Calyx by Prescriptives (1986)

Equal parts guava and grapefruit, Sophia Grojsman's stunner Calyx is arguably one of the best of its fruity genre. Its genius? Reproducing the funky fruit-going-bad ripeness that can make tropical fruit like guava, jackfruit and Durian a little scary for those who want fruit to smell like bubblegum. Add to Calyx's overripe sweetness the bitter freshness of a grapefruit accord so authentic-smelling I can almost taste the rind. Like a Jolly Rancher for your nose, Calyx gives you tart and sweet at once.

Calyx's initial slightly rotting fruit note dips down low, like an orchestra that opens by allowing the musical saw to sound its first wavering, carnivalesque note. Once the rest of its song gets back on its feet to a "normal" register, that fruit-on-the-verge-of-going-bad note lingers, coloring the way the rest of Calyx's fruity floral notes are experienced.

With as much fruit that's packed into this perfume, you'd think that it would be cloying and overbearing like the fruit-bombs that stink up Sephora's perfume aisles today. But, again, Calyx's intelligence belies its often ditzy perfume family (fruity floral).

Sophia Grojsman works some alchemical magic — providing enough green notes, citrus, moss, mint and transparency from fresh florals such as lily of the valley that the fruit comes across as more aromatic than sweet (or at least aromatically sweet).

Calyx is more of a southeast Asian tropical fruit salad — with pomelo, guava, passionfruit, mango and jackfruit — than it is a hypersweet, uninspired fruit salad of strawberry, apple and banana from an American cafeteria. The name alone tells you this isn't just an ordinary fruity floral. A calyx, in botany, refers to "the whorl of sepals of a flower...forming the outer floral envelope...enclosing and supporting the developing bud; usually green." Calyx's predominant feel is tart, fresh — green, like a guava or a grapefruit, neither of which is mentioned in the notes.

Top notes: Peach, apricot, cassis, green notes, tagetes (marigold), spearmint, bergamot

Heart notes: Lily of the valley, lily, jasmine, rose, cyclamen, melon, orris

Base notes: Cedar, musk, moss, raspberry

Diorella, one of my favorite floral chypres, has buried inside it a similar rotting fruit smell, but it gives you some time to take it in. By introducing this difficult note before the "easier" fruits and florals that comprise Calyx's primary character, Grojsman throws off our expectations, playing with perfume time by inverting the order in which notes classically arrive. I'm not sure how she does this, or if I'm making more of it than I should, but unlike civet or cumin or some "difficult" note that rises up more subtly in other perfume compositions, I get the sense that Grojsman deliberately shoved that note conspicuously to the fore, as if to say, "You want fruit? How about overripe fruit?"

When it was announced that Prescriptives, the cosmetics line known for matching makeup colors to skin tones, was discontinuing its line, many a Calyx-lover started stocking up in anticipation that the beloved guava/grapefruit-themed Calyx would go with it. Calyx, thankfully, is still available, and although I'm not sure if there's been a reformulation, I know that when I need a pick-me-up during the upcoming heat-filled months, the aromatic, funky, sweet and green Calyx is going to be on my list of scents.

Comments

[Mals86]

Oh dear. I do love the juicy greenness of Calyx, but that tropical-fruit thing just...

... nauseates me. Rotting garbage. I do wonder if it works differently on different skins - I think I recognized it on a woman at the grocery store a few weeks ago, and she smelled amazing.

My favorite fruity floral - I mean, that smells like a melange of fruit rather than just one easily-identifiable fruit like pear or apple - is the first Ines de la Fressange. I love that one.

[Perfumaniac]

I hear ya, Mals. It's not for everyone. So strange how it both stinks and smells divine at the same time! But that's the paradox of a lot of stinky notes (civet, et al); they can make beautiful notes really sing.

[ScentScelf]

Some scents make me wrinkle my nose and turn away; others, wrinkle my nose, but come back for more. Calyx was this way. Come to think of it, so was Diorella. Both are in the wardrobe now.

I continue to enjoy your reviews; thank you!

[Perfumaniac]

ScentSelf. Calyx does ask that you figure it out. Glad you came back for more! I think it's an amazing scent. I read somewhere that it was one of Grojsman's proudest creations, and she called it her most expressive. Glad you like the reviews and please come back!

[mary]

This is one of my spring/summer scents. I like the light complexity of it. The one I have is a special edition that leaves a "shimmer" on your skin. That's summer-date-sexy. There's something sparkly about the scent, too - especially at first. When I need some sunshine in February, I'll spritz this on.

I really like the grapefruity brightness. I once bought a bottle of Guerlain's Pamplemousse Aqua Allegoria - that was just too sharp, like citronella mosquito spray.

[Joanne]

I would like to buy some caylax

[breathe31]

I first experienced this on someone in a dance class:the heat of her body intensified its scent,which for me was very reminiscent of Cristalle(a great favorite of mine). Of course I rushed to the department store to purchase it.This was in 1986 so I was one of the first of my fellow perfume obsessed friends to wear this scent. Not sure why I loved it so much (perhaps it was all the positive comments I received from men and women alike) but I must have gone through at least 6 or 7 bottles.For me Calyx was the summer,dancing all night in the clubs of NYC and long walks on the beaches of Montauk, Long Island, with my boyfriend. Somewhere along the way I felt as though I had outgrown it and was too old to wear it anymore. Recently in a department store I passed by the Prescriptives counter and gave myself a spritz. The magic was gone so I, too, wonder if it has been reformulated.

[NancyG]

I loved it and wore it when it first came out as well and it's the only scent I bought over and over again over 10 or 12 years. The last bottle smelled different and I returned it... That made me kind of sad.

[Perfumaniac]

I think I need to get a vintage copy, NancyG, because I agree with you. Something's different. More chemical, less warm.

[brigitte]

I think Calyx may have been reformulated. I just bought a bottle online (as I believe it was discontinued but you can correct me if it is still sold in department stores). I used this scent religiously every summer in the mid 80s and the bottle of Calyx I have right now is not nearly as sharp, bracing and, for lack of better words, "in your face" upon first spritz as I remember it to be. However, the floral mid and base notes of what I have now are exact to what I remember from the 80s Calyx. The bottle has been altered as well which further leads me to believe that it may have been reformulated.

[Perfumaniac]

I agree with you Brigitte. I think it was a lot funkier and rounder in its earlier incarnation. It actually smelled like a wonderful, rich, tropical fruit...It's definitely been watered, dumbed, and synthesized down...