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This afternoon, we had the opportunity to chat with Oscar de la Renta at Lord & Taylor for the exclusive launch of his new fragrance—the whimsically titled "Live in Love." For starters, we learned that the notes in the fragrance were inspired by his own vast garden, which includes a sparkling ginger orchid that was flown in from France. De la Renta, if you didn't know, feels very passionate about flowers, particularly their scents: "I think that a flower that doesn't smell is like a woman with no fragrance. For example, one flower that they say is an unbelievable flower is the camellia; it's a shame that it doesn't smell. It's such a beautiful flower but it has no scent. I wonder why Chanel decided to use camellia."
Aside from the notes of sparkling ginger orchid, Live in Love also opens with bergamot, hyacinth, green muguet, and galbanum. The heart of the scent is its florals, which include jasmine sambac, orange flower, and rose. There's also the scent of sandalwood and cedarwood mixed in with musk and amber at the base. If that all sounds pretty Greek, just take our word for it—and the line waiting downstairs at Lord & Taylor's beauty department—when we say that it smells great.
As for the name of the fragrance, de la Renta explains that they sort of came up with it by accident: "We have someone in the workroom, this very talented man who works for us, and over the summer his sleeves were rolled up when we were working, and he had a tattoo. The tattoo said 'live in love,' and I said, 'My goodness, what an extraordinary name.'"
Pricing for the scent begins at $49 for the body lotion, $58 for the 1.0 oz eau de parfum, $78 for the 1.7 oz, and $98 for the 3.4 oz. And he makes a pretty convincing argument for it: "A fragrance is probably the most luxurious thing that you can buy for a relatively low price, because you don't need to wear a fragrance but it enhances your life in an extraordinary way. I always say that it's sort of like an invisible dress. A true fragrance, what it can do for a human being—it's you. This is the way you smell. I can see you," he says, "but if I was blind and I couldn't see you, I could recognize you by the way you smell. This is what a fragrance should be."
· Oscar de la Renta Live in Love fragrance [Lord & Taylor]
· Oscar de la Renta [Official Site]