Where's Alice?

 Masque Milano founders, Alessandro Brun and Riccardo Tedeschi, invited us, perfumistas all over the world, to be part of a live event, on the 3rd of April, where their latest release, Lost Alice, was introduced. As for the two previous events, the Masque Milano team did an amazing job at sending us a beautiful put together box with five secret vials, a bag of Earl Grey Tea and two milk candies to enjoy during the olfactory experience. MacKenzie Reilly, the perfumer, got us through each one of the accords used to compose the fragrance and described each step of the inspiration for its creation. 

Now that 100 lucky people, including myself, had the opportunity to participate to Masque Milano's reveal and almost everyone found out that the Tea Party is actually a hint to Burton's Alice in Wonderland, let's talk Lost Alice's first impressions.

I'll start by saying that for me personally the sum of Lost Alice's parts is greater than the whole and not the other way around. The accords per se are magnificent and have unveiled to my nose tonalities of some absolutes i wasn't familiar with before.

Accord Flower#2 is a beautiful orris/carrot seeds mix with all of their beautiful facets - earthy, rooty, unctuous, floral and dry.

Magic is the cake to the carrots. The accord has a butter biscuits feel with nutty and apricots/suede facets.

Mad is the tea-accord, the more masculine counterpart of the gourmand Magic. Dry (tea leaves), bitter citrus, a burst of black pepper and a touch of the greener side of the jasmine to give more strength and authenticity to the tea accord.

Flower #1 is a broom (flower) based accord. First time i smell such thing and it's fascinating, to say the least. It's rich and sweet honeyed yeast with that specific animalic touch the beeswax is characterized by. It has a musky-floral with a cogniac-like side, it's slightly chocolaty and resinous. More than an interesting sensory experience.

Now, Lost Alice, the final result, is very nice on paper - it's bright citrus infused in black pepper with a sweet nuttiness in the background that sourrounds the warm floral and gourmand elements in a cold embrace. Woods, greens, florals, citruses are perfectly balanced into a delicious gourmand that doesn't surpass any overly sweet barrier. 

On skin, in change, it's very different. Lost Alice loses all of its luminosity in favor of the carrot cake sweetness - only the black pepper manages to pierce with coldness the sweetness that for a non-gourmand like myself results to be overbearing. From there is only gets sweeter to the point of caramel melted in milk. I wish the accords were equally balanced, instead of giving the Magic accord the central weight of the composition. Act IV, Scene 1 didn't fell down the rabbit hole. 

I love Lost Alice's concept and the individual accords that compose it, but i get lost in their translation into the actual scent.