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drmartis – :
Beautiful retro-driven scent! Hyacinth and Narcissus, so popular in the 60’s and 70’s, are quite “dated” ingredients in todays mainstream perfumery. So much better that Penhaligon’s remembers its traditions and dares to create such an extravagant beauty that won’t please everyone and doesn’t want to. Diversity in perfumery should survive this over sugared mainstream taste of today.
yri922elipseskism – :
Tried it once – didn’t like it
Tried second time- didn’t like
On the third try I fell in love. It’s so beautiful. It does have a spicy punch in the dry down. It really is narcotic, like someone said already. It’s feminine, but I can see a man wearing it too.
I have several Penhaligon fragrances, and most of them are from portraits – tho one is on top of my P’s choice
ctac111111 – :
Revenge is an enticing, cold scent- a lightly sweet veneer masking a calculative, penetrating quality. It is one of the few creatively named perfumes that truly lives up to its name. I feel wicked wearing this as a male- and it’s a delicious, empowering wickedness. Perhaps the narcotic Narcissus has drugged me, but I am a willing victim-no, a vessel, for this vengeful spirit of a perfume. With the exception of Nasomatto’s Narcotic Venus, no other perfume has drugged me so. As with all scents, try it on your skin. The beauty is in getting the narcotic note, and being drugged. If you don’t get that note on your skin, don’t bother. Otherwise, by all means, arm yourself with the greatest scented poison-dipped dagger.
vaag73 – :
The Revenge of Lady Blanche is a well-blended fresh and warm scent. It is a rare composition and even rarer a good one among its counterparts. Mugler aura is also a blend of freshness and warmness but it is not as well-blended as this one though it is still a good perfume. Its freshness and warmness are kind of separate. What I mean is that you smell the freshness in one sniff and the warmness in another. However this one is not. The freshness and warmness come to your nose at the same time. I don’t know how they do this but indeed it is a succeed.
It is a confident, ambitious beautiful woman who has her own career and life. She is not a dependent of men. The freshness is her in daytime, acting as a protective shield covering all her secrets and ambition underneath. On the other hand, the warmness resembles her dangerously beauty and deadly lust for money and power which are unknown to anyone. But this is exactly what makes her tempting and beguiling.
On the test paper, it is sometimes fresh and sometimes warm after dry down. I know it seems weird but that is what I got from the fragrance. Nonetheless, on my skin it is much warmer than fresher that the freshness almost disappear or covered by the warmness and I could only smell a hint of freshness although it still smelled good and blended well with my own chemical. I have to say it smells much much better on skin that on test paper so you have to try it on skin to see its amazing performance.
toxin666 – :
oh but this is exactly what revenge should smell like. revenge is a dish best served cold – and this is exactly what the revenge of lady blanche is. it’s cold.
it’s also beautiful and impeccable in every way – if you must have your revenge, you’d better make sure it’s both. otherwise it’s just petty and crass.
it’s so very green, poised and perfect. very simple, too. no base to make it ‘complex’, to make it a bit warmer or forest-like or damp or sparkling. no. the notes are on point: fresh hyacinth, bitter narcissus, elegant iris. that’s it.
the overall impression is that of fresh greenness. quite dry. nothing dusty or sweet or juicy about it. bas de soie is much more juicy, i think. and no19 is much more grassy, plush and velvety in all its concentrations. you see, even though the revenge of lady blanche is almost neon in its greenness, it’s 100% floral. it’s not grassy or mossy or anything like that.
and yet… this would be amazingly beautiful on a gentleman. seriously.
longevity and sillage? moderate.
highly recommended to… everyone.
MeTeoR – :
I’m completely enamored with this collection from Penhaligon’s. The bottles are stunning, the depth they’ve put into the story is great, and in my sampling, I’ve liked what I’ve smelled.
Here’s the thing about Lady Blanche. This fragrance is undoubtedly lovely. It’s very green, but also powdery. It would be too sharp for my taste if it didn’t have the iris note. But…despite its beauty, both in scent and bottle, it’s simply not worth the price unless you are absolutely in love with this scent.
