FORÊT AUX INSTRUMENTS: Une Symphonie d'Odeurs | Limited Edition Box Set

Have you ever noticed how scent shares similarities with song? The way bouquets of aromatic notes can fill your heart the way melodies can fill you with emotion? Both follow a wave of experience, evolving through layers, moments, and harmonies…

Earlier this year, Montréal's symphonic orchestra, L'Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, invited LVNEA founder and perfumer April Lea to collaborate on a project where scent and sound collide. Equipped with an extensive playlist of classic and contemporary masterpieces, April was tasked with interpreting rich symphonic textures into five distinct perfumes. Each fragrance would represent the sections typically found at the orchestra; brass, woodwinds, percussion, strings, and the organ.

Take our hand and step into the Forêt aux Instruments: Une Symphonie d'Odeurs ("Instrument Forest: a Symphony of Odours"), where five distinct parts of a symphonic whole are transmuted from sound into colourful olfactory landscapes meant to lead you through the seasons of the year ears and nose first.

This coffret includes:

WOODWINDS | Camphor, cardamom, cypress, violet leaf, water accord, frankincense, and sandalwood

In an orchestra, woodwinds contribute cool, contrasting tones and moving, emotional solos. They enrich the overall texture of a musical piece and provide rhythm with dazzling agility, equal parts grounding and soul-stirring in their nature.

When interpreted into scent, Woodwinds is a cool woods and incense fragrance that embodies sacred breath, composure, and fluidity. It represents Winter, and debuts with an introspective, aerial quality; clear, calm, and expansive. Before long, the watery heart thaws and flows forth, while a woody base lends the composition a quiet, sturdy presence. As the life-bearing stream trickles forth into the earth, the soil softens in preparation for Spring.

PERCUSSION | Pink peppercorn, green stems, iris, violet, black currant, tuberose, rosewood, oakmoss, and wild grass

In an orchestra, percussion instruments help provide colour and excitement to music. A dynamic range of emotions can be expressed through their slow, subtle rolls and sharp, sudden crashes, providing both harmony and dramatic dissonance  in earnest, eager expressions of exclamation.

When interpreted into scent, Percussion is a playful affair, celebrating the anticipated arrival of Springtime. Rolling green hills are punctuated with colourful bursts of blooming flowers. The scent of dewy grass and wildflowers bring levity, joy, and innocence, while a mossy base reminds us that growth comes from deep within.

BRASS |  Ginger, bitter orange, petitgrain, davana, marigold, oakwood cask, amber accord, tobacco, hay, and a metallic accord

In an orchestra, the brass section provides powerful and majestic sounds, often used for fanfare and celebratory melodies. Their booming voices are typically positioned at the back of the orchestra, and rise from the musical horizon like rays of golden sunlight illuminating the scene.

When interpreted into scent, Brass is composed of bright citrus and metallic notes superposed with a grandiose base of bourbon splashes and booming laughter. Splendid, jovial, and care-free, this fragrance performs like a brilliant solar flare and fades into the warm, brassy patina of a sun-soaked amber accord, representing Summertime.

STRINGS | Clementine, red mandarine, apricot, ylang ylang, patchouli, warm spices, sweet amber, suede accord, and cedarwood

In an orchestra, strings can convey a wide range of emotions, from soaring joy to profound sadness. Serene, lamentous, and soulful, string instruments are considered the ‘voice' of the orchestra, driving it forward in tone and timbre.

When interpreted into scent, Strings needed to embody the complex gamut of emotions elicited from feelings of nostalgia, devastating and romantic. Associated with the season of Autumn, this composition harmonizes ruby-red pulp with bitter citrus zest and the sting of spice. A heart of honeyed florals soothes the senses and provides a warm, ambered glow to an otherwise obscured and opulent backdrop.

THE ORGAN | Pine needles, bitter orange, cedarwood, saffron, forest incense, spiced amber, damp earth, oakmoss.

In an orchestra, the organ provides a sense of spiritual majesty through resonance and grandeur. If the different sections of an ensemble correspond to the seasons in a year, the organ is the Wheel; grand, timeless, all-encompassing. Rows of hundreds of tuned pipes arranged in tiered rows are controlled by compressed air through a number of keyboards, capable of producing innumerable harmonies and devastatingly somber movements. Rarely is the organ granted the opportunity to express the full magnitude of its expression; a roaring, rapturous sound of synthesis and harmony, hundreds of voices rising as one.

When interpreted into scent, The Organ needed to reflect the grandeur of life’s dizzying motions; a chorus of harmonic birdsong rising above a canopy of orchestral movement.

The Organ incorporates facets from all four segments of the musical ensemble, from the bright and brassy to the solemn and grave. It houses hundreds of voices from within its colossal structure, expressed through the masterful juxtaposition of warmth, celebration, contemplation, and lament; citrus, spice, the sweet sting of sticky pine, the lassitude of tree sap, the rising breath of incense and the devastating beauty of ephemeral flowers gone to seed.

Each hand-filled bottle contains 4 ml of Eau de Parfum, for a total of 5 bottles / 20 ml.

A LIMITED EDITION RELEASE
NATURAL · BOTANICAL · UNISEX
BLENDED & BOTTLED IN-HOUSE IN SMALL BATCHES