Because I'm an irascible contrarian, I was prepared to reject Portrait of a Lady because the guys on Basenotes are ALL OVER IT and I don't really like the idea of agreeing with people who treat batch numbers on Creed fragrances like a Kabbalistic key to the universe.* But goddammit they're right: this is really, really good, a modern classic even.
Frederic Malle is a fantastic house and all of their fragrances share a near-obsessive focus on perfect balance. If I was forced to pick a favorite fragrance of all time it might well be Malle's Une Fleur de Cassie, a jaw-dropping masterwork of clockwork precision. And once again Malle shows how it's done with Portrait of a Lady (which btw A++ trolling by giving that name to your very unisex fragrance and confusing all of the poor dudes who are obsessed with ZOMG IS THIS FRAGRANCE FOR A LADY OR NOT? AM I ALLOWED TO WEAR IT??). This is not, on the face of it, a complex fragrance. The notes are clear and perfectly discernible: there is rose and there is patchouli and I don't smell much else. But what there is, is balance. To get a rose this sturdy, a patchouli this . . . well, woody and un-hippy, and to have the whole package be so pleasing and addictive, must be the result of a whole lot of other stuff going on behind the scenes; and so yes, there must be a high level of complexity going on here, but it is hidden behind a deceptively simple facade. As a nice bonus this stuff lasts about 80 million hours on the skin, give or take an hour.
*n.b. All snark aside I like Basenotes a lot. No offense, Aventus-obsessed dudes!
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