Jeux de Peau Serge Lutens for women and men

I am looking to buy a sample or decant... or possibly a partial depending on price! Please lmk if you have ♡

Yes it smells like salt sticks!
For years I was looking to buy a bottle of Jeux de Peau and finally few months ago I found a pack of 10 samples on ebay.
To my nose this does not smells that sweet at all it's more salty and dusty.
Maybe because this samples that I have are from 2011 so it was a long time ago since they are made.
It's just OK for me I'm not blown away with the smell and to be totally honest I was disappointed when I first smell it.
The most prominent note to my nose is definitely wheat and in some strange way overall smell of this perfume reminds of curry also.
As a gourmand lover this does not appeal to me.

for someone who loves sweet gourmands, this is probably an exceptional winner. alas, i am not that person. :( i was hoping for something that would smell like bread in a wheaty, yeasty cracking-open-a-warm-loaf-of-sourdough kinda way. this is just straight up browned butter sugary creamy melt-in-your-mouth doughy dessert pastry all the way through.

I swear this smells like salt sticks on first spray. It's as if i can already feel the crunch and the texture of the salt crystals melting on my tongue. It dries down into a bread-like, milky, powdery scent that's both comforting but also confusing as to why anyone would like to smell of bread. Very comforting and wholesome, but maybe one does not need a full bottle of this :))

I purchased this on a business trip in Paris. It was my last day there and I wanted to get a fragrance before I leave France. Was smelling everything around the department store and ended up at Serge Lutens. The lady asked me what scents I like and I told her green, fresh fragrance, nothing sweet or strong vanilla. Not a fan of gourmands.

She showed me many scents but nothing really appealed to me. I guess it was out of frustration that somehow she showed me this. With the first whiff, I was hooked! Contrary to what I usually like, this smelled like warmth and comfort to me, and so unique. She told me the inspiration of the fragrance and then it reminded me of caramel popcorn. To me the fragrance smelled milky and sweet but not in a cloying way. It’s not an aggressive and sticky sweetness, it’s just a familiar and comforting, like a mother’s hug kind of sweetness. Calming is how it makes me feel.

The scent is very linear in my opinion and there is nothing wrong with that. In fact I love that it stays the same. It smells on me a little bit woody behind all the wheat and creaminess. It lasts a long time (about 8-10 hours) on my skin which is very rare cause I find most fragrances fade on me. To me this is more of a close proximity scent.

I absolutely adore this scent! It’s very unique, comforting and warm. Since this fragrance, I have been more open to trying scents that are not usually in my “preference”, because sometimes you might find something that will surprise yourself.
9/10

First whiff of this is like a green apricot, like maybe not ripe or maybe a bit more orange-zesty, or more flowery than fruity - I guess that's the osmanthus. And toasty caramel, or molasses. Idk I'm not really familiar with osmanthus flowers but I don't think I want my body to smell like them, I'm sure smelling them in nature would be nice. But this is interesting and has a fresh-baked-bread thing going on too.

Baked yeasty bread with some herbs. Smells like foccacia 😂

To me, this smells NOTHING like the food-y deliciousness that other people seem to smell or that would be indicated by sweet and creamy notes of milk, coconut, and apricot. If I didn't know the notes, I'd just say that this smells like fresh hay or grass in a field -- I suppose that is the wheat and immortelle.

I'm glad I just got a 5 ml decant of this for a decent price. I got it because Demi Rawling raved about it, and I honestly don't smell anything that she described. This is just another reminder to not get too excited about the promise of a fragrance and blind-buy a bottle.

I don't recommend this. If you were to wear it, it would be pleasant enough. But I don't know why anyone would choose buy this perfume.

Oedipus complex in a bottle, the fantasy of a mother. I love a oddball gourmand and this fits the bill. The listed notes are accurate but the licorice and apricot are fairly subtle. Milk is in a secondary role compared to bread and wheat. I got a sample because people said it was similar to Fleur Cachée by Anatole Lebreton. I can see a resemblance, and if you like this one but can't stomach the price it could be worth a try. But Jeaux de Peau has a much more domestic vibe, the spices are much more subtle and vanilla is in a supporting role. A crowdpleaser, I think, despite being "weird." But not at all suitable for work. Leans very feminine despite the unisex note list. Very compelling, likely an attention-getter if that's what you're into, but I won't buy a full bottle because I have Fleur Cachée which is a much better value and has a more "adventurous" feel.

This is very unusual scent; i can smell the wheat, nothing lactonic but that kind of bready smell. I dont have any fragrance in my collection like that. I can definitely smell the spicy licorices there. Unfortunately, I don’t smell ani apricot. It’s unisex for sure.
You need to like gourmand to like this. Real food scent, otherwise it will not be for you.

