by Mark
If there has ever been a note associated with a house, the note is vanilla and the house is Guerlain. When I heard that Jean-Paul Guerlain had come out of retirement to create the limited edition Spiritueuse Double Vanille, I figured this was likely to be one for the ages.
SDV opens with an intoxicating vanilla liqueur; if you had handed me a glass and told me to sip, it would not have seemed an unlikely quaff. Deep and rich, it is like the memory of smelling vanilla extract for the first time, perhaps in the kitchen with your grandmother as she was making a cake.
There is a honeyed tobacco note after a while, and a hint of rose, but the heart remains mostly vanilla, vanilla and more vanilla. It does not have the raspiness of Shalimar with its bergamot and jasmine, nor the sweetness of Habit Rouge with its lemon sherbet.
In the drydown, benzoin steers the fragrance into smoky vanilla incense territory, surrounded by cedar. Comforting, especially on a cold day.
The great Ernest Beaux once said "When I do vanilla I get Crème Brûlée, when Guerlain does vanilla he gets Shalimar." There may never be another Shalimar, but Spiritueuse Double Vanille proves that vanilla still runs in the blood of the Guerlain family. Perhaps SDV is Jean-Paul's attempt to do Crème Brûlée. Regardless of intent, I find this a worthy addition to the line.
Perfumer: Jean-Paul Guerlain
Year: 2007
Notes: Pink peppercorns, bergamot; incense, cedar, bulgarian rose, ylang ylang; vanilla, benzoin.
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