Launched in 2013 by Serge Lutens and composed by Christopher Sheldrake, La Fille de Berlin is a spicy rose with a hint of pepper, which the house portrays as a woman whose petals are as sulfurous as her thorns. Beneath a nearly opaque purple juice, critics smell a dark, jammy rose that turns toward violet, metal, and musk. It belongs to the Collection noire.
In 2013, Persolaise first smelled a simple, clean rose, gradually taken over by a metallic sheen and a syrupy sweetness. Robin of Now Smell This found it elegant and serious without being won over; Victoria of Bois de Jasmin loved its crimson, blackberry-tinged rose; Elena Vosnaki of Perfume Shrine found its opening icy.
Olfastory’s review
A deceptive rose
On February 13, 2013, Persolaise first smelled a simple, clean rose beneath a purple color worthy of a blackcurrant cordial. A metallic, almost bloody sheen and the sweetness of rose syrup take it over; laundry musks win out in the base. He sees it as a deceptively simple work that subverts expectations.
Elegant and serious
On February 28, 2013, Robin of Now Smell This described a bright burst of rose, soon jammy, turned metallic and cool by a violet. The rose grows warmer, muskier, and woodier, with a green bitterness. She finds it elegant, dusky, and serious: the fragrance holds her attention without winning her over.
A crimson rose
In February 2013, Victoria of Bois de Jasmin hailed a classic Lutens, beautiful, surprising, with its dark side, which she imagines on Marlene Dietrich. She loves its explosion of crimson petals, rich with an overripe blackberry, its turn toward jammy violets, and its slightly animalic base of amber and musk.
An icy opening
On March 7, 2013, Elena Vosnaki of Perfume Shrine likened its metallic opening to the rose of Rive Gauche by Yves Saint Laurent: cold and distant, as if from the tundra. She wonders whether Lutens is commenting on a Europe in crisis.