香水配对咨询 The case for perfume profiling
“I don’t get it,” says an old university friend. “Surely you either like a fragrance or you don’t?” We were discussing our respective days. As a criminal barrister, she was off to assess the profile of a suspected rapist; my day, meanwhile, would be spent being “profiled” for perfume. A service increasingly popular with boutiques, profiling is designed to help clients discover the right fragrance for them. (It’s arguable who put their law degree to better use, my friend or myself, but I defend the right to a signature fragrance, m’lud.)
“我不明白，”一位大学老友说道，“你要么喜欢一种香水，要么不喜欢，肯定是这样吧？”我们正讨论着各自的日常工作。她是刑事律师，平时要评估强奸嫌犯的“心理画像”。我的一天则花在与香水配对上。香水配对(perfume profiling)是精品店里日益红火的一项服务，旨在帮助客人发现合适的香水。（我和我的朋友都有法学学位，很难说谁更是学以致用的那一位，但我捍卫拥有一款招牌香水的权利吧，法官大人。）
As someone who isn’t loyal to any one scent but who nonetheless has olfactory opinions, I’m inclined to be as sceptical as my friend. Perfume is like art, right? You don’t know much about it but you know what you like. And, more pertinently, what you don’t like.
我不执念于某一种香型，但在嗅觉方面颇有主见，因此我也和那位朋友一样对事物充满着怀疑。香水就像艺术，对吧？你不太懂，但你知道自己喜欢什么样的。更重要的是，你知道你不喜欢什么样的。
Apparently not. “It’s hard to find a fragrance because there are so many,” says perfumer Azzi Glasser, whose profiling service at Harvey Nichols in London poses questions of loves, hates and favourite designers.
但事实似乎并非如此。“很难挑选出一款香水，因为选择范围太广了。”香水师阿齐格拉瑟(Azzi Glasser)表示。格拉瑟在伦敦夏菲尼高百货(Harvey Nichols)提供香水配对服务，问许多与爱好、憎恶和最喜欢的设计师有关的问题。
Corny as it sounds, finding the right scent can be life-changing. Benjamin Paul Mabbett, the ma de consultation at the Roja Dove Haute Parfumerie, tells me that one client broke down in tears when she found a fragrance that suited her: “I’ve been smelling of cat’s pee for 26 years!” After being guided through choices for an hour, she had picked Lalique’s Perles de Lalique (55). Each time she returned to stock up on it, she reeked of confidence.
虽然听上去是老生常谈，但找到合适的香型可以改变人生。Roja Dove高档香水店的高级顾问本杰明保罗氠贝特(Benjamin Paul Mabbett)告诉我，一位客人在找到合适的香水之后喜极而泣：“26年来，我的身上都有猫尿味！”在被领着挑选了一个小时之后，她选择了莱俪(Lalique)的水晶之珠（Perles de Lalique，售价55英镑）香水。每次回店里“囤货”的时候，她信心洋溢。
Mabbett’s profiling consultation (150, redeemable against purchase) is great fun. It is approached via the celestial marble corridor of the Salon de Parfums, which sits like a sort of posh perfume souk at the top of Harrods. Inside, it’s all Swarovski crystals, that shade of Prince-purple, and a sofa area like the VIP bit of a nightclub. Mabbett puts me through an hour of rapid decision-making, with some interesting discoveries along the way — one fragrance smells strongly of Play-Doh, which, he explains, is because it’s packed with “amber notes, and vanilla, benzoin and labdanum”.
马贝特的配对咨询（150英镑，如购买产品可免费享受）服务乐趣横生。在哈罗德(Harrods)百货顶楼，穿过香水沙龙（Salon de Parfums，它像一座荟萃了时髦香水的集市）富丽堂皇的大理石走廊，便可到达他的店面。店里镶满了施华洛世奇(Swarovski)水晶，主色调采用美国歌手Prince标志性的紫色，沙发休息区类似夜总会的VIP包厢。马贝特带我经历了一个小时的闪电决策过程，中途不乏有趣的小发现——一款香水带有强烈的培乐多(Play-Doh)彩泥气味，对此他解释说，因为它“使用琥珀香调，富含香草、安息香和劳丹脂的气味。”
In the end we narrow my “profile” down to the chypre family and I pick the beautiful Risqué (345) by Roja Parfums from the 400 fragrances on offer. Risqué is both fresh and leathery, with notes of bergamot and patchouli, cedar wood, vetiver, rose, jasmine and hyacinth. Mabbett assures me that Risqué will “take the wearer to the edge of the forbidden”, so I’m expecting something really exciting to happen any day now.
