What fragrance to wear with vintage clothing? This is a question I often ponder. Should one team a delicious piece of vintage with an equally arcane perfume – a Shalimar or a Miss Dior or an Arpege – and thus create a sort of double whammy of historically resonant cloaking.  Or do you update a vintage outfit with a  resolutely contemporary perfume and allow it to provide an olfactive update/contrast to your outfit?  Well perhaps Dior have dreamed up the answer.  Collection Privee is a wonderful edit of eight wonderfully uncommercial new fragrances. These are perfumes with integrity: rich with history and imagination yet completely contemporary.  New Look 1947 is not only a  fantastic name and idea for a perfume – a scent inspired by that timeless nipped-in silhouette – it is, in my humble opinion a  great choice to team with that prized vintage dress.  The constituent notes are tuberose, rose, jasmine and vanilla.  It is a modern floral, not cloying and concentrated like the florals of yore.  Nor has it been corrupted into one of those horrible ubiquitous cynically commercial fruity florals. Or rendered cologne like by the addition of too much citrus. No, it is ladylike and powdery and ideal if you want to feel feminine and precise without feeling blousy or saccharine.

Words by Bethan Cole

Tags: Arpege, Bethan Cole, Collection Privee, Dior, Miss Dior, New Look 1947, vintage