ABOUT
Why 'The Bible of Niche Perfumes'? We know: this blog name can evoke a lot of mixed emotions.
Let's address immediately the elephant in the room: no, we do not exclusively wear niche scents, and no, we are not by any means experts and can claim an intellectual and critical supremacy on the subject (honestly we can't on any subject). [for more disclosure, please refer to our q&a]
Our blog name is indeed snobby, and we contemplate each day since we launched to change it. Reggie, my dear friend and blog partner has often begged me to rethink our agency and how choosing to mantain such potentially misleading name can imply a specific positionality within the virtual blogging community.Yet, I still have to admit my struggle in overcoming its origins.
There is a big nostalgic reason that holds me so defensive to such stupid and insignificant detail of our online presence, and unfortunately, I haven't been great yet at emancipating myself enough to detach emotionally from it.
I met Reggie at my first university.
I was failing the first weeks of a never completed medicine degree and he was rocking his ASNC (Anglo-Saxon Norse and Celtic) undergraduate course.
He was the first person to introduce me to the notion of niche scents, fragrance collecting, and the big, murky machine of commerce and marketing behind perfumes.
While my terrible attempt in STEM ended pretty immediately and miserably, the university town exposed me to an enlightening community who utopically hosted the most beautiful example of inter-religious liberal tolerance.
Each college had choirs, religious communities representing worldwide spiritual movements, and I quickly became fascinated by Christian mysticism, apologetics, and neo-platonism, - all disciplines highly engaged with the senses-, and made friend with some incredible enthusiasts and scholars in the field.
This is how our name originated: a very special person in our lives, who was highly responsible for my turn to sociology, religious studies, and sociology of olfaction, came up ironically with this infamous name.
At that time we were two 20-something spoiled brats, struggling with the overconsumption, and materialistic compulsion of fragrance collecting, and honestly, were simply the epytome of annoying niche snobs.
Gratefully, we became more educated with time, the virtual community compromising experts, industry insiders, and incredible enthusiasts with such an impressive knowledge of the market and legacy of fragrance gave us the resources to grow and become more aware, cautious, and responsible of what such extremism implies.
Maybe one day we will change the name, I really haven't figured out how to feel about it.
In my mind, it is a highly ironic, subversive joke, as we have elaborated some pretty strong feelings about the corporate fragrance industry, but I am also aware of how misleading remains.
I hope you can accept my douchebagness about it, and allow me more time to mature and formulate some more conclusive thoughts on the matter.
ADDITIONAL NOTE by Didi
Let's address immediately the elephant in the room: no, we do not exclusively wear niche scents, and no, we are not by any means experts and can claim an intellectual and critical supremacy on the subject (honestly we can't on any subject). [for more disclosure, please refer to our q&a]
There is a big nostalgic reason that holds me so defensive to such stupid and insignificant detail of our online presence, and unfortunately, I haven't been great yet at emancipating myself enough to detach emotionally from it.
I met Reggie at my first university.
I was failing the first weeks of a never completed medicine degree and he was rocking his ASNC (Anglo-Saxon Norse and Celtic) undergraduate course.
He was the first person to introduce me to the notion of niche scents, fragrance collecting, and the big, murky machine of commerce and marketing behind perfumes.
While my terrible attempt in STEM ended pretty immediately and miserably, the university town exposed me to an enlightening community who utopically hosted the most beautiful example of inter-religious liberal tolerance.
Each college had choirs, religious communities representing worldwide spiritual movements, and I quickly became fascinated by Christian mysticism, apologetics, and neo-platonism, - all disciplines highly engaged with the senses-, and made friend with some incredible enthusiasts and scholars in the field.
At that time we were two 20-something spoiled brats, struggling with the overconsumption, and materialistic compulsion of fragrance collecting, and honestly, were simply the epytome of annoying niche snobs.
Gratefully, we became more educated with time, the virtual community compromising experts, industry insiders, and incredible enthusiasts with such an impressive knowledge of the market and legacy of fragrance gave us the resources to grow and become more aware, cautious, and responsible of what such extremism implies.
Maybe one day we will change the name, I really haven't figured out how to feel about it.
