Robert Piguet Fracas Perfume Review: Why We Love It

In the history of perfume, there are a few that rise, like the most effervescent of top notes, to a higher plane than any others. These are the textbook masterpieces, fragrances that are inarguably the best of their kind; timeless scents that have spawned countless copies and even more homages. Dior’s deathless Diorissimo, cited by every perfume expert on the planet as the sine qua non lily-of-the-valley fragrance, is one of them. Robert Piguet’s Fracas, the ultimate tour-de-force tuberose, is another.

Fracas is a magnet for complicated, larger-than-life women. Devotees have included Courtney Love, Martha Stewart, Madonna, and Edie Sedgwick—an unconventional, unapologetic crowd. And it is an unconventional, unapologetic fragrance. It was created in 1948 for French couturier Robert Piguet by Germaine Cellier, an elegant, eccentric, pioneering female perfumer who was friends with Jean Cocteau and approached fragrance composition like a Fauvist artist. She certainly had a penchant for bold strokes and shock value, both of which are defining characteristics of Fracas—a perfume that could only have been made after World War II, and in my opinion, only by a woman.

When I first smelled it, on a passing stranger at a party, it stopped me in my tracks. It was the only time I’ve ever followed someone across a room to ask them about their perfume. The wearer was French, naturellement, clad in a red one-shouldered floor length gown, and she answered me as though speaking to a lesser being: “Well, Fracas, of course!” Because what else could be so divine? I bought it the next day.

At first blast, Fracas is sweet—but not cheap or candy-sweet like the mass perfumes of the last two decades. This is the sweetness of seduction. It has a darkness to it, though it’s not heavy; and the more it develops on skin, the more it feels alive and blooming. Put simply, Fracas is a tuberose bomb—a powerful, lush, heady white floral with a narcotic undertow—but Cellier’s genius was in the way that she couched the polarizing flower in other notes to make it three-dimensional, round, and soft. Bergamot and orange blossom top notes give it a freshness; a whisper of peach makes it creamy; cedar, musk, and sandalwood in the base add warmth. The composition has the effect of being confronted with a bouquet of flowers, but also of pressing your nose against salty skin. The ingredients are simple, but the mystique is undefinable.

I’m not saying Fracas is easy to wear. It’s so glamorous, so ravishing, and has so much presence that there are certain situations when it feels too much; at an intimate dinner, for instance, it might make feel like a pushy uninvited guest. But in a crowd, it’s devastating: Just watch people’s noses twitch and their eyes glaze over dreamily as they try to sniff out the source of that bewitching sillage.

Honestly, though, I wear it mostly when I’m alone. I have a lot of fragrances in my rotation, but Fracas is my superpower spritz. It’s the fragrance I reach for when I require fortitude (too often these days). It takes strength of character to wear such a scent, and it makes me feel bulletproof. So, I spray it on before I write, or after I read the news and want to cry. I spray it on to dream of the parties I will go to—soon, I hope—when everyone is free of worries, and we can all swoon to Fracas in a fracas-free world.

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io