Product Review: Sunday Riley Ceramic Slip Cleanser

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Over the past year or so I’ve learned to treat my skin more carefully, with a special emphasis on gentle cleansing. My current regimen includes a spritz of rosewater and a tiny dab of LUSH 9 to 5 in the morning and my trusty Victoria Lanolin Ägg-Tvål Eggwhite Facial Soap in the evening. Once a week or so, I give myself an extra treat with Sunday Riley Ceramic Slip cleaner.

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My Back Pages: Emily Dickinson, “I tend my flowers for thee —“

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It’s almost Spring (really! soon!) and the green leaf-tips and purple-edged buds of crocus flowers have been peeping up from the dirt in front-yard garden patches along my street.

For me, no writer conveys the anticipation of each changing season as well as Emily Dickinson. I love Dickinson’s poem beginning with the line “I tend my flowers for thee —,” especially this flower-filled stanza, which evokes the fragrance of a garden in bloom:

Carnations — tip their spice —

And Bees — pick up —

A Hyacinth — I hid —

Puts out a ruffled head —

And odors fall —

From flasks — so small —

You wonder how they held —

You can read the rest of the poem here. (Of course, it holds deeper layers of interpretation!) You might also enjoy this discussion of garden imagery in Dickinson’s work, here.

Event Invitation: Denyse Beaulieu at Aedes de Venustas

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Have you read The Perfume Lover by Denyse Beaulieu? If you haven’t, and if you’re a perfume-lover yourself, you should seek it out.

Denyse will be visiting New York on the occasion of the United States publication of her book, and she will be signing copies at Aedes de Venustas on Friday, March 22nd. If you’re located in the New York City area and you’re interested in attending, you can send an RSVP e-mail to aedes@aedes.com.

You can also visit Denyse’s fragrance blog, Grain de Musc, for further information and related reading.

Just Because: Venus del Pomo

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From the Museo Nacional del Prado in Madrid: a classical marble statue of the goddess Venus. It is a Roman copy of a Greek original, and it dates to 150 B.C. A seventeenth-century artist added the perfume bottle under the goddess’s right hand, giving the statue its nickname of “Venus del Pomo.”

You can read more about this work of art on the Prado’s website, here.

Image: Venus del Pomo via virgi.pla on Flickr.