In my mind, it is a highly ironic, subversive joke, as we have elaborated some pretty strong feelings about the corporate fragrance industry, but I am also aware of how misleading remains.
I hope you can accept my douchebagness about it, and allow me more time to mature and formulate some more conclusive thoughts on the matter.
Scents became consciously part of my life only during my first teenage years.
Fragrances didn't constitute part of my parents' identity; I have never found a cologne owned by my father, while the only two bottles of Eau de Toilette were my mother's Sunflower by Elizabeth Arden and Chevrefeuille by Yves Rocher .
This passion erupted during an ordinary day of school, or as to better say, during a hookie with some class mates.
As we were cheekily skipping a test, we decided to shelter in a drugstore for the following hour.
We weren't looking to buy any particular item, yet all those skincare and home products held somehow a sacred if not mystical imaginary to all of us.
Everything seemed so unattainable, if not almost forbidden for its adult sacrality to a random group of teenagers, until we didn't reach the last shelves of the shop, where a perfume selection was stored.
One of the girls was insistently pointing the Dior's Sauvage bottle, describing one of the most globally known fragrances as the "ultimate boyfriend scent", so we all gathered around her, as she sprayed few hints on herself. There was something extremely awakening for me in that act; maybe for how the perfume became the symbol of our sacred friendship bond, or for how a peer was already capable to express so much sexual consciousness through the senses.
It was the very first I was witnessing how scent is a political weapon, and how we can subvert and take control of narratives around the everything-social by acknowledging the role of olfaction in our life.
It was the very first I was witnessing how scent is a political weapon, and how we can subvert and take control of narratives around the everything-social by acknowledging the role of olfaction in our life.
At that time I was smoking as most Italian teenagers do, and it was during that hookie that I decided to buy a fairly priced perfume in order to hide from my mother the heaviness and nauseating oudor of roll-your-own cigarettes burnt tobacco.
With 20 euros in my wallet, I didn't have a lot of repertoire to choose from.
As ''virgin'' as my nose was to fragrances, I was lucky enough to already have an allergy towards overly sweet, headachy, and long lasting perfumes.
As ''virgin'' as my nose was to fragrances, I was lucky enough to already have an allergy towards overly sweet, headachy, and long lasting perfumes.
The cashier wasn't helpful either, since it was a commercial drugstore. I was left alone with my nose to decide which fragrance to blind buy.
With my limited knowledge, I ended up investing those 20 euros in a violet eau de parfum, by Borsari 1870.
I can still remember the tons of sprays I used to torture my skin and clothes with, and how the fragrance was doing its designated work in hiding my embarassing smoking addiction from my parents. There is no bigger regret in my perfume journey than throwing away my very first perfume bottle.
Almost ten years have passed from the drugstore episode, and I am still feeling a novice when it comes to the universe of perfumes.
There is no bigger joy than being aware of knowing so little about olfaction and the delicate (occasionally murky *side eye to marketing*) craft required behind each composition, and how much I have yet to discover.
Having the wonderful privilege of learning each day something knew, document it, and exchange opinions with people from all over the world, with all sorts of biographies, all united by the infinite purposes and meanings scent hold in our lives, it is one of the biggest gifts of my life.
The world of smell and particularly perfumes gave me so much: life-long friendships, new treasured encounters with the most passionate experts of this craft- it gave me a job and a very late embraced academic vocation within the wonderful research community .
There is no bigger joy than being aware of knowing so little about olfaction and the delicate (occasionally murky *side eye to marketing*) craft required behind each composition, and how much I have yet to discover.
Having the wonderful privilege of learning each day something knew, document it, and exchange opinions with people from all over the world, with all sorts of biographies, all united by the infinite purposes and meanings scent hold in our lives, it is one of the biggest gifts of my life.
The world of smell and particularly perfumes gave me so much: life-long friendships, new treasured encounters with the most passionate experts of this craft- it gave me a job and a very late embraced academic vocation within the wonderful research community .
For this reason, I want to give back what I received, and document publicly all the resources that made my ordinary so exceptional.
comprised of drafts,
mistakes,
emotions and accountability.
Dedicated to anyone capacable of appreciating the beauty of the ordinary.
