Guerlain – Chamade

A good friend of mine is from Iceland, which like any country, features an unique culinary tradition. Given the island’s reliance on the fishing industry, much of their cuisine revolves around fish, although their excellent dairy places a close second. Since we first met each other toward the end of the year, the subject of holiday meals came up. Always eager to learn about a new culture, I asked my friend if there were any special dishes that were eaten on the holidays, conjuring visions of holiday recipe-swapping. The response was not quite what I was expecting: fermented stingray. After clarifying that this was not a joke, my friend went on to explain that stingray was traditionally prepared by Iceland’s Viking ancestors by burying a dead stingray and letting it “ferment” (her word, mine “rot”). While I will spare you the minute details, the ammonia contained within the stingray’s body essentially “cooks” the fish, not unlike a ceviche. Needless to say, I would not be preparing this in my kitchen anytime soon.

When I asked my friend if she liked it, she said “Not the first time. The first time it smelled so awful, I thought I might get sick”. The use of the term “first time” implied that there was a second or even numerous times. She explained that while it was an acquired taste, after the initial opening stench of ammonia, the stingray was delicious. I was baffled! How did she get past that offensive opening and come to love this strange creation? It made no sense to me. And then I realized it did: Chamade.

While I am a lover of bright, intense openings and even more so a lover of Guerlain, in all honesty I must admit that the first time I smelled Chamade I thought that someone, somewhere had made a mistake and filled this beautiful, inverted heart bottle with nail polish remover. While I adore several fragrances which feature prominent hyacinth notes (Chanel’s Cristalle and No 19, Balmain’s Vent Vert) they are tempered by the introduction of other elements. Not so with Chamade. The combination of hyacinth with galbanum and blackcurrent created an opening that cut through the air like a sharp green saber which showed no signs of relenting. I put the bottle back, far into the darkest reaches of my perfume cabinet, untested.

But something didn’t feel right about walking away from this fragrance, named after the distinctive pitter-pat of a heart in love, a nod at the Françoise Sagan novel and French film by the same name starring none-other-than Catherine Deneuve. So many had waxed poetic about its charms, and the skill of the then-young Jean-Paul Guerlain, I felt I must be missing something. I had read the fragrance notes, and I knew there was a Guerlain accord hiding in there somewhere, if I could just steel my reserve and do the unthinkable: test it on skin.

Needless to say, I was rewarded. Chamade perfectly captures the cool detachment of attraction and the growing warmth of love, but its beauty is only revealed to the patient suitor. The intense opening was merely the awkward, butterflies-in-your-stomach feeling that proceeds the sweetest and most passionate of kisses. Chamade slowly unfolds into a soft floral base of rose, ylang ylang, jasmine, lilac, and lily of the valley: for every great romance must have its tenderness. As the fragrance settles further, drawing heat from the skin, the magic of Guerlain is revealed in a soft, velvety base of vanilla, amber, iris and woods: for every great love must have its warmth. And as we overlook the idiosyncrasies of our most beloved, I am finally able to embrace the sharp opening, knowing that a warm embrace awaits me.

Floral oriental

Notes of Turkish rose, ylang ylang, jasmine, lilac, blackcurrant, lily of the valley, hyacinth, cassis, galbanum, sandalwood, vetiver, vanilla, musk, amber, iris and tonka bean.