of The Dream Lily.
Fredrik Dalman courtesy of Maison Mona Di Orio
Fredrik Dalman has composed a hauntingly musky muguet seemingly fashioned of palest angel skin coral or the celadon-glazed ceramics which originated in China during the Han dynasty (206 BCE- 220 CE). Quite simply, the perfumer’s lily floats effortlessly, a fragrant nebula of tenderness which lingers on the flesh much as the memory of a skilled and thoughtful lover’s caress will. Perfectly rounded, ethereal and pastel-hued, Domaine embodies the odor of ineffable compassion; if kindness were a perfume, this is how it would smell.
Muguet via Mona Di Orio Instagram
Mona di Orio Domaine is velvety, weightless and gracefully persistent: it clings closely and for considerable duration. Periodically, it will gently waft into your olfactory orbit unannounced – just when you thought that it had faded. When sprayed on cloth, it is long-lived – and because the jus is limpidly transparent, it’s not likely to stain most hardy fabrics. Fredrik Dalman’s coup lies in his ability to straddle the tightrope between innocence and carnal knowingness – which contributes to Domaine’s appeal. That sensuous ambiguity is conveyed with refinement as well as dignity, and is part of its charm.
In the words of Matsuo Basho: haru kaze ni / fukidashi warau / hana mogana
A Spring breeze is blowing
I’m bursting with laughter
— wishing for flowers ~ Spring, 1668
Notes: lily of the valley accord, expansive soft musks, perceived woody notes (no notes listed)
Bottle gifted me by Mona do Orio – many thanks! I will cherish it. My nose is my own…
~ Ida Meister, Deputy and Natural Perfumery Editor
Mona Di Orio Domaine via Instagram
Thanks to the magnanimity of Maison Mona Di Orio, we have a 100 ml bottle of Mona di Orio Domaine for one registered reader in the EU, USA or Canada. You must register here or your comment will not count. To be eligible, please let us know what you enjoyed most about Ida’s review of Mona Di Orio Domaine, and where you live. Draw closes 2/22/2023
Mona Di Orio Domaine and Mona di Orio Perfumes are sold on their official website
Available in the USA at Luckyscent.com
Please read Michelyn’s interview with Mona di Orio here
Maison Mona Di Orio Creative Director Jeroen Oude Sogtoen and in-house perfumer Fredrik Dalman via Mona Di Orio
Michelyn’s Interview with Fredrik Dalman here
Michelyn’s article with Creative Director Jeroen Oude Sogtoen here
Michel Roudnitska’s essay on his father and Diorrissimo here
Mark Behnke of Colognoisseur and Editor-in-Chief Michelyn Camen’s Perfumer Signature: Edmond Roudnitska (a 2018 Perfumed Plume Finalist) and their Perfume Signature article on the late Mona di Orio.
Mona di Orio Domaine is the first perfume for the house since the Alinea Collection, reviewed by Ida Meister here
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