nu_be new line of scents
nu_be is a collaboration between a
group of an enterprising group of young people and Fluidounce,
a new manufacturer of fragrances which has required the work of
talented composers from Takasago.
"nu_be speaks
of the origins of the universe, of that primordial magma that gave
birth to stars, a material still in fusion harking back to Chaos, a
state preceding finished Form. (...). An adventurous trek that begins
far, far away to end up as life on Earth: from a cloud in sidereal
space, the celestial dust itself becomes a "new being",
alive and transformed. (…) Something spiritual and cosmic
recalling the uncontaminated matter boiling in the Earth's bowels" they say on their website.
I liked their definition a lot, and I write it here because their fragrances are quite consistent with this "mystical/geological" view. Yet, they aren't so strange that they can't be worn, indeed. You smell the research for new accords giving birth to unexpected sensations, but this research never gets into the “un-wearable” side so they stay, in their strangeness, pleasant to use (sure, they take a minimum of openness and curiosity about the wonders that molecules, properly used, can offer to our nose).
I liked their definition a lot, and I write it here because their fragrances are quite consistent with this "mystical/geological" view. Yet, they aren't so strange that they can't be worn, indeed. You smell the research for new accords giving birth to unexpected sensations, but this research never gets into the “un-wearable” side so they stay, in their strangeness, pleasant to use (sure, they take a minimum of openness and curiosity about the wonders that molecules, properly used, can offer to our nose).
Hydrogen (by Antoine Lie, his are some
of the most beautiful scents in the Etat Libre d'Orange and Comme des
Garcons lines): melon and tangerine, basil, cold spices and oak moss,
white musk and aldehydes, calone and dihydromyrcenol offer an
intensely clean feeling of bitter coldness. This icy-cold feeling, marking the "New Freshness" family (starting with Cool Water), here is taken to its extreme, and suggests a perfectly white, blinding neon light. Hydrogen is also as dry as
an ice awl, or as a vodka on the rocks. This thrilling impression eventually dissolves into a rough, aromatic, stimulating woody note (Cashmeran and juniper?).
Helium (Sylvie Fischer) iris and damask
rose, clary sage, cinnamon, benzoin, styrax, patchouli, guaiac
wood, tobacco and vetiver make a velvety and warm scent, of soft,
poudrèe elegance. A delicate suede (sage) and "apricot jam"
note complement each other with rose, creating a gently enveloping
feel. One of the most interesting fragrances in the line.
Carbon (Francoise Caron: hers are the
legendary Ombre Rose by Brosseau and Eau d'Orange Verte d'Hermes,
Iris Nobile by Acqua di Parma and CdG's Palisander, as well as many
others) is woody, deep and mystic; it brought me back to mind the
dark forest and dangerous feelings in Shiseido's Feminite du Bois:
here cedarwood is central, joined by cold spices such as
cardamom and ginger, black pepper, iris and sandalwood. Over time,
the fragrance offers a rare and masterfully composed harmony
between an almost fruity sweetness and a spicy, dry and dusty feel.
The more complex and meditative scent of the line and, in my opinion, and the most exciting.
Lithium (Nicolas Bonneville, enfant prodige just graduated at Isipca and apprentice of Francis
Kurkdjian, "Maladie d'Amour" in the Histoires d'Eaux line
is by him) is a challenging and interesting scent played on opposite
impressions: one is cold/mineral and the other is heat/flintstone.
The start is quite smoky with iris and warm spices, then rose, woods
and musk (I also smell IBQ and galbanum). The overall impression is
fascinating, intense, mysterious, hot, dark, opaque and rubbery like
one of those black paints that are all the rage on cars. Underneath
the overall impression there's a frosted-tangerine note also present in
Maladie d'Amour (I guess it's some speciality from Takasago) smiling
without being noticed too much: its presence only serves to further
strengthen the thick darkness of the fragrance.
Oxygen (Antoine Lie) "Here it is,
a fragrance that you can't grab or capture, but that is in the air
all around you," says Antoine Lie. And in fact, given this
assumption, Oxygen bears witness to the genius of its author,
who was able to give substance to an extremely elusive olfactory
impression. With pinches of saffron (which I haven't detected),
frankincense and pepper, vetiver, white musk and an overdose of
aldehydes, Lie was able to recreate a convincing smell of steam: clean, fresh,
but also opaque, chalky, rough with something "gasoline"
in it, which makes it less abstract and more real. It was
deliberately kept delicate and not overly impactful; if that's your
thing, you will be reminded of the brilliant "Cologne" by
Morillas for T. Mugler, it shares its serene and discreet mood. It's a strange scent, difficult to label, but I know that if I had to fly a spacecraft around the
Earth, I couldn't wear anything more appropriate than this.
I must warn that this line is to be tested on skin, I was shocked to discover the huge difference between the tests on touche, where fragrances don't "sing" at all, and those on skin, where they "open up" much better revealing a thousand shades more. Some are rather multifaceted and soft-edged if not blurry, the often contradictory feelings overlap and melt one in another in a continuous movement that does not define a sharp form: I found this an intriguing feature. The scents don't radiate much from the skin, their impact being reserved to the wearer and the people who he/she chooses to invite closer, and their life is average long.
Have you already had chance to smell them?
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