When I wear fragrances, I do it with purpose. I feel like the purpose for which I would wear this fragrance can already be achieved by another scent in my collection. Now, if handed a bottle of this for free I would gladly accept and would certainly wear it. But I personally can’t justify this one. However, I do feel like this is a signature scent type of perfume. It’s just got something about that makes it unique enough to be memorable without being over the top.
The bottom line is, I have a lot of respect for this scent and I would love to be in the presence of it, but I won’t be purchasing it for myself.
inciongxwv – :
Lovely, grown-up chypre, with green floral and orris notes. It opens brightly and stays fairly linear with a medium sillage. It lasts about 7 hours on my skin before become too much of a skin scent.
I wear this one to work. It is perfect in the summer or the autumn for me.
Vovchik Lysak – :
Fragrance Review For The Revenge Of Lady Blanche
Penhaligon’s
Notes
Hyacinth
Narcissus
Iris
Edwardian Revenge Drama
1910
Lady Blanche is the last person you’d imagine to be capable of extracting revenge on anyone. She has what appears to be the happiest most perfect life! And not only that she is not called Lady Blanche for nothing. She is British-Welsh, petite, happily married, the mother of a girl and a boy, blonde, with blue eyes, and she has the sweetness of youth. She is only in her mid-20’s. She wears a lot of white dresses, hats, gloves, and takes 4 o clock afternoon tea with ladies that are older and have a good influence on her. She is high society and gives much of time and money to causes and charity. But somewhere along the way she was wronged. She has a bitter rivalry with a dark-haired older woman from the same neighborhood, a hypocritical and very malicious high society matron who has done everything she could do to break up her marriage, slander her, attempted to destroy her and has nearly succeeded but this shrinking violet girl has finally blossomed into a mature rose- WITH THORNS! Reminds me of a dramatic soap opera from the 1900 to 1912 period, something like Downtown Abbey. In the end, Lady Blanche has the last laugh and indeed gets her revenge but she has been so discreet about it that no one even noticed. Her nemesis is defeated and in fact, it is she who has been destroyed and has to leave England altogether.
Revenge opens with whispery white flowers, with a distinctive narcissus as a trumpet flower as if it is announcing the arrival of a grand lady. The narcissus in the top I found rather soapy but it is clean and refreshing. The white floral scent turns into a fresh English dewy hyacinth. The hyacinth gives this fragrance that Anglo character from Penhaligon. It is as floral as many of the other fragrances from the line but it’s far more linear and simple, almost a solifore of iris. The iris takes over in the dry down turning the whole thing into a dusting powder. Fortunately for me the iris blends well with my skin and I welcome dusty powdery fragrances.
This perfume is elegant, conservative, lady like and mature and she matches up with suits! Not dresses but blouse with a blazer jacket over it and a skirt. This is business formal day wear stuff. Because it is strictly floral, it is perfect for spring and summer. Feminine and nothing unisex about it. I wish there had been additional notes, at least a few more, which would have given this fragrance a stronger base other than orris. Some musk and incense or sandalwood, patchouli, would have been nice. It has a touch of something green which I can’t quite make out perhaps it’s a dash of vetiver, and it only appears in the middle of the performance which seems to be part of a green-floral stage following the hyacinth. Smells like a garden or rather someone running from a garden and then hastily into a boudoir. She is a well-behaved fragrance but she does have a haughty air, like a young lady with all the money in the world, a title, position, and while not influential herself, she is either married to someone with a lot of power and influence or is the daughter of such a man. This is a clean fresh floral day time perfume for the likes of (no offense just dropping names) Kate Middleton, or her sister Pipa who was recently married. This is also evocative of a woman who while she may not come from money has married into money but has had to fight to maintain a good reputation. Sort of like Krystel Carrington from Dynasty. She has triumphed over Alexis Colby and can breathe a sigh of relief. The mansion that she has made into her nest with Blake can never be taken away from her.
