Houbigant Quelques Fleurs

Houbigant Quelques Fleurs

What is it with Sales Assistants who know less about fragrance than I do and yet treat me like a fragrance sheep, as if I'm in your store to buy whatever you tell me smells good (baaah). Honestly, you might be charming and cute (a charming, cute man helps), but I know what I like and I know what works on me, and I also know what does not.

Recently I was in the fragrance department of a large, upscale store with a lot of niche fragrances. I was ogling the Caron display there, since you ALL KNOW I'm dying to own my very own vat of French Cancan. I asked the overly attentive (hovering, really) SA about the Cancan. As it turns out, despite the presence right there on the counter, of a beautiful little bottle labeled "French Cancan," They don't sell the stuff.

If I hadn't been there with two children who want to try every fragrance known to man, I might have discussed with him the idiocy of this, and asked him to remove Cancan from the display since it's obviously not carried there.

If I saw a Balenciaga purse in the window of a store and walked in, only to find that they don't carry Balenciaga purses, I'd be a little miffed.

ANYWAY...then the SA says to me "If you like French Cancan, you'll LOVE Quelques Fleurs." Honestly, as hard as I try, the logic of this completely escapes me, but I say to him "I've tried Quelques Fleurs and it doesn't work on me."

He responds "Oh, but it's a new crop, and it's incredible! It will stay with you ALL DAY!" I tell him I've tried it several times in the past and, while it's great for the first 10 minutes, after that it seriously heads south.

Somehow (aforementioned charm/cute factor) he persuades me to try the new batch, and then sprays it LIBERALLY all up my entire arm. All you fragrance freaks out there know how precious skin real estate can be on a sniffing expedition, so I was annoyed, even though I didn't have much sniffing to do that day. I was also anticipating the turn and didn't want to be stuck with an armful of stink all damn day.

So, as usual, it starts off glorious. Honestly, it's a beautiful fragrance. And for 10 minutes I walk around in a CLOUD (QF is not a fragrance that should ever be sprayed THAT liberally) of beautiful floral.

Then it begins - the turning of the fragrance. Slowly but surely, I can smell it going off right there on my skin. I offer liberally sprayed arm to SA man, saying "See what I mean? It's going off, right on my skin." He says "I think it smells beautiful - and it will last all day. It's wonderful!" Humph. I wander around some more, it goes further off, I make him smell it again - I say "Can you smell it, how it smells off?" "I see what you are saying but it's obviously a beautiful fragrance, still." I go in search of a Bobbi Brown lipstick for my mom, drive the poor lipstick lady nuts trying to find the perfect color, for a woman who only wears makeup that looks like no makeup, and by then I'm fully reeking.

I walk around some more and then I bump into SA again. I say "Here, smell this. Do you see how it smells STALE? Like a 100-year old perfume. It smells like a very very old bottle of parfum that your grandmother used to wear."

He said "Yes, but a grandmother with impeccable taste."

As I walked out the door, past bottles and bottles of Quelques Fleurs, I finally figured out why he'd been trying so hard with this one. Duh. It was the push of the day/week/month. Finally it clicked - why he'd been so patient instead of saying - yeah, that really stinks on you, let's look for something else. Why he compared QF to Cancan. Why he knew QF was a "fresh crop" and didn't know if they even SOLD Cancan, although it was sitting on the counter.

I will say that I am Queen of Rationalization, and I couldn't have done such a good job with a stanky woman shoving her arm in my face all morning.

Is there a point to all this? Nah. It was just a strange encounter of the fragrance kind and I thought I'd share. And please don't let my experience with QF turn you off. This is a rare occurrence, and for some reason this fragrance simply doesn't like me. I do think it's a beautiful fragrance - you don't hang around for almost 100 years in the perfume world if you're not. Anybody who likes florals should give it a shot.

Per Bergdorf Goodman online: One of the most renowned and admired fragrances of all time, Quelques Fleurs L'Original forever changed floral fragrances when it became the first true multi-floral bouquet 90 years ago. A classic that has endured the test of time, the fragrance is wrapped in a theme of sculptured petals in a frosted and clear French glass. The true Quelques Fleurs formula has never been published. An ancient formula still kept in the family archives, this fragrance will never be duplicated. The blend of soft, sensual florals uses over 250 different raw materials and more than 15,000 flowers to create just one ounce of Quelques Fleurs eau de parfum. To this day it is still produced in Grasse, France, where Jean Francois Houbigant first created his perfumes in 1775.