As part of programming for the museum’s trio of floral-inspired exhibitions—Rebecca Louise Law: Awakening, Cross-Pollination: Flowers Across the Collection and Moemoeā—perfume expert Neil Chapman takes the Doris Duke Theatre stage to discuss the olfactive significance of flowers and perfumes through history, artistry and the physiological.
Chapman is the winner of the Fragrance Foundation’s prestigious Jasmine Literary Award for fragrance writing, is the author of Perfume: In Search of Your Signature Scent (Hardie Grant, 2019) and a regular contributor to Vogue Japan.
He has produced the influential blog The Black Narcissus, an exploration of perfume and the experience of smell, since 2012. Chapman has been interviewed about perfume and all things olfactory for BBC Radio London, Radio Europe, and Monocle, and has written features for Aesop Magazine, ODOU magazine, and Shooter Literary Magazine, as well as being featured in Woman & Home, The Slowdown.TV, and the Japan Times.
3 Comments
I am glad you chose to write because you are such an excellent writer.
I have well over a thousand fragrances and love them all, albeit some more than others. However, since I was forced to retire and now have no paycheck, I realize how much I went overboard with my perfume collection. Especially, since now the perfume industry is very different than when I began my journey with perfume. Back then, there were only what we now call vintage, thus perfumes were much more special and constant new launches did not exist. Now there are thousands of perfume houses cropping up every day and most of them start off with exhibiting at least five perfumes and sometimes many more. It makes me think that the new popularity of perfume has created lots of money mongers who could care less about perfume but want to become rich by creating a line. Your blog was and is an excellent reference for people who are truly into the world of fragrance. You tell it like it is and it is what it is, although sometimes I wish it was more like long ago when there were very few houses, but most of their new (and old) offerings were beautiful. Back then, we were happy if we were able to even own one. Now, there are too many around that are just there to make money and do not really care or have true love for perfume. Thank you for your honest and always enjoyable reviews! Your book is a classic. Perhaps one day you will create your own perfume, I know it would be better than some of the ones that are now out there.
Absolutely fascinating