Before the birds begin to sing… | February 27, 2009 | Comments (12)

before-the-birds-begin-to-sing1before-the-birds-begin-to-sing

When: Friday, Feb. 27th, 2009.

What: Ivory dress by M by Madonna for H&M, vintage fur coat. Bra and panty set by Elle Macpherson. (I am in love with her website. The photographs with all the goosebumps and dimples and realness of yes, very trim women, but still more real women than we are used to seeing in ads, especially in lingerie ads, delights me.) Watch, Guess. Earrings from Juniper Tree. Rings, vintage and Laundry by Shelli Segal.

Scent: The very elegant Tubéreuse Criminelle by Serge Lutens, with notes of tuberose, jasmine, orange blossom, hyacinth, nutmeg, clove, styrax, musk and vanilla, from the exclusive range. Let me say this first: When M & I were married at San Francisco City Hall, it was in a cloud of giddy-yet-somber love reverberating through the rotunda and gently raining down tuberose, from my bouquet. I can’t help but sink fondly into this fragrance, even it comes howling like the devil out of the decant. Within moments it stops shrieking like a newborn from the womb and just nestles in, and if angels existed the soft folding of their wings to kneel down and gaze into the eyes of some broken creature with love so abstractly vast it melted your brain to even contemplate it, well, the sound of them would smell like this.

People love or hate this. They are so put off by its vulgar beginnings that they abandon it, or some version of tuberose so watered down it scarcely resembles the real thing has blinded them to the beauty of Criminelle. Some people think it’s mysterious, they marvel at its depth, its can’t-put-my-finger-on-it-ness. Some think it packs sexual power.

I love Criminelle because it tells the truth. Perfect. In every way.

Confession: I promised assorted FFAF readers that I’d post a blog with this dress and the fur, albeit not necessarily together. With the recent days of still chilly air veiled with clear blue skies and the faint stirrings of Spring, I knew my days were numbered where the fur is concerned. (Not that we really ever have fur-worthy days out here, I know you East Coast kittens are rolling your eyes at me so hard they’re loud as eight balls cracking against corner pockets.) So I paired the two, experimented with some trickery in Picasa and Voila!

furdeux


, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

SBJ @ 10:56 PM

Comments (12)

  • cate3710

    So sexy and glamorous!

  • http://bangsarethenewblack.wordpress.com bangmaster

    Ooooh… so glamorous! What, pray tell, is that glamorous nail polish?

  • http://willblog4food.wordpress.com Jen

    I cannot see photos. Sad face.

  • http://willblog4food.wordpress.com Jen

    Oh nevermind. My computer decided to download images this time. Very glamorous!

  • M

    boobies touch!

  • Skinny Bone Jones

    @bangmaster: It’s an unknown Essie color! Apparently, I ripped the label from the bottom of the bottle. Very bad. But it’s vampy, no?

  • truculentandunreliable

    Skinny, I keep meaning to ask you–have you heard of Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab? It’s a very small house, but they have a huge following. Plus, there are always new scents and scents are often discontinued, which I think makes it even more fun.

    http://www.blackphoenixalchemylab.com/welcome.html

    I’ve bought a few imps from them, but I’m pretty conservative with my scents and don’t really want to spend the money right now to experiment. My favorite that I’ve tried is Asphodel, which is a pretty simple green/floral scent, but I found it so unsettling that I couldn’t wear it often. It seemed to encapsulate the idea of an asphodel perfectly–it doesn’t have a lot of lasting power, but once it settles in, the best description I have of it is that it smells like the ghosts of dandelions.

    She also has a lot of stuff that sounds really, really sexy and slightly animalistic, but I don’t really go for those types of scents, but the descriptions sound like they would be great for you.

  • truculentandunreliable

    Oh, and they’re oil mixes, so they don’t have fixatives, so none of them have the staying power of commercial perfumes. I’ve found that they last, at most, a whole workday, but I am also really conservative about how much I apply.

    Also, they have a series of scents inspired by Neil Gaiman!

  • Skinny Bone Jones

    @truculent: I don’t believe I’ve heard of them, but it sounds wonderful and I’ll have to check them out now! Thanks for tipping me off, sugar. The Neil Gaiman series sounds totally insane. (In a good way!)

  • truculentandunreliable

    No problem! Let me know if you get any of their scents what you think.

    Now that I’ve looked at the site again, I am finding all sorts of things I want to try! I have to stay away.

  • truculentandunreliable

    There should be an “and” in that second sentence. Whatever.

  • Sher

    I love, love, love your hair in these photos. Mmmmhmmmm!