Burlesque

This perfume is absolutely stunning! On me it starts out with incense-y smoke and patchouli, then melts into creamy, powdery iris and rose. The orange is less pronounced on my skin, but I can tell it’s lingering in the background, giving the other notes a juicy fullness. I can imagine discovering a beautiful, unmarked bottle of perfume in an antique store and smelling this fragrance within. This is all scarlet lipstick, cigarette holders, and finger waves. Elegant, blasé and sexy.

This beauty had me at its opening notes- sexy skanky incense and patch, with resins in the background and a beautiful balancing blood orange note. I also smell a nice note of civet. This is like vintage Tabu, Shocking by Schiaperilli and My Sin, with the iris from Shalimar all rolled into one glorious perfume. As the fragrance develops it softens and iris becomes a major player followed by a glorious rose note. This is a stunning retro glam femme fatale perfume that can happily be worn by a modern woman of any age. Burlesque is a modern beauty with reverential reference to the golden age of perfumery. Others have tried and failed to create what Maria Gentile has accomplished with Burlesque. Pure genius in my opinion.

I am a fan of Maria Candida Gentile's perfumes but even still Burlesque surprised me. I think mostly because it develops on my skin differently than it's described. The citrus top notes are extremely mellow, not tart, and the blood orange morphs seamlessly into a creamy iris/rose combo where neither one is delineated but both accentuate each other beautifully. The incense and patchouli make their appearance very quickly on me, but this is not Haight/Ashbury patch, this is the burlesque, boas, and ruffle-up-the-flowers patchouli. Just enough earthiness to make this incredibly sexy while still retaining it's elegant composure.