Hidden Dragon: Chinese New Year Flavors

2023 Author: Jessica James | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-26 15:47

This year, Chinese New Year is celebrated on February 16th. In connection with the holiday, perfume critic Ksenia Golovanova compiled the best fragrances for this event.

Perfume Panda, Zoologist Perfumes

On New Year's Eve, the Chinese like to give the so-called "bamboo of happiness", a beautiful plant with stems artificially woven into a symmetrical pattern. The fact that bamboo pretends to be a different species - Dracaena Sander - donors do not bother; the main thing is that the right number of stems stick out from the pot - for example, two (for happiness in love) or eight (as a wish for wealth). But the Panda of the Canadian brand Zoologist is a lot of bamboo, a real abundance of bitter grass and chewed eucalyptus leaves, a vegetarian feast in the middle of a Chinese reserve. Indeed, happiness is pandas.

Buy: $ 135 for 60ml, Luckyscent Online Store

Cologne Eau de Mandarine Ambrée, Hermès

The festive menu for the Chinese New Year often includes fish, as the word for fish (yu) sounds the same as the word for excess, the blue-green algae fatsai, whose name is homonymous with Cantonese for flourish, and mandarins in some dialects they phonetically match the word "luck". The rounder and more golden the fruit, the better, and in this sense, Hermès has no competitors: its huge, fiery mandarin slowly and heavily sinks into the amber, like the sun beyond the edge of the Great Wall of China.

Buy: 5 670 rub. for 100 ml, Ile de Bote online store

Toilet water Yvresse, YSL

This beautiful fruity chypre shows a movie about the New Year, as the Chinese golden youth celebrate it: champagne corks fly, expensive powder flickers on porcelain faces, peach blossom crumbles into plates - a tribute to the New Year's traditions of parents. The intoxicating scent of new wealth.

Buy: 7 087 rub. for 80 ml, YSL online store

Eau de parfum Jade, Olivier Durbano

In China, jade, a mineral most often colored in shades of green, is called the stone of longevity: due to the peculiarities of its structure - its thin fibers intertwine like felt - jade is stronger than steel. In Chinese culture, long life is considered one of the main values (and, at the same time, virtues), so giving jade is always appropriate - even in the form of perfume. Moreover, Jade is really very good - a cold menthol chypre with a reservoir of mountain air in the very heart of the stone.

Buy: $ 190 for 100 ml, Luckyscent Online Store

Eau de parfum Osmanthus Interdite, Parfum d'Empire

Osmanthus, a tree-like shrub with small star-shaped flowers, widespread in tropical regions of Asia, is considered one of the ten sacred plants in China: the moon hare pounds the elixir of immortality in a mortar all year round, sitting under an osmanthus tree. The absolute obtained from its flowers smells like a ready-made perfume: apricot and peach, soap suds, honey and violets. Chinese New Year's dessert - slightly sweetened jelly with golden stars of osmanthus, and Osmanthus Interdite - but the latter neatly spreads its fragrant riches on a thin leather cloth, smells of the same wonderful things.

Buy: 10 500 rub. for 100 ml, boutique "Perfumer"

Eau de parfum Kenzo Amour, Kenzo

On the 15th day of the first lunar month, the Chinese celebrate the Lantern Festival or Yuanxiaojie, which traditionally ends with New Year's celebrations. The main treat of the festival is yuanxiao, balls of sticky, usually sweet, rice. There are 2 types of yuanxiao, with and without filling: the former are boiled in sweetened water and served in cups, the latter are filled with walnuts, sesame seeds, cinnamon flowers, rose petals, tangerine zest and sweet soy puree - in any combination. Edible and Kenzo, smelling like a dessert from a New Chinese Restaurant - sweet rice to which vanilla foam and cherry blossom coolies have been added.

Buy: From 3 592 rub. for 30 ml, Rive Gauche stores

Eau de parfum Cinnabar, Estée Lauder

Cinnabar translates as "cinnabar" - this is the name of the pigment obtained from the mineral of the same name, and a bright shade of red, it is also Chinese red. This is the color of the famous Chinese lacquer mixed with gold, silky red money envelopes that the Chinese give to children and seniors for the New Year, and the covers of vintage Cinnabar perfumes - the modern version has a transparent stopper. But the essence remains the same, flaming red: ylang-ylang and jasmine burn without a trace in a transparent aldehyde fire.

Buy: 4 182 rub. for 50 ml, shops "Rive Gauche"