According to one of Bratislava’s legends, a seemingly upright burgher lived in a house in the center of the city, who, however, secretly dealt with alchemy. He was so obsessed with the idea of making gold that the devil himself took advantage of it and offered him this secret (under foreseeable conditions), but on the condition that he would not use that gold too much so that it would not be suspicious.
But appetite comes with eating and the burgher used gold more and more, until it became suspicious of others where he took it. And one evening, after the day when he broke the agreement in a truly large-scale manner, the devil came again to his house and both disappeared in a cloud of smoke.
That smoke could smell maybe like the new Athanor perfume, which is the latest addition to the Talismans collection from the Menditorossa brand.
Athanor – originally in Arabic al-tannoor – is the name of an alchemical furnace. And the whole scent is carried in the spirit of fire and alchemy. There is sulfur in the head (I fortunately don’t smell it here), in the heart there is a special substance of Fumencens, which is obtained by distilling frankincense.
The perfume smells really interesting, something like incense smoke, but purified from any bituminous or spicy tones. It does not resemble “church” incense or “oriental”, nor is it a campfire odor, just a pure smoky scent. A little bit of aiyr iris may help the impression, but Fumencens clearly plays a major role.
The bottle is, as usual with this brand, once again beautiful, not only with a beautiful lid, which is a bronze statuette itself, but also inside the bottle is a small piece of metal, which is imitation of a nugget of gold, which alchemists dreamed to produce.
And another small alchemical miracle is the fact, that while it is still a pre-order only on the Menditorossa website, it is already available for purchase in Bratislava’s perfumery Le Parfum Le Chic.
The nose of the perfume is Luca Maffei and the bottle design was created by Stefania Squeglia, the fragrance is available in a concentration of Extrait de Parfum (35% of fragrant ingredients).
Fragrance Notes:
Head: sulphur, blackcurrant, saffron
Heart: iris, cypriol, Fumencens
Base: Cashmeran, Gaiac wood, Java vetiver, Black amber
