Boy Chanel by Chanel

Boy Chanel by Chanel is a pleasant surprise. I had successfully ignored all information about it because I’m not very interested in the fougere theme beyond my beloved Jicky and because I haven’t been too impressed by the newer releases in Les Exclusifs line, such as 1932 or Jersey.

But faced with the bathtub-sized bottle of it at Dublin airport the other day, I decided to give myself a good dousing – five sprays to each arm, and five more to the neck and chest area. I don’t mind being unbearable to my fellow travelers – I’m already travelling with two pretty awful mini humans so I figure it can’t get much worse. But actually, it turns out that Boy Chanel never really builds to any great density when over sprayed, and even if it did, I can think of far worse aromas to be broadcasting in a closed cabin 30,000 ft in the air.

Texture-wise, Boy Chanel is like watercolor on silk – a series of muted aromatics and flowers laid delicately one on top of another, their transparency rigorously maintained. The lavender is a single, lilac-tinted theme running through the composition but there are also hints of fluffy heliotrope and palidly rosy geranium.

Immediately, the connections to other fougeres strike me. Boy Chanel is Pour Un Homme (Caron) embellished with florals and done on a better budget – Jicky (Guerlain) filtered through a sieve to remove the civet, and that rough, vomitous clash of bergamot and cream. Later on, in its tonka or coumarin phase, Boy Chanel is even a faded outline of Fourreau Noir, like a photocopy done when the ink was running low. If the Lutens is a dense lavender doughnut, then Boy Chanel is a high-end gelato delicately aromatized with dried lavender.

I don’t think that Boy Chanel is really a fougere, though. After all, a fougere should technically have moss, coumarin, and lavender for it to qualify, and there is no moss to be found here. Then again, there is no moss in Jicky either. Maybe it’s the dark, dirty feel to Jicky that qualifies it as a fougere? I don’t have the answer. Anyway, Boy Chanel is bright and sunny, not dark, bitter, or mossy – there are no forest ferns here.

What Boy Chanel does have in spades is the creamy, sweet, and somewhat boozy almond undertone I associate with tonka bean. Coumarin is listed, not tonka bean, but I get all of the spicy-sweet, vanillic tones of the tonka bean and none of the dry, aromatic, grassy aroma of coumarin. In fact, Boy Chanel is quite tonka-ish in general, leading me to wonder if Chanel is trying to appeal to the common denominator of modern male consumer, that is, a preference for sweet tonka bases over the bitter, mossy bases that used to be in style? I am thinking here of how popular fragrances such as Feve Delicieuse (Dior), Allure Homme Sport Eau Extreme (Chanel), and Midnight in Paris (Van Cleef & Arpels) and so on.

As it hits the base (which it does in a very short period of time, by the way), Boy Chanel gets even sweeter and creamier with the addition of a powdery sandalwood, vanilla, and more delectable almond-like chewiness in the form of heliotrope. I am surprised at how sweet it is, actually. For a fougere, it approaches Coromandel levels of sweetness. But texture-wise, Boy Chanel is not at all baroque or opaque – it retains a luminous translucency from head to toe. The sandalwood in particular is more of the single cream type you find in ETRO Sandalo (although far, far better quality) than the fatty, over-egged feel to something like Samsara.

Overall, Boy Chanel is fresh, aromatic, and creamy-sweet, making it something that women can wear as easily as men. It doesn’t make a grab for originality or boldness, but is extremely pleasant to wear. It is long-lasting but never loud. No matter how much I sprayed, I could never rev its engine out of the cruise control its engineers designed it for. Surprisingly, I think that’s what I like  best about it. It’s just the kind of thing you need when everything else is going to shit and you have to be able to count on at least one thing in your life that won’t screw things up even further. This is it – pleasant to smell, effortlessly chic, and impossible to overdose on.