Elektra Abundance (Dominique Jackson) likes flaunting her luxurious lifestyle and when she goes to bail Blanca out of jail, she reinforces this attitude. She charms a police officer who’s interested in her perfume: she explains it’s Caron Poivre, a very expensive perfume that an ordinary police officer has obviously never smelt before.
This is an unusual choice: Poivre is not among the classic powerhouse fragrances which ruled the 1980s, so it tells a lot about Elektra’s lifestyle. Created by Michel Morsetti and launched in 1954, the fragrance is named after its dominant note (pepper). It was originally advertised as “the dream fragrance for furs” [1], so it sounds perfect for a woman like Elektra who often wears furs.
[1] Probably the most famous fragrances “for furs” were created in 1928 by Claude Fraysse for Parfums Weil – Chinchilla Royal, Hermine, Une Fleur pour Fourrure and Zibeline. As a matter of fact, the perfume house’s founder, Marcel Weil, owned a famous furs atelier, Fourrures Weil.
Before leaving the Hawthorne School, Cordelia Goode (Sarah Paulson) and Myrtle Snow (Frances Conroy) comment on the smell in the air. Myrtle can’t bear it: she states Bourbon Street in New Orleans smells like Chanel No. 5 in comparison.
Nash (Ennis Esmer) and other members of the Red Oaks Club staff are having an outdoor party. When asked what his blood tastes like to mosquitoes, he replies: “Cardamom and Drakkar Noir.”
No surprise he namedrops the perfume by Guy Laroche. Created by Pierre Wargnye in 1982, it was basically everywhere in the 1980s.
There has been a bag swap at the Red Oaks Club: Wheeler (Oliver Cooper) realises what has happened when he finds a bottle of Williams Aqua Velva after-shave lotion in the bag which turns out to be Herb’s.
Sam Sylvia (Marc Maron) asks the wannabe wrestlers what their “special abilities” are. Sheila the She-Wolf (Gayle Rankin) explains she has “a very acute sense of smell.” Sam tries her: what cologne is he wearing? She replies: “Drakkar Noir.”
The TV show is set in the 1980s, so this reference is very accurate: the Guy Laroche aromatic woody fragrance, created by Pierre Wargnye and launched in 1982, was incredibly popular at the time.
Sam’s question is tricky, though: he’s not actually wearing Drakkar Noir, but he has sprayed it on his clothes, something he does when he forgets to do his laundry.
With Lee Harris on the run, sieged in the Roanoke House, people are desperate to know more about her. Actor William Van Henderson (Denis O’Hare), who played Dr. Elias Cunningham in My Roanoke Nightmare, appears on the news, but he can’t say much about her. They briefly met at Paley Fest 2015: he remembers she wore Shalimar.
Ryan Murphy must be a fan of the Guerlain perfume. You may remember a character from American Horror Story: Hotel (
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