★★★★★The lean-in
he asked what I was wearing. twice.
Two drops before dinner. He’d already leaned in by the time we sat down and then asked again in the car. I didn’t tell him either time.
A Tuesday. Nothing special.
You turned the lamp off before he came up.
He was already asleep, turned away. Nothing happened. Nothing has happened for a long time.
Somewhere in the last few years the two of you went logistical. Who has the school run, did the thing get paid, is there milk. Roommates with a shared mortgage and a shared bed.
He does not look through you on purpose. He just looks through you.
From the founder
I built this for the quiet years, not the early ones. Two drops, and something in the room is different before anybody says a word about it.
Kemi Verbier, founder
What you already tried
Every one of them asked him to notice.
◦
The date night. A reservation is a scheduled attempt at a feeling, and he knew what it was for.
◦
The good lingerie. Seen once, in the dark, at the end of the night.
◦
The perfume you own. Two sprays at seven, gone by the time he came upstairs.
◦
Waiting for him to just do it. The longest of the four, and the most expensive.
Anything you have to point at has already lost.
So change one thing in the room, and let him find it on his own.
Then he leaned in and asked what it was.
The composition
What he is leaning into.
It opens bright and a little jammy, and that is nobody’s favourite part. Twenty minutes in it drops, and then it stays down there for hours getting warmer rather than fainter.
01The opening
Cassis
Dark fruit, twenty minutes of it, tart at the edge. The part you are not buying it for.
02The heart
Vanilla
Molten rather than sugary. This is where it settles, and this is what he catches.
03The base
Amber
Resin and warm skin. At eleven at night it is stronger than it was at eight.
Grown, not girlish.
Sweet, and nobody has ever called it sweet. An extrait sits on skin instead of filling a room, which is why he has to get close before he can place it.
Extrait de Parfum · 30 ml · glass dropper · [[price]], in the register of a $300 to $450 niche extrait
From buyers who reordered
★★★★★
★★★★★
he said I seemed like myself again
Five minutes at the vanity before the house wakes up, that’s the whole thing. He said that on the Thursday and I had to sit with it for a second.
★★★★★
please just keep it in stock
They need to stop with the monthly drop thing and just keep it in stock. I ordered in the last batch, I’m nearly out, and now there’s a wait until the next one. That’s the only reason this isn’t five stars, the perfume itself is stupid good.
★★★★★
took me three goes to stop overdoing it
Two drops means two drops. First night I did four and could smell myself in the car, which was mortifying. Two is right. Nobody tells you that bit.
Every one of these is from someone who bought a bottle. We have not tidied them up.
N°01 Désir. Poured once a month, in one small batch.
Thirty nights on your own skin. If nothing in the room changes, send it back and we refund it.
How it is worn
Two drops, and then you forget about it.
Un
Draw two drops. That is the entire dose.
Deux
Press them to the pulse and the curve of the neck. Never rub.
Trois
Your own warmth does the rest, over hours rather than minutes.
30 ml, dosed by dropper, runs for months rather than weeks.
Why there is a wait
We would rather you were annoyed with us than sold something we rushed.
The oils rest for months. Poured early, the vanilla stays on top of everything and the whole thing smells cheap. So one small batch goes out a month, filled by hand, and then it stops.
People run through it in week three and tell us about it, in reviews, at four stars. We have read all of them. We are keeping the complaint.
Kemi Verbier
Founder, KEMI Paris
Three things people ask.
How is this different from the eau de parfum I own?
Concentration, and how it goes on. Eau de parfum is mostly carrier, which is the part built to evaporate. Extrait sits at the top of that ladder, and it arrives with a glass dropper rather than a spray head, so two drops go onto you rather than into the air around you.
Two drops is really the whole dose?
Yes, and the first time it will feel like nowhere near enough. Two drops, pressed, not rubbed. Give it ten minutes. Dosing it like a spray is the one way to get this wrong.
What if nothing happens?
Thirty nights from the day it arrives. Wear it properly, at night. If he never gets close enough to ask, email us and we refund it, opened bottle included.