A beautiful somewhat theatrical fragrance for a woman who is confident, mature, smart, independent and who can appreciate English fragrances like this one. This is not one of the better Penhaligon frags and it’s as tame and powdery is Iris Prima but it has more white flower essence in it which I really like. I have received many compliments on it. You can pick this up at the Penhaligon perfume store in London or order it online. Worth the price though it is quite simple and soapy-powdery, subtle, without the real bite I wish it could have had in order to properly feel like I have had my revenge!
lidiya – :
I don’t find this similar to Chanel 19, other than the fact there’s a distinct iris. It’s cleaner and less complex than that, less earthy (no moss, leather or galbanum)it also has a slight sweetness, like Iris Prima but far more crisp, less sweet, powdery and soft.
The hyacinth stands out for me – it’s a very spring-like perfume, the narcissus isn’t animalic or rich (as it is in Lumiere Noire for example). It’s elegant, cool and I think more contemporary than vintage in style.
The green-ness is quite naturalistic, very much like the scent of bluebells, not too ‘bathroom soap’ though since the iris adds its perfumy dry powderiness.
I like it, I’d say the mood is slightly formal and definitely daytime in spring, similar to comments below I don’t find it very vengeful!
Elultjagbug – :
very green floral; would swear it has some fig, fig leaf and violet leaf in it; it is mainly this green fig scent with a hint of floral with some sharpness (the way fig sometimes gets you in the throat) and depth with a little spiciness; this is one of the strongest of portraits next to Radcliff; it doesn’t have that powdery rub your nose in your arm skin scent quality
NEED_FO_MY – :
From the blurb on the package of the sample I expected DRAAAAMAAAAA…but this is simply a pleasant little green floral number. Lady Blanche for my nose is a rosy cheeked, airheaded girl, pretty, albeit without much substance, and most definitely incapable of revenge in any shape or form. Not because she is innocent (which she may be), but because that would require intellect, and that she sorely lacks.
The perfume smells extremely soapy on my skin, like old fashioned hyacinth soap. Not bad really, but nothing to write home about.
SHIROKOWWW – :
Oh, the opening is so fun! Narcissus and Iris as you’ve never experienced them before. I felt like Alice in Wonderland in a surreal meadow of flowers and plants that make you feel more and more curious and constantly surprised by the complexity of their scent.
Well guys I must test it again to be able to explain myself better than saying it’s dreamy. At least the opening. Please be patient.
The only thing is that the dry down was a bit linear and also “unrevengeful”, unlike promised. It reminded me of other less interesting scents of this category. Still.. it is worth the try. You’ll love the initial cocktail of wonder.
gt3000asb – :
The first hour of The Revenge of Lady Blanche is promising: bitter green sap of hyacinth with a subtle powdery texture, almost like those in vintage green floral fragrances but not quite as harshly soapy; velvety petals of lily-of-the-valley scattered within, while the golden hay nuance of narcissus lies underneath. The whole effect is like a modern ballad of spring blossoms, lively yet polished as well.
These spring blossoms becomes gently honeyed roughly 2 hours in, before merging together into an iris/laundry white musk in the next 9 hours of long dry down. The laundry-like white musk doesn’t smell aggressively sharp, thankfully. Instead, it’s rather smooth and fluffy, which reminds me of the diaphanous LM Parfums Chemise Blanche. There’s occasionally some metallic/citrus-y aldehyde dancing around the edges, which also makes me think of Byredo Blanche, although Lady Blanche is much less muddy and more translucent.
In its final hours, the white musk becomes slightly creamier, warmer and sweeter, as rose and a tonka-like golden powdery note become more noticeable. The sillage is relatively close in general, and the longevity is around 11 hours.
I enjoyed the opening phase of The Revenge of Lady Blanche a lot, since hyacinth and narcissus are among my favourite floral notes. Moreover, the bitter sap of green floral fits perfectly the murderous backstory of the cunning aristocratic woman imagined by Penhaligon’s. Unfortunately, the clean, almost innocent dry down, as pleasant as it is, didn’t live up to the PR story, as if the revenge was only an intention, but never made its way to the eventual execution of the plan.
If you happen to be looking for a clean, modern, elegant green floral/white musk fragrance, I think The Revenge of Lady Blanche worths a try. But I would also suggest trying a few others in the same genre, as I do believe that there are other more sophisticated options at a more reasonable price.
botsman1971 – :
A scent by Issey Miyake is back.
Its new name is The Revenge Of Lady Blanche 😉
Same perfumer, by the way!