Marina’s Message to Clement regarding the second mod of Holy Grail
This concludes Marina’s Round 2 with mod R2/D.
My second mod, Holy Grail R2/D has arrived! This is my message to Clement regarding the mod:
Dear Clement,
I was so thrilled to try my second mod! It started with a spicy explosion of saffron and my heart rejoiced. I do like this version more than Mod No. 1, simply because it is spicier, warmer and more “substantial”, not as ethereal.
For the next mod I was wondering if we could make it even warmer, heavier and more animalic. I know that my proposal said that I want my scent to be spicy, but I was thinking that perhaps we could tone down the spice (which I perceive to be mainly saffron) a little, not so much by reducing the amount of it as by making the other notes stronger. As it is, to my nose and on my skin,” saffron” overwhelms everything else. I do smell a little musk and some amber in the drydown, but apart from that the scent seems rather linear, like a saffron “soliflore”. (If you are familiar with Safram by Laura Tonatto, this is how Mod 2 smells to my nose.)
I would absolutely love the scent to have more woods, particularly sandalwood. And I would be so happy if the musk was made much, much stronger. I also want this musk to be very obviously “dirty”. No clean musk for me, please. I don’t know if you had a chance to read the comments made by our readers about the first mod…One of my wonderful fellow bloggers, March, came up with an idea of Marina’s Skank-o-Meter. On a scale of 1 to 10, where Clair de Musc by Serge Lutens is 1 and Muscs Koublai Khan is a perfect 10, I would like my Holy Grail to be 8,5 or maybe even 9. Please don’t hold back and don’t be afraid to scare me off with animalic notes. I love my scents to be dark and dirty.
I also wanted to note that some of the people who received the 2nd mod told me that they smelled a leather note there. I was a little upset that there seemed to be no leather on my skin. However, after a couple of more tries, I did actually start to smell leather, albeit faintly, in the very late drydown. I would love for that note to be much stronger! Paired with the dirty kind of musk I have in mind, spiced up by some saffron and cardamom, softened by the velvety sandalwood and perhaps some vanilla…oh my!
To sum it all up and hopefully to amuse you, here are my impressions and wishes:
This is how Mod R2/D smells right now- bright, thrilling, but essentially insubstantial:
Fireworks
This is how I would like it to smell- warm, sensual, generous, inviting, like a fire burning in the darkness of the night:
Fire
I also want it to be “dirty” and not at all innocent. I would go as far as to say that I want it to smell “dangerous”, perhaps even a little sinister…Like this:
Franz von Stuck, Sin
Thank you very much again! I am looking forward to hearing from you and to the next mod!
Best wishes,
Marina
The images are from art.com.
The samples of R2/D are now available in the online shop.
17 Comments
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Marina
Civet sounds great! Yes, please, lets have some civet! 🙂
I wish I got more leather, like you, V. Thankyou very much for sharing your impressions! -
Katie
You really are going to have to patent that Skank-O-Meter, M. Heh. I got something a little like lactose in it, a plate of snickerdoodle cookies, and some musk, but saffron was relatively strong on me as well. I’ve no idea about leathery intonations on the drydown, though. I mean, there was some note that had a little bit of an oily ping, but no leathery anything for me… Interesting.
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Marina
Katie,
See, that leather note…it’s playing hide and seek with me. Now I am smelling it, now I am not…and mostly I am not. But it would be great to have some (more) of leather. Musk, leather, civet…now we are talking! 😉 -
kuri
I get something reminiscent of mothballs. Spice and musk? Kind of musty but not heavy. I want to say incense or lots of wood. Pretty sure I don’t get any saffron though, but maybe I’ve forgotten what saffron smells like. There’s a nice thread of sweetness running through it and I wouldn’t consider it animalic or dark by any means. It does seem quite linear so far. No leather either.
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Marchlion
What the heck. I’m mailing you your own civet. They’re cute and furry, right? Can’t I get one at Civet.com or something? Not sure how you get the juice out, though … hey, can you make me a decant? 😉
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Marina
C,
I didn’t get mothballs. I actually really like the smell of mothballs, weird as it sounds. I am probably the only person in the Universe who likes it. 🙂
Thank yuo so much for your comment! -
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legerdenez
Oh, help! I finally tried R2/D just now. It reminds me of a recent torrid stay in a hotel on the Seine. I know that’s cryptic, but it is a strong association for me. I do smell leather and it is electric and animalic and quite sweet. I smell the return of the repressed Shalimar in R2/D. It is challenging to wear, not tame and thus it smells like a perfume of yore. I am so glad I have the opportunity to sample these mods. Thank you.