最后，我们将“配对”范围缩小至西普(chypre)家族。我从400款候选香水中选择了Roja Parfums精美的Risqué香水（售价345英镑）。Risqué清新、有皮革味，融合了佛手柑、广藿香、雪松、香根草、茉莉和风信子气息。马贝特向我保证，Risqué会将“使用者引向禁锢的边缘”。好吧，我期待着哪一天能上演什么激动人心的事情。
At Diptyque’s fragrance-fitting, I find myself sniffing the air as fragrance expert Julie Bonin offers me candles to smell (candles’ scents have less complicated structures, so they’re a good way to figure out a person’s likes and dislikes). Its 34 scent (65) is composed of 100 notes and turns out to be my favourite. Its fig, sandalwood, roses and tuberose alternately dazzle like excitable children before each settles down into a wearable blend of green woody opulence.
在Diptyque的香水配对柜台，香水专家朱丽娠坓(Julie Bonin)给了我一根蜡烛闻，于是我试图对着空气嗅出点什么。蜡烛的香味化学结构比较简单，因此容易分辨出一个人对香味的好恶。Diptyque的34号香氛（售价65英镑）由100种气息组成，是我的最爱。它的无花果、檀香、玫瑰和晚香玉气息好似容易兴奋的孩子，交替散发出迷人的味道，最后沉淀下来，幻化为萦绕周身湿木材味的丰盈感。
London has two new fragrance boutiques — Creed at 99 Mount Street and Frederic Malle at 14 Burlington Arcade (a perfume hotspot where you’ll also find Penhaligon’s, Chanel and By Kilian) — both of which offer free profiling. Creed has a serene drawing room — you can take a group of friends (book first) and work your way through the 44 fragrances. I’m asked which scents I already wear — Le Labo Santal 33 (150); Shay & Blue Blood Oranges (55) — and what I don’t like. “Oud,” I tell boutique manager Claire Slaney. When she slips in Creed’s new eau de parfum Royal Princess Oud (130) however, which uses a green oud from Cambodia with iris and vanilla (something else I thought I didn’t like), I’m surprised by its freshness and lightness.
伦敦新开了两家香水店——蒙特街(Mount Street) 99号的Creed和伯灵顿市场街(Burlington Arcade，香水聚集地，在这里还能找到潘海利根(Penhaligon's)、香奈儿(Chanel)和By Kilian等品牌）和14号的Frederic Malle，它们都提供免费香水配对服务。Creed配备了安静的休息室，你可以带上一群朋友（需提前预约），挨个尝试44种香水。我被问及自己用过什么香水——回答是Le Labo Santal 33（售价150英镑）和Shay & Blue Blood Oranges（售价55英镑）——以及我不喜欢的类型“沉香。”我告诉经理克莱尔斯莱尼(Claire Slaney)。但当她拿出Creed的新款沉香香水Royal Princess Oud（售价130英镑）时，我却讶异于它的清新和轻盈。这款香水取材于柬埔寨的一种绿色沉香树，混以鸢尾和香草味（也是我以为自己不喜欢的东西）。
Equally at Frederic Malle — which opened earlier this week — I find myself veering. They may have 22 fragrances but each is exquisitely different. I’m tempted by the woody Angéliques sous la Pluie (130), Malle’s collaboration with Jean-Claude Ellena. “Ellena is like a watercolourist, he likes fragrance to be translucent and effortless,” says Margaret Magnuson, who has worked at the brand for eight years and who tells me it’s a fragrance for someone who is confident and “does not need to broadcast their arrival. A lot of architects and photographers like it.”
同样在不久前开张的Frederic Malle，我发现自己又被颠覆了。Frederic Malle可能只有22款香水，但每款都是制作精良而又迥然不同。我钟情于散发着木质气味的Angéliques sous la Pluie（售价130英镑），它是Malle与让-克洛德埃莱纳(Jean-Claude Ellena)合作的结晶。“埃莱纳就像水彩画家，他喜欢为香水赋以半透明、慵懒的质感。”玛格丽特氠格努森(Margaret Magnuson)表示。玛格丽特在这家品牌工作8年，她告诉我，这宽香水适合性格自信，“不需要大张旗鼓地通知自己到来的那种人。它受到许多建筑师和摄影师的青睐。”
I’m not sure that pinpointing a signature scent via profiling is so easy. You’ll find one you love, several even, but these things take time and however good the profile, you need to live with the fragrance. Glasser chose Sequoia Wood (95) from her eponymous new line, The Perfumer’s Story, with top notes of fresh-smelling neroli underscored by cedar, patchouli and white musk for me — but it came with instructions: I have to wear it every day, day in and day out, even under my arms and in my hair. “Promise me,” she says, “because only then will you really feel the magic of the perfume.”
我不清楚通过配对找到一款招牌香水是否真有如此简单。你会发现自己钟爱的一款乃至几款，但这需要时间。而且，不论配对有多好，你都需要学会与香水相处。格拉瑟为我挑选了自己同名品牌新系列The Perfumer’s Story的Sequoia Wood（售价95英镑），其前调采用清新的橙花油，配以雪松、广藿香和白麝香，不过这款香水使用起来也很讲究：不管在家还是出门，每天都要使用，甚至是腋下和头发都要喷。“答应我，”她说，“因为只有这样，你才能真正感受到这款香水的魔力。”
