Le Labo Concrete Parfum: A Solid Scent Collaboration with Anthropologie

Sunday, October 23rd, 2011 | Collaborations, Fragrance

Meilily: Le Labo Fragrance Collaboration with Anthropologie!

Love, love, love collaborations + this one is especially cool!

Unique, hand-blended fragrance house, Le Labo, has collaborated with one of my favorite stores, Anthropologie, to create an exciting fragrance line that includes a new solid perfume, Concrete Parfum, which comes in an inspired brass swivel-top tin. So exciting!

By the creators of Le Labo + Anthropologie Concrete Parfums:
Top Picks…
– Poudre D’Orient – feminine, soft and delicately smouldering
– Chant de Bois – musky with a woody pungency
Other scents from the line…
– Bouquet Blanc – extreme floral (for those who love intense jasmine notes)
– Orange Discreet – faint citrus with sharp green tones
– Belle du Soir – very green and herbal, like rosemary (and oddly similar to Orange Discreet)

The cardboard packaging is gorgeous but the brass swivel tin with magnetic closure is even more beautiful. I will admit that a large part of my desire to try this Concrete Parfum is the swivel brass packaging.

After much deliberation, I picked up a Le Labo Concrete Parfum in Poudre D’Orient, one of the more interesting and unique scents in this series – complex, exotically feminine but not overly powdery. I almost chose Chant de Bois, another interesting scent from the line (my second favorite) – musky and woody, but slightly sharp at the finish from cedar and pink pepper notes.

Two other scents, Orange Discreet and Belle du Soir, share a similar green/herbal pungency that I can’t quite identify, and unfortunately both scents smell too similar to each other (in the tin) and are a bit too sharp for my tastes…

Orange Discreet is described on the Anthropologie site as “a clean citrus blend of petigrain, bergamot, mandarin zest and orange blossom mixed with vetiver, cedar and musk (FRUIT),” but I detected more sharp green notes than citrus, and no fruit. The citrus notes in Orange Discreet briefly come alive more on the skin, but only to be overpowered by other notes.

Belle du Soir as described on the Anthropologie site is “musky and rich, neroli, water lily and gardenia float above notes of cedar, sandalwood and patchouli (SPICE),” but unfortunately I couldn’t detect any subtleties of water lily (one of my favorite fragrance notes) or musk over the early herbal pungency, which perhaps comes from the patchouli and cedar notes.

Tip: try these before you buy! The scents are quite different in person from their official descriptions, and they may smell different on skin.

Le Labo Concrete Parfum for Anthropologie retails for US$28 for .16 oz. at Anthropologie.com and retail shops.

Meilily loves… Collaborations! Check out Le Labo + Anthroplogie!