Hair On The Brain

For months now, I have been on the hunt for a new perfume. Every time I go to Sephora, I sniff the fragrances, but nothing seems quite right.

Then I was sent a sample of of Kilian Hennessy 9th scent titled, Love & Tears, Surrender and it was love at first whiff. Kilian is grandson and namesake of the founder of the LVMH Group, Hennessy, and has previously worked as fragrance creator for Christian Dior and Alexander McQueen.

Tired of the traditional of “luxury” perfumes that retails for $65, but costs $2 to produce, Kilian created his own line of luxury fragrances  called By Kilian, which are available exclusively at Bergdorf Goodman and Saks.

“I wanted to go back to the beginning of the 20th century, to a kind of perfume that today only exists in museums — with gold leafing and beautiful bottles. I wanted to create a modern, boudoir perfume that was luxurious but didn’t look like it belonged to Marie Antoinette,” said Hennessy.

I was able to test his newest scent called Love and Tears, Surrender–his fourth and last installment in a series of fragrances based on the evolving phases of love, which launches this September. The main fragrances is Indian jasmine, but it’s a compelling blend of jasmine, Italian bergamot, French cypress, and Madagascan ylang ylang.

“Only the jasmine flower, with its endless spectrum of facets–citrus, green, floral, and animalistic–was able to express the profusion of emotions that I wanted to communicate with this scent: the beginning of love marked with excitement, the fear of the unknown, and, ultimately, the surrender to love!” said Hennessy.

Love & Tears smells fantastic and lasts for ever on your skin, not fading like all my other fragrances seem to. All of the bottles are refillable, so that once you buy a new fragrance, you can keep the bottle and simply bring it to the store for a lower-priced refill. A new bottle costs $225 and refill sizes ranging from $70 to $125.

An editorial sample was provided by the company so I could review this product. Please see my About page for further information on Disclosure policies.