I quite like the bready milkiness of this Frag. It projects quite well, and blooms in the heat. The spices are very prominent on me, and it deters it from becoming a love for me. Overall a great gourmand, without being too sickly sweet.

Bready, but smells musty and moldy in a stifling way. Not very light to me at all. It's like the uncanny valley of bread.

smells like cream of wheat, but in a sexy way? its pleasantly weird

very light bread and sugar. lovely scent!

Can't stop smelling it
It smells like a wet baby diaper with a hint of maple syrup lol

This is good, I remember it was a love at first sniff for me. Too bad my husband doesn’t like it but oh well I’m wearing it today since it was a rough morning and this is very warm and comforting. It is nowhere near as woody and rich as Un Bois Vanille, which is too dense for my taste. The coconut here is much more subtle. Normally I can’t stand coconut in fragrance, plus the apricot is heavier. Also it smells like apricot NOT the sickly smell I get from osmanthus. In todays wearing the wheat and lactonic qualities are not as strong which is perfectly fine with me.

No milk or coconut on me, sadly. It smells like pepper and herbs, with a little bit of sandalwood. I'll stick with Un Bois Vanille.

Jeux de Peau (translation from French "skin games") has this hallucinatory effect on my nose. I immediately detect upon its opening the ethereal, nutty, buttery sesquiterpenoids of sandalwood, and it immediately follows by a wave of lactones and something reminiscent of the maillard reaction aroma in toasted bread, and it just gets more fascinating from here. A sweet cream butteriness has me imagining that the sandalwood is now soft, spongy and edible, and can be slathered with butter and preserves, and with each nibble, a waft of osmanthus tea comes from a steaming cup.

I've often expressed that I am fussy about gourmands, and while excessively sweet dessert "smell like a snack" scents render me apoplectic, Jeux de Peau bridges different corners of the palate. It is tasty but is surely a perfume, with qualities that remind you that you can't lick and chew, but inhale and feel a bit intoxicated. The sandalwood and lactones are truly the dreamiest part as Jeux de Peau descends closer to the skin's surface. But wait, mmmm...now it's a hot bowl of Cream of Wheat with cinnamon, this IS playing games, and I enjoy every minute of it.

I don’t get anything milky or sweet from this fragrance. I do get a lot of savory, peppery bread. Props to the realism, but while I’d happily eat something that smells like it, I don’t want to smell of it myself. It’s very long lasting.

What a bummer. This is an amber wood. It is a pretty, spicy, amber wood but there is nothing remotely wheat or lactonic about this. I honestly think that a blind sampling would eliminate most of the poetic waxing about mothers milk and bakeries. I did a paper sample and skin sample. This one has been on my test list for so long I did it the night of a party and stuck my wrist in the nose of over a dozen people. Not a single person picked up a hint of bread, wheat, milk, etc. Many people liked it but I think the Fragrantica forum trend of recommending this as the iconic bready lactonic perfume is super misleading.

Intoxicating, stunning. I usually roll my eyes at fragrance reviewers who claim they exclaimed at first sniff but I really said “oh my god” after I sprayed. It’s gourmand without being dessert— more like a buttery breakfast croissant or bread basket. There’s a layer of dried, smoky herbs that almost smells like incense beneath the wheat. I sampled this for the osmanthus but am not really picking it up, though I’m going to buy a full bottle for everything else.

Does anyone with a bell jar bottle want to sell me a decant? Please dm if so. Needs to be shipped to mainland UK please 💛

Okay to the scent. This is my ultimate love! I’ve gone through my stash of the bottles by the end of 2020. If I’m not mistaken Jeux de Peau (slim bottles) was or has been discontinued for quite a few years. Although I stumbled across a bell jar on SL website. I’m slightly put off buying it as I worry they changed formulation hence looking for a decant from a bell jar or some advice if anyone can compare old Jeux de Peau (c 2015) to the current bell jar formulation.

I love the old Jeux de Peau so much words can’t describe it! It suits cashmere jumper weather and can be both cozy and sexy (not sure many agree with the latter, I’m sure it’s down to how we differently perceive milk with a pinch of salt).

I had reasonably high expectations for this one, but my experience was pretty meh. The first scent I get is fake maple syrup over something wheaty. Like eating French Toast Crunch– entirely artificial and lacking in substance. As it settles I get a bit of licorice and something that is maybe supposed to be milky, but ends up more like buttered popcorn flavored jellybeans. The double-whammy of artificial flavors ends up making it feel cheap and candlelike, which is absolutely the last thing I expected to say about this. I was worried I'd be the only one who smelled it that way, but checking the other reviews, it seems that this is a pretty common impression. Should have done my homework before I bought my sample!

In one word - Delicious!

