It's no secret that I love 1950's fashion (well it may be if we have never met before and you are new to this blog and to my writing, in which case I shall let you in on my secret now). Wherever I go I go in swing skirts or pencil skirts, faux astrakhan jackets, little clip top handbags and tiny hats. Naturally, being a perfume lover as well I am always on the look out for a perfect perfume to compliment my clothing obsession. This is a harder quest than you might think now that the heady vintages of the mid 20th Century have been swept aside beneath a barrage of sweetly floral and fruity fragrances. The perfumes of the 1950's and 1960's like a roll on girdle or the perfect court shoe screamed maturity and responsibility along with femininity. Their successors in the late 1960's whispered of inviting exoticism and mysticism with wisps of patchouli and honey. Now, however, the emphasis is firmly fixed on the ever youthful appeal of peaches and strawberries, spring flowers and spring showers. The plastic surgeons glossy leaflet as portable, spritzable promise.
I'm afraid that strawberries are my limit, I don't want to smell like dessert any more than I want to wear nude lipstick and I really don't want to wear nude lipstick (not sure I own any shade paler than the classic Revlon: Cherries in the Snow).
Don't get me wrong, some of these fragrances are beautiful, I was rather impressed by Chanel No.5 L'eau even though I feared for it's staying power and know in my heart that, whilst classic No.5 has enough silage that fellow shoppers have chased after me to ask what that perfume is and where they too can obtain a bottle, L'eau may prove sadly fleeting.
However, they are not quite what I would want in a perfume and so one sometimes has to turn to vintage juices for special occasions and when I'm feeling rather 50's (full outfit, black eyeliner wings, red lipstick) one perfume stands out head and shoulders above it's competition: Balenciaga's Quadrille.
Like Balenciaga's dresses of the 1950's this perfume has volume and quirkiness in abundance. It's a powerhouse of amber and musk where the heart and top notes are, fittingly enough for a perfume named after a 19th century square dance, like coy ballerinas just hovering round the edges. After the first dab, one is aware of a rich scent of plum, peach and the crispness of lemon before the cloves and cardamon jump up sharply from the heart and beckon you in to the real party going on deep down in the musk and amber heart of the composition.
It may have been an invitation to a quadrille but those tame 19th century dances have no place down here in the depths. Someones dropped a jazz LP down on the record player, there's a hint of smokiness in the air and the bar is serving only whiskey and gin. You want to slip into a little black jumper with shoulder pads and a frilly tulle petticoat. The world is on the cusp of a new era, things will be bright up ahead, your rocket cocktail shaker promised you so.
That's the beauty of Quadrille to me. It's all the things you want from a vintage perfume, depth, complexity, musk and smokiness. It elbows it's way in and demands to be smelt the same way a black high heel demands that you look.
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