The Scents of Summer : Five Fresh Summer Fragrances

It was Faulkner who wrote "Memory believes before knowing remembers." Roll that one around your head for a minute; it's a lovely way of honoring the role of memory in our quotidian existence.

And as Proust showed us with his lime-blossom tea, the sense of smell is what most often awakens the memory.

Think of summer and its fragrances: freshly-mown grass, a squirt of lemon, the faint perfume of a perfect peach, the salty ocean, the chlorine of pools, bed linens hung out to sun dry. All right, so we're talking idealized summer - but any one of these smells can take you back to your most favorite summer ever: the one when you fell in love on the Ferris wheel or the one when you and the lifeguard... The night you slept under the stars...

The fragrance industry and parfumeurs have long understood the subconscious attraction to this season that most people regard as their favorite.

There are the obvious summer fragrances - and no less alluring for being obvious. Fragrances such as Clinique's Happy, an ebullient burst of citrus fruit and white florals that was simply intoxicating for millions upon its introduction in 1997.

There's also Banana Republic's Classic (1995), another fresh and clean scent that brings to mind Cape Cod summers with dune grass blowing in the breeze, gin-and-tonics in hand.

And every recent summer has brought Issey Miyake's annual ode (eau'd) to the season, his limited editions which expand upon his note-perfect Eau d'Issey (1994): the cool and crisp minimalist elixir that launched a thousand follow-up aqueous fragrances.

Then, of course, there's the global dinosaur Davidoff's Cool Water (1988), the forebear of nearly every subsequent juice marketed as fresh, green, and oceanic.

With nearly a thousand perfumes introduced every year, the perfume industry generates more than $25 billion in revenues. Interestingly, even amidst the Great Recession, it's the artisanal, niche fragrances (read: expensive) that are propelling young people (especially males) to wear fragrance more often, and often with more confidence and derring-do than their elders.

Here is our list of five innovative summer fragrances - to supplement your summer fragrance classics.

Hermes : Voyage d’Hermes (2010)

You know the bag; you know the house. That unmistakable Hermes orange. Originally a saddle-maker at its founding in 1837, Hermes has, in recent years, thanks to in-house parfumeur Jean-Claude Ellena, become well-known and highly-regarded for its imaginative and coherent line of fragrances, most notably Ellena's Jardin series.

For Voyage d'Hermes, Ellena's mission was to create a scent that evoked a destination unknown, rather than one that took its wearer back to a particular place or time - and the resulting fragrance floats as light as a breeze.

Opening with a squirt of citrus and a blast of peppery cardamom, Voyage d'Hermes' top note has the sharpness of freshly-picked arugula, before settling into the lightness of green tea. Fans of Ellena's earlier work with Bulgari might recognize a nod toward his Eau Parfum�e au Th� Vert (1993). Ultimately, Voyage d'Hermes settles into the kind of softness that one associates with the gloaming during summer: a lawn chair, the dunes, bedsheets hanging out to dry against the setting sun. It's as evanescent as that - and a perfect fragrance for the acceptance of the season's transcience.

As for the splendid stirrup-shaped refillable bottle (a nod toward Hermes' equestrian heritage) with an aluminum cover that pivots to sheath the glass, this is a collector's item and an objet worthy of display (while perhaps also providing partial justification for the purchase price).

PRICE: $90 / 1.2 oz.
LINK: http://usa.hermes.com

Histoires de Parfums : 1828 Jules Verne Eau de Toilette (2001)

Every fragrance tells a story - a fact that Histoires de Parfums employs as a launching point for their line of luxury scents. Rather than place or mood, Histoires de Parfums chooses a particular year as a fragrance inspiration - and marries the juice to a momentous event.

For example, 1828 is the birth year of Jules Verne, the French author of 19th-century thrillers such as Around the World in 80 Days and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. An explorer and an intellectual, Verne represented the nineteenth century's obsession with global adventure - and Histoires de Parfums' eau de toilette named for Verne's birthdate is a timeless fragrance exploration.

Imagine Odysseus on his way back to Ithaca, passing through Mediterranean islands where the sea breeze is perfumed with a bracing amalgam of citrus, mint, and eucalyptus. Following a trail of black pepper, Odysseus wanders an evergreen island, lush with cedar and cypress. Barefoot over pine needles, he walks, the scent of amber and vetiver trailing in his wake.

You - and Odysseus - are deep in the woods now. He's searching for Penelope, but you're there instead. You're with Odysseus, wearing 1828, an Histoires de Parfums fragrance evoking Jules Verne's 19th-century adventures, a juice that was introduced in 2001. Time travels. Tempus fugit.

Nearly a decade after its introduction in 2001, 1828 remains an embodiment of the evanescence of time - and the ongoing desire to capture it. Breathe deeply of 1828 - and travel across time.