This is a gourmand lovers dream and another interesting release from Serge Lutens.
I have a fondness for the use of immortelle in perfume compositions, which to my nose is often reminiscent of slightly burnt brown sugar. The use of it here adds a lot to the overall expression, which creates the scent of freshly baked goods. This one smells just like delicious golden browned breads biscuits and pastries that have come fresh out of the oven. There is a syrupy and jammy apricot note, which smells extremely edible, alongside a wheaty and laconic character to it overall. The sandalwood is earthy and there is a slight bit of warm spices, which give another dimension of sweetness and an almost nutty aroma profile.

This perfume makes my mouth water a bit actually. I can imagine some just toasted bread, spread with butter, then havung a dollop of apricot jam added on top. I do think it's an interesting gourmand, although not the most interesting one I've encountered by any means, and I appreciate the inspiration that was behind the fragrance, because it does capture what the perfumer wanted to conve perfectly.
This is a very fine example of a bread scent to be found in the perfume world, so, if you're after that, then this one is your cup of milky and malty tea.

I managed to get a bell jar bottle, but I do think an atomiser would work best for this one really. I have found that when the liquid is dabbed on the skin it doesn't last too long on me. However, I do enjoy it a lot for how long it does create those mouth watering moments of pleasure for myself and it was good enough to get a full bottle.

I came here to comment on how I still adore my remaining bit of juice and how whenever I wear Gris Charnel it reminds me of this. I think Aliebling hit the nail on the head though, I like those jelly beans.

Looking to purchase a bottle please pm me

It literally smells like buttered bread, but there’s also a slight sweetness that I think comes from the coconut and licorice note. It’s not too buttery like HOO What About Pop. The woody coconut aspect faintly reminds me of JHAG Sunny Side Up, but add bread and butter.

It smells nostalgic like a core memory. I’m kind of upset I like this because it’s so expensive. If you have bread-filled memories you’ll probably like this. It smells like waking up in a warm bed and going to a bakery early in the morning.

Now if you only like typical sweet florals you probably wouldn’t like it at all. I will admit that as a fragrance this is a bit unique, particularly because it’s on the savory side. To the point where it actually makes me hungry haha. I read many reviews about this before I sampled it but the reality of it is hard to put into words. You have to experience it.

272
Out of all the wonderful notes listed(apricot, osamanthus, spices), I only got a barbershop scent with sweet buttery biscuit cookies and maple syrup.

2/10-do not understand this, not horrible, just cookies and aftershave…

Hate at first sniff. This makes me gag in a way that reminds me of those vile buttered popcorn jelly bellies.

Someone interested to sell a bottle ? (any ml)
Europe

Open up like a bread with a lil bit fruit, to me its more male, strong and sweet, very nice in winter

This scent has a distinctive and lively aroma that's hard to miss.

IMO: Originality isn't something you can just smell, but this scent is sincere and honest. There's nothing quite like it on the market right now which makes me think there will definitely be demand for more scents in general!

POV: Even if you don't like the smell, everyone will notice your scent and be curious about it.

Fragrance as a hobby is a Russian roulette of tiny sample vials. Every once in a while, you pull the trigger and there’s actually a bullet in there — a divinely aromatic bullet that costs several hundred dollars.

Why do I do this myself, I find myself wondering each time I test this particular sample. Why take the risk of falling deeply in love with an outrageously expensive fragrance? Initially, for the first minute at least, the smell repels me. It is a bitter immortelle and maple syrup burning in a cast iron skillet.

Then, it settles down after a moment: honeyed granola, flour, unsalted butter. Intense malt. Soon a lactonic coconut, and a sweet, dried immortelle flower. The immortelle is unmistakable as I used to add a drop of pure immortelle oil to a bath every once in a while when I really needed to relax. It was a tiny, precious bottle of syrupy, smokey heaven. I smell something licorice adjacent that spirals out from and weaves back and forth with the malty note; together they form a double helix of boozy wonderment.

I find that nearly all of the listed notes occur exactly as described, which is very rare for a fragrance. The only thing I absolutely cannot locate is anything like apricot. I don’t miss it though. For me, this is what gourmand would mean in an ideal world. Bread with creamy butter, inky licorice ropes, and malty tea biscuits.

This fragrance reminds me of the smell of vanilla popcorn in the movie theater's lobby. So sweet, warm, and relaxed.

Addictive. Sweet but not in a fruity or sugary way. Reminds me of tapioca.

I was suprised by this one. I had not read the notes, but from the name "Skin games", I was expecting muscs, animalics, maybe something lactonic, definitely something more suble and deep. The opening smelled intensely of spicy cononut (I originally got hazelnut) in a desserty kind of way, similiar to Kilian's stuff. I sort of wish I could tear off the spices and the coconut to get to the "skin" part, especially to the wheat buried somewhere underneath.

It is interesting and remarkable how people perceive the same perfume so differently. