Cartier Perfume
Cartier has kept an in house perfumer since 2005, which almost no jeweller does. Mathilde Laurent has run the fragrance side ever since, and her work is why the scents here tend to be stranger and more precise than the licensed output of most luxury names.
Two listings. La Panthere in 75 ml is Laurent own composition - a gardenia built without any actual gardenia oil, reconstructed from musk and fruity notes so that it smells animalic and creamy at once, housed in the panther head bottle that is one of the better pieces of fragrance packaging made this century.
Beside it is a Declaration eau de toilette gift set. Declaration came out in 1998 from Jean-Claude Ellena and is one of the great bitter, dry fragrances for men - cardamom, birch, cumin and orange, sharp in a way that still feels modern nearly thirty years on. The set is a straightforward gift if you know someone who wears it.
La Panthere is listed with 5 ml and 10 ml decants, which is worth doing since it is a divisive one. People either find it hypnotic or find it too creamy, and there is not much middle ground.
Both are available online, and both are on the shelf at our Miami Gardens store.
