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[quote=fenton_t_fox;999334] Originally Posted by teflondog I was disappointed when I first smelled this. I was expecting something really funky and outrageous. Instead I found it very wearable and clean smelling. To me it opens up with a fizzy accord that reminds me of 7-up. It later progresses into something that smells like freshly steamed towels at a sauna. I'm missing the whole "graveyard" effect with it and I regret not being able to make that connection since I like outlandish scents.[/QUOTE Messe de Minuit is one of those fragrances that i have noticed, through my experience of it alters in different climates and for that musty old damp book shop church effect you have to wear it in northern europe or maybe more temperate parts of the usa.
I've worn it in damp and grey Wales where it really did give off that damp musty old church smell and also on the Greek island of Rhodes where it was almost a spicy mandarin dry type of incense smell ,one fragrance two totally different climates and two totally different outcomes . It's very interesting with this particular fragrance how different the perceptions of it are. Some people like you, find it very wearable & not "weird" , unless, like you said, you wear it in a damp location. I smelled this scent in Saks, and found it to be very stale & musty smelling, my son didn't smell what I did, and kind of liked it...interesting...
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Originally Posted by RCavs I hate this stuff! If I said It's Hideous, I'd be complimenting it...
Completely unwearable, reminds me of old stuff stocked in a church or dungeon, full of incense smoke and dust. Those kind of things where rats and other disgusting insects have passed and left their smell...
I'm getting the visual, not a good advertisement for the fragrance...lol...
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Originally Posted by Squeezeweasel Absolutely love it. I don't really believe that scent is a sense connected to memory any more than hearing, touch, taste or sight are - that said, there are a few perfumes which I find very evocative (in the same way that I find some sounds or tastes evocative).
Although I'm not religious, I love church music and the beauty of church architecture. I grew up in a high-church Anglican environment, went to school next door to Westminster Abbey and later on had a choral scholarship at St Martin in the Fields. For me, these places were very happy places and it was a very happy time - Messe de Minuit nails that time down for me. The papery dankness reminds me of the rooms in the crypt at St Martin's where we kept the sheet music, the cold stone feeling reminds me of the monuments in the abbey, and it's all tied together with the incense.
I've a friend who had a very unhappy Jesuit childhood, and he hates, hates, hates MdM. Another friend is a book-loving librarian who works in a university library, and she loves it - it makes her think of book stacks. I do wonder whether this is one of those rare perfumes that people perceive completely differently depending on associations with time and place, rather that depending on the abstract beauty of the fragrance. Your interpretations are very interesting, and you basically are saying, if you are a well balanced minded person & have had good memories in your life, that you would perceive this as a positive experience. I guess I'm imbalanced, tell me something I don't know...lol...

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I would love to try it but it's so hard to come by in the UK.

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Originally Posted by Dante I would love to try it but it's so hard to come by in the UK. Liberty carries it, and Les Senteurs used to (I assume it still does...) You can order a sample from the latter.
It makes me think of black mould.

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It puts me in mind of how my grandparent's house often smelled at night with the southern summer heat blazing away outside and their antiquated air conditioner sputtering on. It certainly does give the impression of age and nostalgia. I didn't exactly get the "gothic" aspect, (which only the scent of a clove cigarette inspires in me) but it is clearly has a very familiar character. I personally find it difficult to think under what circumstances I'd wear this, but I admire it. It's likely best used in private enjoyment, as someone else suggested.

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Originally Posted by fernloth It puts me in mind of how my grandparent's house often smelled at night with the southern summer heat blazing away outside and their antiquated air conditioner sputtering on. It certainly does give the impression of age and nostalgia. I didn't exactly get the "gothic" aspect, (which only the scent of a clove cigarette inspires in me) but it is clearly has a very familiar character. I personally find it difficult to think under what circumstances I'd wear this, but I admire it. It's likely best used in private enjoyment, as someone else suggested. Your like the third person who said they liked "clove cigarettes." I never heard of or smelled them, but clove is in quite a few different scents. The only strong clove I've smelled was at my dentist office, years ago. I don't think I would like something to remind me of that...lol...

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It's almost a "novelty" scent to me...hard to explain. I think there's better in this whole Catholic church genre, including, as has been mentioned, the "incense" series by CDG.