PRICE: $185.00 / 120 ml.
LINK: www.histoiresdeparfums.com
www.vivre.com

By Kilian : A Taste of Heaven Absinthe Verte (2007)

First of all, there's the color: as green as chartreuse, the eponymous liqueur manufactured by the Carthusian monks in the Chartreuse Mountains, which is a coincidental tip-off to By Kilian's own heritage: its founder, Kilian Hennessy, is the scion of the Cognac family.

By Kilian has a reputation for creating perfumes with only natural ingredients and a great deal of depth, a quality evinced on the website, where the parfumeur's formula for each fragrance is published.

Inspired by absinthe (hence the color), the drug of poets, A Taste of Heaven Absinthe Verte is a fantastically rich and sumptuous bergamot/lavender/vanillin fragrance that is roughly the equivalent of a perfectly-tailored silk suit. The sort of thing you might wear for lunch at one of Valentino's homes, where the garden is in full bloom and the cuisine as delicious as the surroundings. That's the fragrance's power: its ability to envelop the wearer in a dreamlike state of suspended disbelief where everything is possible - even lunch with Valentino.

A Taste of Heaven Absinthe Verte was created in 2007 by parfumeur Calice Asancheyev-Becker (J'Adore for Dior) as part of By Kilian's L'oeuvre Noire collection. If there's anything dark about this fragrance, it's in the slightly burnt-sugar and vanilla drydown that evokes the process of drinking absinthe (fire, sugar, slotted spoon). Or possibly it's the sillage; even after nearly 24 hours, A Taste of Heaven Absinthe Verte lingers on the skin, the bedsheets - a memory of what happened the night before.

As seductive as that stranger lingering about the yacht harbor, and as smooth as MJ's criminal, By Kilian's A Taste of Heaven Absinthe Verte sneaks into your soul, leaving its memory long after summer's turned to autumn.

PRICE: $225 / 1.7 oz. (refills $115)
LINK: http://www.bykilian.com/

Atelier Cologne : Orange Sanguine (2010)

The orange of all oranges, Orange Sanguine is the definitive orange elixir and every bit as cheerfully optimistic as its name. If you wore Happy when you were young, and if you adore Arancia di Capri by Acqua di Parma, and if you hold dear the memory of a summer afternoon spent sipping blood orange bellinis in a trattoria in Trastavere, Atelier's Orange Sanguine is certain to render you spellbound at the transcendent power of fragrance.

Atelier's colognes are comprised of "cologne absolue," a concentration of fragrance at 15% (significantly above the industry average for cologne of 5% and closer in concentration to eau de parfum's 15% average) - hence their lengthy sillage, a virtue which is particularly unusual in citrus scents.

As evocatively orange as Hermes signature color (for whom Orange Sanguine parfumeur Ralf Schweiger created Eau des Merveilles in 2004), Orange Sanguine is Atelier Cologne's homage to seasonal familial gatherings on the Mediterranean. Right from the start, the sweetness of the blood orange bursts into the air around you like a sudden misting in an orange grove. It's impossible not to smile.

Thanks to its highly-concentrated formulation, Orange Sanguine keeps you smiling, long after its top note shifts into jasmine and geranium before settling into the sensuality of sandalwood. All day long, you feel as if you're on holiday, recalling joyful meals spent with friends and family - and the laughter that comes so easily when life is good.

PRICE: $145 / 6.7 oz.
LINK: http://www.ateliercologne.com/

St James of London Founders Reserve : Post-Shave Cologne Soothing Cedarwood and Clarysage (2010)

Roughly 66% of men wear fragrance - and if you're one of the hold-outs in that remaining 33% (and why again aren't you wearing fragrance?) and if you're thinking that maybe it's time to dip your wrists into the fragrant waters but you're still a little uncertain about opening your wallet for a high-end cologne, then St. James of London Founders Reserve has a fine entry-point, post-shave cologne.

The St. James of London collection has been serving the needs of British gentleman and their barbers since 1953 with a line of professional barbershop products (free from alcohol, SLES, and parabens) utilizing high quality extracts and ingredients designed to benefit the skin (such as mint which cools and calms after shaving).

Their soothing Cedarwood and Clarysage Post-Shave Cologne pops with an earthy, spicy combination of pepper, bay rose, geranium, and patchouli, all wrapped in cedar. Think of an autumn morning spent traipsing through the woods with your father, freshly-shaved, as he explains to you the facts of life.

This is a fragrance with the same comfort level of Old Spice (and every bit as inexpensive) - and yet also a step into the realm of personal fragrance, whereupon you realize that the pursuit of what smells good on you is as sexy as you are.

PRICE: $8.00 / 50 ml
LINK: http://www.stjamesoflondon.com/