YSL Kouros: So Macho

Here at The Scentimentalist, we tend not to trouble ourselves with the notion of ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ scents, preferring to take the view that these are puerile – if not cynical – industry constructions, designed to create and sustain distinct gender-based markets.

Pah! We exclaim. Didn’t both gentlemen and ladies wear toilet waters, way back when? Isn’t Jicky enjoyed as much by men (Sean Connery, anybody?) as women? Why, even I myself cross-dress in Penhaligon’s Opus 1870 cologne, the camphorous leather of Knize Ten, and Czech & Speake’s incense-y No. 88.

If it smells good, we wear it! And to hell with the gender typologies.

But there is one ‘archetypal masculine’ that I have yet to smell on a woman (though isolated internet testimonies imply that a miniscule minority of such ‘deviants’ exists). A scent so ineffably manly and macho, so irredeemably hunky and virile, that only those in possession of a penis could ever comfortably, and effectively, wear it:

Kouros, by Yves Saint Laurent.

Kouros burst in a fury of androgens onto the global scent arena back in 1981. For many who came into adolescence in that decade – The Scentimentalist and much of her cohort included – this is the nonpareil Eighties power scent for men. An instantaneously brash, woody, animalic fougère, its use of incense, civet and ambergris ensuring projection of Scud-missile capabilities, this was a truly ‘men-only’ fragrance, for both gay and straight followers alike.

Kouros man was an aspiring Adonis. Kouros (meaning ‘male youth’, ancient Greek κοῦρος), is the modern term given to those statues of young men that first appeared in sanctuaries in the Archaic period in Greece. Sculpted commonly from marble, upright and naked, they served as representations of the god Apollo, and as tombstones for deceased victorious Olympic athletes.

Bolstered by a canny, pre-Men’s Health marketing campaign, boasting hard-bodied, tight-bunned, butt-naked beefcake, Kouros peddled a fantasy of other-worldly masculinity. As the strapline for one magazine advert reads in French: Les dieux vivants ont leur parfum: Kouros (‘Living gods have their perfume: Kouros’).

Amongst the ‘living gods’ of my acquaintance who wore this stud-scent were an early boyfriend (a former choirboy who sent me passionate, Kouros-smeared billets-doux), and just about every young Royal Marine on the base near my university, who would brawl each Saturday night with the local lads (similarly chino-clad and soaked in Kouros).

It may come as a surprise to some, but in 2010 the testosterone-fest that is Kouros remains a substantial seller, even (perhaps, especially) after the ‘wimpy’ aquatics and unisex offerings of the Nineties and beyond. For its many detractors, however, it remains vulgar and impertinent, redolent only of body odour, semen and deodorising cakes used in men’s urinals – and all the while stuck in a relentless 1980s time-warp.

Are you a lover or hater of Kouros? What, for you, is the most ‘macho’ scent? Share your thoughts below with The Scentimentalist.

Orientalism

Oh, we’ve all heard about the lure of the so-called ‘Orient’, not least here in the fantasy world of fragrance.

A cheerful – if lazy – conflation of anything falling vaguely eastwards of Bulgaria, this mythical clime has gifted us fruits as choice and rare as frankincense, myrrh, aoud, lotus, sandalwood and Rosa damascena. The art and technologies of perfume making are firmly in the Orient’s debt.

Such is the pull of the exotic, erotic ‘East’ that the noble house of Guerlain boasts largely Orient-inspirited scents among its ‘feminine’ perfume classics.

Chief among these is the stately Shalimar, inspired by Emperor Shah Jahan’s exquisite ‘Temple of Love’ (Shalimar) gardens in Lahore. Its jazz-age sister, Mitsouko, a fruity chypre of impeccable pedigree, is named for the winsome Japanese heroine of Claude Farrère’s novel La Bataille. And Samsara, an otherworldly, Eighties floriental, takes the Sanskrit term for ‘eternal birth’ as its conceptual brief and name.

For Occidentals and others living beyond the nebulous ‘East’, what are the olfactory associations of the Orient?

The Perfumed Garden? The Kama Sutra? Opium? Cinnabar? The path to Nirvana?

Perhaps predictably, the imagined ‘Orient’ may be reduced to clichéd stereotypes and binarisms: sensuality rubbing up against Zen-like serenity; ripe voluptuousness spilling over into spirituality. The East is a compelling, vaguely scandalous, fragrant paradise; women who wear its scents become bewitching, inscrutable odalisques.

Even the estimable Yardley of London, most famed for its Old English Lavender and other toilet waters, was seduced by the marketing pull of ‘Eastern promise’. Possibly titillated by Guerlain’s discontinued treasure Kadine, in 1968 Yardley launched its own Khadine, a Delacroix floral elixir of roses, silks and perfumed pools.

And who was the feminine paragon around whom this scent was created, even as women’s liberation snapped at the heels of the modern woman? The kadine, the ‘Chosen One’, the Sultan’s favourite of the harim. A fragrant, fetishised fantasy. A courtesan in cologne.

What do ‘Oriental’ scents mean to you? Share your fantasies here with The Scentimentalist.