Perfume Blog

NY Times perfume critic always smells a metaphor

Author, investigative journalist and researcher Chandler Burr, 44, is The New York Times’ perfume critic. His is the only column of its kind in North America to scrutinize and rate fragrances as critically as the Michelin Guide does restaurants. His latest book, The Perfect Scent: A Year Inside the Perfume Industry in Paris & New York, is published by Henry Holt & Company.

Q: What is the mission of your Scent Strip column?

A: When it came out, Stefano Tonchi (Times style guru) said that The New York Times would be the first publication in the United States to treat perfume as a true, full art. Just as one would treat painting, music, food, wine, these are all creative art forms that have their critics….Stefano understood that perfume needs its own truly independent critical apparatus.

Q: You’re an accomplished author who can fluently speak four languages. Did you ever think you’d be walking around New York with Sarah Jessica Parker talking about perfumes?

A: No, I certainly didn’t…(but) I grew up in Washington, D.C., in an upper-middle-class area where there were a lot of kids with famous parents and that sort of thing. The secretary of defence actually lived down the street from us. So I was sort of used to (celebrity).

Q: You seem to get some flak for the way you describe perfumes such as Diorella smelling like “a new fur coat that has been rubbed with a very creamy mint toothpaste. Not gel. Paste. It is a great, great fragrance….” Why do you write this way?

A: Using terms like floral, woody, fruity means almost nothing. From an aesthetic point of view and even an intellectual point of view, there is almost no content. They are zero-calorie terms….The (perfume) reflects the artist’s intellectual, aesthetic and artistic intentions. Those intentions are what we criticize. Is the work successful? New? Innovative? Beautiful? Striking? Familiar? Disturbing? Does it illicit emotion? Metaphor is the only interesting and effective way of describing the experience of that art.

Q: What is your favourite scent?

A: Obviously, I have a million of them. But if you forced me to choose one it would be a carbon dioxide distillation of baby carrot from a company called Firmenich.

Q: Is it wrong when men wear women’s fragrances?

A: It’s totally right. Most masculines are crap….I call it the masculine cliché. Every version of the masculine cliché smells the same. It’s a little citrus, throw in a little spice, throw in some metallic tin can and that’s it.

They are all the same and smell like they should be sold in drugstores for putting on under armpits. They are garbage.

Q: Scents usually cause emotional reactions in your writing. Has a fragrance ever caused a physical reaction?

A: I am not a particular fan of sentimentality. I don’t like drama. Or exaggeration. But when Chanel No. 22 was relaunched, I actually, very briefly, began to cry because my mother wore it. I have a very strong memory of her dressed up with makeup, a ring and pearl necklace ready to go to a party and me at 5, 6, 7, having to go to bed, hating it and her kissing me goodnight and remembering the scent of her perfume.