When throwing a Flower Party, the featured fragrance should be, well, floral, no matter how non-groundbreaking that may be. At the very least, the invitations should have a floral scent to them. Enter Balenciaga’s sumptuously flowery ‘Florabotanica’ – which is what I used when crafting summer invitations earlier this season.
Oddly enough, I’ve never been a fan of florals for fragrance. There are exceptions, and summer is the time when they happen: I love a neroli or a bergamot for the hot days – and any sort of citrus blossom is enough to bring back sunny memories that may or may not have actually happened. The feeling it invokes is so sweet, however, that it doesn’t matter. They’ve come to exist on a memory plane that belongs solely to them.
Balenciaga created a pair of fine florals a couple of years ago, and Florabotanica spoke to me because it had a green freshness that worked to temper the sweetness of its floral focus. The literature for this fragrance is as over-the-top as the scent itself, so of course I adore it:
The astonishing FLORABOTANICA came to life in a four-hand score. The two composers are Olivier Polge and Jean-Christophe Hérault. These two internationally renowned noses have written a music of scents that play on two major accords, like a plant world within a world. The Vetiver, Amber and Caladium Leaf accord to create a resonance of mossy and mysterious dark wood. And the Rose, Carnation and Mint accord like an exhilarating note with juvenile freshness. It should be specified that we are not talking about those extremely well-known roses from the Vulgaris Rosacea family. It is a hybrid rose born of the olfactory imagination of our two orchestrators. We cannot reveal all the secrets of these two floral, alchemists, but the Experimental Rose finds its origins in opulent Turkey. To give it a fairytale air, the two perfumers have added a formula of psychosensory plants, making it particularly enchanting. This Experimental Rose has the power to endlessly charm.
This isn’t one for everyday wear in my world – it’s too potent and dramatic. (And if I’m saying that, take heed.) But it is a beauty, one that opens up like its proverbial rose inspiration, and dries down to a slightly more delicate form. It is definitely floral as fuck, and shot through with enough greenhouse dreaminess to entwine the wearer with wreaths and tendrils of jungle sweetness. A guaranteed precursor of a summer swoon to those brave enough to try it on.
