Sarah Baker Velvet Vendetta, image via the brand
It’s no secret that I binge-wear my favourite perfumes from the cinematic universe of Sarah Baker. From Twin Peaks nostalgia to smoky film noirs and from glossy rom-coms to sun-drenched road movies, she’s got it all, and I wouldn’t miss a premiere for the world.
It’s hard to play favourites here, as every single one deserves a click on the “add to test wishlist” button, but I have to mention the recent peachy-hued romantic comedy of Pastel Rumours that played on repeat on my skin all summer long – a.k.a. the Vespa ride in slow motion, under skies filtered through a pink milkshake, and the Technicolor fruit thriller Peach’s Revenge – a sugar-rush crime of passion with a side of guava mystery that is NOT as light-hearted as one might think. My olfactive roleplaying wardrobe is richer because of my beloved autumnal James Bond-esque Tartan Cask, all smoke, leather, and brooding highlands an my life-long tuberose love affair has gained a new spark thanks to Flame and Fortune, the Thelma & Louise-esque speed chase, all wild hair, dust clouds, car keys still in the ignition, mescal bottle rolling somewhere under the passenger seat.
Sarah Baker, image via the brand
Unboxing a Sarah Baker fragrance is always a treat. From the perforated pull-tab on the outer sleeve that makes my Pavlovian reflexes wag their tail, to the tactile weight of that glossy orange cap, it’s a full-on sensory experience. It makes me wish I had long, pointy aesthetic nails just to do an ASMR tap-open for the delicious drama of it all. But this autumn a new vanilla chapter begins (that is anything BUT… vanilla, ahem!). Saddle up for a new take on some delicious cinematic drama, because we’re stepping into the western chapter of the saga and the air smells like gun powder and trouble. Someone just kicked open the saloon doors… and enter Velvet Vendetta – the most seductive outlaw to ever ride the vanilla plains. And she’s smooookin’ hot!
Margaux Le Paih-Guérin of Flair Paris, photo via the perfumer
And who better than Margaux Le Paih-Guérin of Flair Paris to cast the best ingredients in this new showdown? A visual thinker with a painter’s instinct, she infuses texture and light into her art, making her creations fluid, instinctive and deliciously unpredictable. Her love for contrasts and raw sensuality runs deep, and you can feel it here in full untamed & dangerous glory.
“The idea behind Velvet Vendetta was to dive deep into a dark, sensual, animalic vanilla, as if it were born in the Nevada desert at the end ofthe 19th century. The goal was to take people on a journey through a haze of tobacco ,bourbon, and smoke. Raw, untamed, and yet undeniably sexy. Go wild!” (Perfumer’s Notes)
Smoke& silence: Gunsmoke, Pink Pepper, Nutmeg, Dried Fruits
There’s a certain silence that belongs only to Western opening scenes: zooming in on those leather boots that lift the dust into the air, the wind sweeping across the empty road, the lonely tumbleweed drifting by, the half-broken sign creaking as it hits the pole as our hero enters the city. He raises the gun to the sky and fires, just to see if anything stirs around. The air thickens, smoky and tense, as the saloon doors swing open. Pull up a high chair, lean over the bar, grab a handful of honeyed dried fruits. The hat comes off, and a cascade of copper-red hair spills over her shoulders.
“What does a girl need to do – shoot somebody? – to get a drink and some snacks?” she smirks.
The Showdown: Forbidden Vanilla, Bourbon, Black Olive
The bartender pours without a word. A bowl of black olives and some salty crackers slide across the counter. She smiles “uuu, fancy, fancy” baring her teeth as she laughs. “Did I scare you, old boy?” She takes her bourbon neat, double – the kind that burns going down and doesn’t numb you, just makes you feel more alive for the pain.
She shrugs off her jacket, and her perfume slowly claims the room. She smells a bit sweet – but not the kind of sweet you bring home to meet your mother and bake cookies together. Forbidden vanilla. The shadow twin of everything you think you know: dark, narcotic, sensual, with the kind of subversive sweetness that makes respectable people confess their sins. And then sin again. And again. Think of a vanilla that’s been aged in old barrels, steeped in smoke, and hidden in dark places beneath dusty floors, with a feral, salty edge that keeps everything tense.
A cigarette’s red light burns in the darkness of the corner, and a long shadow comes to greet her, drawing near.
“You know, I’m not just passing through your town” she says. “I’m here for someone… something I encountered many years ago, in the desert. And I’ve got all the time in the world to wait.”
Sarah Baker Velvet Vendetta, image via the brand
Roll credits: Tobacco, deadwood, molasses, resins, black vanilla
Days later – or maybe weeks; for as we know, time moves differently in westerns – she’s out on the balcony, and the sun is setting. Tobacco smoke curls lazily from her hand-rolled cigarette, contemplative and thick. The night’s blue begins to slowly swallow the red line of the horizon, right where the desert ends and the air is thick with the scent of sun-bleached wood, the bones of trees that once stood tall, now markers of time’s indifferent march. Somewhere down the road, a church bell tolls once, and incense rises into the cooling air, resinous, amber-warm, like the promise of redemption you never asked for, but that somehow found its way back to you.
That’s when she feels it: that familiar weight in the air, heavier than smoke. He’s here, growing out of the shadows of the room behind her. The same presence she felt in the desert – the one she’s been chasing ever since. The one that left its mark on her skin and grew in her memory, with claws and teeth, until there was no other escape but to return and look for it again.
She doesn’t turn. She just exhales his scent wrapping around her. Black vanilla. The incense of a desert church. Warm molasses. Strange resins. Animalic and feral, yet so deeply human.
“Took you long enough” she whispers.
AI collage with Sarah Baker Velvet Vendetta by Nicoleta
I love vanillas. I love them in all the forms they come, from the sweet and fluffy to the dark and smoky. The syrupy, the toasted, the leathery, the indecent – they’re all on my shelves, all fighting for attention. This autumn, though, Sarah Baker Velvet Vendetta has them all silent, trembling in the corner of my shelf. Because this is one vanilla you don’t mess with! This is complex, weathered, touched by smoke and time and maybe by something a little dangerous, too. This is vanilla that’s seen things. Done things. Survived to tell the tale.
Margaux Le Paih-Guérin has composed a full cinematic arc – with character development, plot twists, and an architecture that feels alive on the skin, on each wear. There’s humor, danger, sensuality and that unmistakable Sarah Baker touch running through it all: playful, bold, sleek, artistic, self-aware, a little wicked, and always dressed & picture perfect for the close-up.
Did I mention I love it? I do. I do, do, do, do!
Warning: May cause sudden urges to kick open doors dramatically, speak in gravelly one-liners, and dramatically raise your eyebrow when you flirt.
In three words: Rugged, gunslinger, velveteen
Top: Gunsmoke, pink pepper, nutmeg, dried fruits; Heart: Forbidden vanilla, Bourbon, black olive; Base: Tobacco, deadwood, molasses, resins, black vanilla
Nicoleta Tomsa, Senior Editor
Disclosure: A bottle was offered by the brand, opinions are always my own.
Also, check out the reviews for Pastel Rumors, Peach’s Revenge Tartan Cask Flame and Fortune
Read the entire interview with Margaux Le Paih-Guérin in our ÇaFleureBon Young Perfumer Series here
AI collage with Sarah Baker Velvet Vendetta by Nicoleta
Thanks to the generosity of Sarah Baker we have a bottle of Velvet Vendetta for one registered reader from the US, EU & UK. You must register or your entry will not count. To be eligible, please leave a comment saying what sparks your interest based on Nicoleta’s review and where you live. Draw closes 11/21/2025
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