If you’re a music fan you are well aware of the phenomenon of “finding” lost recordings of musicians. Sometimes they are the self-financed independent recordings of a new popular artist. More often it is music of a recently deceased or no longer recording star and is a cynical money grab by the record label. The great majority of these “lost” recordings should have stayed lost as they are rarely good music. At best they offer a glimpse of the creative process as you sometimes see the early glimmers of what the artist will become. It is this aspect which I find most interesting as even the artists themselves might not realize they are taking the path that will lead to success at the time of the recording. While this is common in the music business we now have an example in the perfume business as A Lab On Fire releases Sweet Dreams 2003.

The artist having his “lost” fragrance unearthed is Thierry Wasser. M. Wasser has been the handpicked, by Jean-Paul Guerlain, in-house perfumer at Guerlain since 2008 and in my estimation has done a very commendable job with this highly scrutinized position. In 2003 he was five years away from elevating himself to this position and he was very early in his career with Christian Dior Addict perhaps his biggest success up to that point. He made a fragrance for S-Perfumes called SLOTH as part of their “Seven Deadly Sins” series. SLOTH was an orange blossom fragrance that was cut with an earthy metallic quality as befit a fragrance meant to be more artistic than commercial. While he was working in Sacre Nobi’s shop he must have also worried that SLOTH was too full of contrasts and also created a safer modification. It is my conjecture that Sweet Dreams 2003 is that modification. In any case the official story via press release is Sweet Dreams 2003 was left behind when M. Wasser headed from New York to Paris. Now A Lab On Fire which is also under Sacre Nobi’s purview has released this “lost” perfume.

One of the themes M. Wasser has spoken of is his love of using bergamot in his creations and Sweet Dreams 2003 might be where he first came to understand how he would like to use it. Bergamot, petitgrain, and neroli are the opening. The press release says a Mediterranean beach was the inspiration and this trio of notes definitely pours the sunlight in to the opening stages. A light application of jasmine is all there is in the heart and is the bridge to a base of amber and musk which again are kept light and create a gentle accord of sun-warmed skin. The whole construction is light and airy almost like that pleasant dream you try to remember upon waking only to have it slip away. Sweet Dreams 2003 is an ethereal light-filled fragrance.

Sweet Dreams 2003 has below average longevity and below average sillage.

Sweet Dreams 2003 is a pleasant fragrance perfect for a day at the beach or a noontime stroll. M. Wasser would re-visit many of the themes on display here and create a much better version in the 2010 release, for Guerlain, La Cologne du Parfumeur. Like all “lost” pieces of art Sweet Dreams 2003 is more interesting as a window of what will be instead of standing on its own.

Disclosure: This review was based on a sample purchased from Surrender to Chance.

–Mark Behnke, Managing Editor