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perfumecritic
Hmmm, on me, my first thought was Shalimar or maybe more accurately, Takashimaya’s homage, their namesake “T”. Yet somehow Katie’s allusion to snickerdoodles also applies. Someone mentioned an oiliness that I found trailing in the basenotes, a kind of slick, oily sweetness. I’d imagine more saffron and leather with a little something nasty to change the overall effect from southern belle to vamp-goddess.
Marlen
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Marina
Dear Cait,
How different are the perceptions! I did not get any Shalimar (That’s a good thing, for me. I am not a fan of Shalimar). I do actually understand what you mean by electric, yes, I can definitely “see” that. Thank you so much for sharing your impressions! -
kuri
Er, R2/D2 haha! Sorry. Fascinating; I don’t get anything animalic from this, but see the oily sweetness Marlen mentions. Sweet mothballness. I want to hear more about this torrid stay at the Seine. Side notes: Marina, did you track down Mon Ange? It sounds like a regular fruity floral. I found the eponymous Marina de Bourbon a lot more interesting, though didn’t try either on skin. Does Takashimaya carry “T” in Japan too? Can’t find any info on it.
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lilybp
Well, I finally got a chance to try R2/D (I think my postal carrier was sampling it before) and on a first try before bed I got. . . saffron!! Lots and lots of saffron!! I can see the resemblance to LT’s Saffram, although this seems less vanillic. I didn’t get much leather. It’s quite a pleasing fragrance, but it’s very—-yellow. Marina’s Holy Grail should be painted in deeper tones.
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Marina
C,
Sweet mothballness sounds strangely appelaing to me 🙂
I haven’t found any Mon Ange, but if it is, as you say, just another fruity-floral, I am not even going to bother with it. 🙂 -
Marina
Judith,
I completely agree about it being yellow! And I do want something deeper and darker. Thank you so much for your comment! -
Andy
In quest of the holy grail. 21st century variation. Without looking at any posts that have been presented here, I go along with this scent, Holy Grail R2 D, that I do not understand, yet. Maybe I am too much linked in medieval times, in search of prince Arthur and his companions, with their horses, visiting churches, that seem to touch the sky, dark, cool, mysterious and filled with the scent of Frankincense clouds, fumes spread to praise a higher being. In search of the holy grail, these men will eventually come by some spices from far away places, pepper from India, saffron too, cardamom from Egypt, and Myrrh, ahhhhh Myrrh that smells so rich and leathery and full bodied, a woody, flowery delight. And Sandalwood…. Thus, I sit here in front of R2D, having flash-backs to Star Wars and realize: This is a 21st century search of the Holy Grail. Our churches do not touch the sky anymore and the spices, you get in the local supermarket. Thus, Prince Arthur wears blue jeans, learns Chinese and listens to JL on his I-Pod. He will not find exotic delights on his journey, the real stuff I mean, these mysterious, spiritual scents, animalic, smokey woods, delighful spices and sandalwood. He will find an abstraction of these delights that –eventually- fits better with the shiny i-Pod. Thus, I sniff and I kind of like it, because R2D got braver, much more. And it got character. I do not like the kick-off, though. I find it unbalanced, somehow. After an initial puff, I get spices on an aerial kind of background, with some vibrant dry powders, which might be part of a Saffron interpretation. Myrrh (again, but there I probably am wrong) and woods reminding me in scents from the local bakery, but before 4 am, meaning the bread dough is getting prepared, flour clouds, dry and with an edible quality, but not really inviting you to take a bit, yet. Flowers are there, too. A shy rose maybe, I get phenylethylalcohol, with some powdery ionons eventually, but may be totally wrong. The edgy spices give space to more round forms, soon, the story gets more balanced, a little bit sweeter, and –this I like a lot- is very present, not shy at all. Sandalwood I miss somehow, and I miss a little bit of dirt, you know: Dirty, sweaty horses and men sitting on them….
Where are we now with this R2D version, are we there yet? No. Are we getting somewhere? Yes, but on our quest for this century’s holy grail, we might want to look back a little bit, get in touch with sandalwood again, inhale this natural delights and dream the dream of far away places
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Victoria
It seems that you want more civet in your fragrance rather than musk. Muscs Koublai Khan is quite heavy on civet.
I received Holy Grail R2/D and had a chance to wear it a few times. Almost immediately, I had an impression of apples baking with cinnamon–sweet and spicy. I found it to be closer to what I envisioned as Marina’s fragrance, and it is quite nice, with many nuances. The leather was obvious to me both on skin and on the blotter, and it provided an interesting twist.