




Now, for what y’all are going to go crazy for. Le Bienaime is an upcycled perfume house from Geurengoeroe blogger Erik Zwaga. This is pure madness and absolute brilliance all rolled into one. He takes perfumes from the same family of scents or from the same house – mixes them together – and makes a brand new scent. For example, Guerlainisimo is a mix of 20 Guerlain scents and forms a more perfect Guerlinade concoction that is more pure Guerlain than you can imagine. Cha-cha-chanel mixes 10 Chanel scents for a new kind of magic. S.T.I.N.K. is a musk/incense/oud bomb with a mix of scents from these lines: Von Euserdorff, Histoire de Parfums, Comme des Garcons, Parfum D’Empire, Obsessive Oudh, and Song for a Queen. Wow, it took sheer will power not to buy all six scents that were on display – I ended up buying three. I am hoping to catch up with Erik while I am in Amsterdam this week… this guy sounds like a brilliant madman.
After the wonderful trip to Annindriya, I had to go into dance music mode. I had invited Hiram to dinner and he agreed to play along before catching a train back to his hometown of Gouda. About two hours later, we ended up at a Thai restaurant with Crystal Waters, Vassy (“Bad” with David Guetta, “Secrets” with Tiesto), and Eric Lumiere (Filo & Peri “Anthem”). It was great to see my different worlds – music and perfume – merge together so seamlessly.
All in all, an amazing start to my week in Amsterdam.