Eris Parfums

Your mother would like them

I had a six-hour wait at Naples airport and could not wait to crack open my haul from Esxence. The first sample set that came to hand was Eris Parfums. Eris is a US-based firm art-directed by perfume collector, historian and critic Barbara Herman. It started in 2016 and has been releasing fragrances at a sensible pace, roughly one per year on average. This already tells you that they do not belong to the standard niche vaporware firm that does 20 fragrances in rainbow colors on day one, linked together by some flimsy icosahedral concept. Eris is a Greek goddess of “strife and discord,” so expect the perfumes to be of the sort your mother wouldn’t like, but for the fact that she is just the type to wear one of them.

Sitting at the airport Lavazza bar with smelling strips in a row next to a cappuccino and sublime cornetto—a croissant with jam inside, since Neapolitans consider the plain one a penance—had an interesting effect. Three women (two passengers and a waitress) approached me in quick succession, asking to smell the perfumes. I texted Tania about this and suggested we move to Naples. She countered that the friendliness of the local women indicated that we should not move to Naples. I did the control experiment of removing the smelling strips to see whether my popularity persisted. No one approached for the next half hour.

All Eris fragrances are composed by Antoine Lie, dear to my heart since his insane Sécrétions Magnifiques (2006), a brilliant and mostly unwearable essay in bilge and spermatous notes. We reviewed Belle de Jour, Ma Bête, Mx. and Night Flower in the 2018 guide.

For paid subscribers, reviews of Green Spell, Delta of Venus, Scorpio Rising and Mxxx.