Papillon Artisan Perfumes

Papillion seems to have sprung, beautifully formed, from nowhere. Samples of the first three perfumes have been doing the rounds for a while and arousing a good deal of interest. The reason for this is simple. All three are exceptionally good. It would seem the reason most perfumes are bought into the world has little to do with a desire to communicate through olfaction. We can be bludgeoned into cynicism by the sheer number of releases each month. Liz Moores, however, already exhibits the traits of a master perfumer: meticulous, deliberate, unhurried creations which speak directly of a highly personal aesthetic uncompromised by the need to imitate or hide amidst a passing flock of trends. Anubis has a quality of intense passion about it. Early creations by other maverick perfumers share this singular, unwavering focus (I’m thinking of Andy Tauer’s L’Air Du Désert Marocain here or Mark Buxton’s original creation for Commes De Garçons). Anubis feels like a manifesto, a statement of intent. Perilously deep, labyrinthine complexity, swooningly rich and unapologetically emphatic. It is a ritual perfume. Tobacco Rose does things few other roses would dare. It places the bloom at a distance from which it can be examined amidst tendrils of golden aromatic smoke. Surely the beguiling behavior of roses in the wild has more in common with this elegantly reticent bloom than the suffocating masks often devised in their name? Angelique similarly places the iris, at a distance, giving us the chance to explore all it’s facets, to turn it this way and that and marvel at the impossibly beautiful fusion of earthy, buttery heart and the diaphanous powdered sigh of its escaping soul. A remarkable debut indeed.