Flor y Canto
Arquiste (2011)

Putting on Flor y Canto is like entering a rain forest, where sweet-powdery flowers grow among green leaves and stems, and brightly coloured birds feed on mango-like fruits.

It’s like a Rousseau painting done by someone who knows the forest intimately. The scene is joyful and bright, and there is none of that Fear of the Other which inhabits the shadowy scenes of Le Douanier.

The opening stanza is cassie, vanilla and balms, but that doesn’t capture the sense of déjà vu I had when first putting it on.
This odd dislocation isn’t due to the fact that it’s based around tuberose, that familiar weirdness only appears later. It’s something about the way that the fruity and confectionery tones mix and mingle with the resiny underpinning, they combine in a way which is both natural and quite strange; it doesn’t feel forced, as it might at the hands of a lesser perfumer, instead it’s intriguing.

Flor y Canto – Flower and Song – is a simple two-part harmony of milky acid fruitiness and tuberose bouquet. It’s begins quite unusually – but is somehow familiar, and then, as the tuberose comes to the fore, it becomes more familiar – but still unusual. It is basically a tuberose after all…

Rodrigo Flores-Roux is known for his use of customized natural materials, and with the help of this unique arsenal he’s created his own eclectic style of modern perfumery, one that – when combined with inventiveness and a concern for quality compositions – gives his work an authenticity that puts him outside the mainstream.

And, perhaps because of that, there is a sense of integrity to this solar fruity floral – which is familiar but unusual – and narcotic, but not heavy; it’s as easy to wear as picking a bloom from the forest and placing it behind your ear.

This isn’t natural perfumery, but there’s a naturalness to it that’s hard to resist.

Yesterday I culled through my summer flowers to prepare for winter and snow. I cut the marigold blossoms off the plants and put them in a glass in my kitchen. The sweet smell of the flower heads was all over my hands and I started wishing for a marigold fragrance. I briefly looked for primary tagetes and calendula notes in scents but got sidetracked. I'd recently secured some Arquiste scents and noticed that one of them featured a marigold note. While I get tuberose throughout, the main note to me is marigold. A sweet, almost cloying marigold, at times almost reminiscent of Jil Sander, No. 4 - but not so syrupy sweet. Not a long lasting fragrance but wearable for when I want to add a little depth to my florals.

Tuberose and magnolia and clearly the two core components of this unashamedly sweetish-floral composition. It is soft, gentle and flowery in a spring garden way.

At times hints of geranium break through, an in the second half the marigold emerges. The floral character never changes, and there is not even that standard coda of musk or vanilla that usually graces the base notes. No, a sheer bouquet of flowers, not more and not less.

I get moderate sillage, adequate projection and an excellent longevity of nine hours on my skin.

A lovely creation, not very creative or original and nicely done and not too synthetic. And quite unobtrusive and hence very wearable in the office. 3/5.

A limpid, summery tuberose-magnolia combo with a hair spray aura. Wears soft and easy, but too much of a simpleton in cheap attire.

I got a sample of this from my local perfumer here in Minneapolis. WOW....I am just now getting into florals and this one is a show stopper. It is oh so elegant and very refined. I am a total newbie as far as the language so all I can say is I smell the tuberose and I am guessing everything else combined perfectly! To sum this up in one word: Lovely.