Purple haze, Mona di Orio Violette Fumée

Friendship is an extraordinary bond between people. When this feeling is sealed with a fragrance then it’s a whole new level of being a friend. The connection becomes somehow immortal, eternal and boundless. Mona di Orio created a special fragrance for her friend and co-founder of the Maison Mona di Orio, Jeroenu Oude Sougoteu, before she passed away in late 2011.

It was a token of their friendship. This year Mister Sougoteu decided to share this fragrant memory of his friend by giving Violette Fumee to the wide distribution. There’s something symbolic in this move, like he wanted everyone to become friends with Mona di Orio even after her death, simply by having a flacon of this special perfume in their perfume cabinets. It’s touching…

This perfume opens on my skin with a lovely and ozonic freshness of violet leaf. It’s green and crunchy with an aromatic twist. There’s also some watery dewiness that marks the ozonic feeling of a garden after the rain. Just a few minutes later I can notice the actual smell of a violet, the flower. It has a clear, floral vibe combined with a velvet feeling of the petals. There’s also something sweet about this accord, like the flowers were coated with sugar, ready to be eaten as a part of some pretty dessert. This feeling lasts on me for around 20 minutes and then another phase of Violette Fumee is ready to get started and effuses other, different aromas.

What I smell next is the opoponax. It smells kind of creamy and balsamic, also with a transparent sweet twist to it. After another 15 minutes a lovely powdery feeling reaches my nose. I suppose it’s lavender with its dusty and powder like facets. In this perfume lavender isn’t very floral neither is it herbal. There’s only this powdery feeling about it – I wonder how did they achieve this effect.

As the time flies Violette Fumee becomes more floral but at the same time the feeling it has as a composition is quite manly, masculine. At the 1 hour mark I could smell a sheer rose note. Nothing very rich or seductive. It’s not a bloody-red rose but a flower with very light petals and gentle aroma. Clary sage that appears shortly after the rose brings a little bit more herbal and sweaty aroma which makes the perfume even more masculine. Now is the moment when I begin to smell tobacco as I catch another wafts of the perfume. It has this rich, smoky and incensy aroma of a pipe tobacco. Warm, balsamic and kind of spicy with something that reminds a honey chord to me.

The addition of myrrh in this phase introduces a brand new quality that blends really well with tobacco. Myrrh adds salty and resinous character, as well as it brings this light burning sensation. Cashmeran, though being a synthetic perfume ingredient, stands here for a nice and mellow, smooth woody finish. For another few hours I could smell violet, tobacco and rose.

Upon one application even lavender got much stronger and I liked it. 7 hours later we get closer to the drydown which is quite classical in terms of a perfume style. There’s a zesty bergamot combined with a rough smell of oakmoss. The entire composition ends with a guaiac wood which I couldn’t detect. I’m sure it wasn’t used in high quantities and it probably is supposed to prolong the lasting power of Violette Fumee. This perfume lasts for long 12 hours and it doesn’t effuse intensively. It prefers to stay closer to your body.

Mona di Orio Violette Fumee is the latest fragrance from this Maison. I don’t know when Mona di Orio composed it for her friend, but the perfume was introduced in 2013. It’s a part of Les Nombres d’Or collection and it’s available in 100ml bottles for 230€! Concentration is eau de parfum intense.

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