Mona di Orio Parfums - PART I

The best was saved for last!

Mona di Orio - Les Nombres D'Or collection

The perfect  choice for classy gifts!

Photo credit: Mona di Orio

In 2010, Mona di Orio and Jeroen Oude Sogtoen revamped their brand "Mona di Orio Parfums" with an exquisite collection called Les Nombres D'Or, inspired by the GOLDEN RATIO, a divine proportion used in architecture and maths by masters such as Michelangelo and Da Vinci, known very well by Mona, as having herself, a background in Architecture. 

As she explains "Golden Ratio ... might be the key to understand beauty. Intrigued and attracted by this aesthetic theory, it let me imagine how to revisit some influential classics of the perfumery. Searching for the perfect proportions to reach a melodious harmony. Using the best raw materials, beautiful ingredients, precious gifts blessed with divine proportions. Close your eyes, open your nose and follow their mysterious and sensual sillages."

Photo credit: Mona di Orio

In her collection today you will find 07 beautiful fragrances -  Ambre, Cuir, Musc, Vanille, Tubéreuse, Oud and Vetyvér, all EDP concentrations (except for Musc which is EDT, and OUD which is Parfum Intense), presented in a beautiful classic bottle and a very luxurious package.

Mona succeed to achieve what seemed to be impossible - to make my dad accept the idea of wearing a new perfume. You see, my dad wears Eau Sauvage by Dior since the 60's, and whatever perfume I brought for him to try, he just made a face and said "I want to see the day you will bring me something that can be compared to the beauty of Eau Sauvage" and then he pushed the bottle/samples away. The day Mona's Vetyver arrived I ran to check what my dad would say . Expecting the same reaction as always, to my surprise he opened the bottle, and with a smile he declared "This is absolutely marvelous! - Who made this perfume?" OMG, he wanted to know who created the fragrance (FYI this is the attitude of a classic perfume consumer) - So I showed him Mona's website (now under construction - being revamped too) and when he found out that she had been trained by his beloved Roudnistska, he shouts "I knew it!", like he is some kind of Luca Turin...LOL. When I told Mona about my father, she just answered me with the most humble polite attitude I have ever seen in a perfumer: "I am honored". Isn't she amazing?

But back to Les Nombres D'Or. I have already reviewed her Cuir and her Ambre fragrances. I have also posted a beautiful review on Vetyvér, but unfortunately blogger made some changes in the website and I lost this review. But she is totally worth my effort to rewrite the article.

Les Nombres D'Or OUD - against all odds, Mona crafted the best Oud perfume recently launched in the niche market. Why against all odds? Because she didn't want to develop one. Only after many requests she finally gave in, and after studing many types of raw materials she found the beauty in oil form Laos. The notes of the fragrance are: elemi from Philippines, Calabrian green mandarine, petitgrain Paraguay, Indonesian patchouli, Chinese osmanthus absolue, opoponax, jasmine,  Indian nargamotha, Atlas cedarwood, essential oil of Oudh Laos, musc, ambergris and oak moss. 

In most Oud fragrances you will find compositions inspired in Middle Eastern scents, with cardamom, saffron, roses etc...in others you will find a heavier combination of oud with vetiver, sandalwood, leather. They are all nice fragrances, but IMO Mona's stand out for her creative way of combining oud with osmanthus, opoponax and a rubbery note of cedarwood. I have mentioned many times that I love the flowery powdery rubbery woodsy effect of Black Bulgari, and now I have a different perfume, with different raw materials, from a different perfumer, and an amazing flowery powdery rubbery woodsy combo. I even dare to said that I love Oud more than Black Bulgari (OMG! I thought that day would never come!). Mona said she wanted to create a very spiritual fragrance and many consider it so. But not me. To me this is a very modern perfume classically crafted. It is very urban, very hip, and most of all very very chic. I don't feel like meditating or relaxing, although it is a very smooth delicate yet powerful scent. I want to buy a ticket to Berlin, Tokyo, New York, Shanghai...walk among the crowds...to feel the city beat!

Les Nombres D'Or TUBÉREUSE - tuberoses are tricky. Somedays I love them, somedays I just can't bare there carnal lascivious sweetness connotation of this scent. Sometimes they feel like you have bathed in laundry products -  clean to bones; sometimes it feels just dirty, sexual filth. This clean-dirty duality is somehow either interesting or really confusing to my senses. Mona's composition brings notes of pink pepper, Calabrian bergamot, green leaves, Indian Tuberose absolute, Siamese benzoin, heliotrope, amber, coconut milk and musk. The trio pepper-tuberose-coconut milk is rather opulent and beautifully contrasted with the citrusy-green sparkling notes. It is fresher and greener, complexed, less buttery, less carnal and much less opulent than the tuberose fragrances I have seen, but absolutely not less beautiful. If I can compare to all the rest, Mona's Tubéreuse whispers love words in your ears at night. It does not shout, it does not demand. It simply conquers you with her joyful tranquility of those who does not have to make effort to please others. 

To be continued...