hortus conclusus

To wash that t errible Givenchy (Ange ou Demon le Secret) from my nose, I scrubbed myself down, had some coffee, took a deep breath, then applied one of my favorite roses, the lovely, understated Les Parfums de Rosine Ecume de rose , a salty, fresh rose with a certain herbaceous quality to it. Something about the way this interacts with my skin creates that tangy salty smell--or is it a feeling-- that you get when you smell the skin of somebody who has been exercising outsid e in the cold. it is briny, a bit metallic, tickles the nose ever so slightly, and is very real, and it makes all sorts of memories come flooding in. The vetiver (one of my favorite notes) at the base gives this a woody, rooty, musky slant, and really does summon images of a rose bush growing on some rock overlooking some wild oceanscape. Really quite lovely. In some ways this reminds me of a beautiful day I spent with my sister last year. She lives near Seattle, and the day before I had to leave we went to a...

My husband is a lot more meticulous than I am. Where I am slovenly and haphazard, he is careful and graceful. I especially admire the way he makes his daily routines into aesthetic rituals that have a real depth and beauty to them. For example, while I shower in a dark closet of a bathroom, he bathes in a foggy, luminous steam in the other bathroom, which has a window in the shower area. He uses Guerlain’s Vetiver body wash to wash his body—this makes that steam smell absolutely luscious—and a local company’s equally marvelous Mahogany soap for his face. He washes his hair with lavender shampoo, and sometimes conditions with rosemary mint. He says that on of his favorite things about the process is “smelling all the different stuff as I put it on.” Once he feels sufficiently steamed up, he wraps his lithe little body in a white towel, and sets to work on his dark, bristly beard. He lathers up some Crabtree & Evelyn Sandalwood Aromatic Shave Cream and paints it on his face with...

I am a huge fan of Alexander McCall Smith's series of books about the Botswanan lady detective Precious  Ramotswe, all of which are truly a joy to read. McCall Smith's deceptively simple prose somehow succeeds in bringing me on a journey to a place--surely partly imaginary--where life is simple and so is the ethical code, which is based on a lovely notion of traditional values. Precious Ramotswe often finds herself in difficult quandaries, but she always chooses the path that shows care and respect for others while maintaining her own dignity. That may sound boring or too moralistic, but believe me when I say that these books are refreshing, sincere, and completely uncynical. So to inaugurate my new series of Synaesthetic adventures--blueprints for little themed adventures for all your senses--I give you my plan for a very nice afternoon that challenges all your senses. Put the pot on, and brew some nice Rooibos tea . I like it with milk and a tiny bit of sugar, but you...

My husband and I have been mourning the death of one of our favorite products, L'Occitane's Cade After Shave Splash , and have been casting about for a replacement. Then it occurred to me that we could at least try to create a suitable substitute, since what we really need is a strongly spicy/juniper accord in a super-alcoholic splash--I can do that, I told myself. I'm no perfumer, but I figured trying once wouldn't hurt. So I created a base of essential oils of vetiver, cedarwood, rosemary, juniper, and tea tree, blended it, and let it sit. So far so good. Today I pounded down cloves, cardamom seeds, mint, lemon peel, coriander, pepper, cumin, allspice, nutmeg, juniper seeds, and bay leaves into a rough powder in my mortar and pestle, then added a bit of rosewater, my homemade vanilla extract, and a tiny bit of almond oil and pounded again to create a paste. It smelled pretty heavenly, I must say! I funneled the green paste into my essences, the poured in a bunch...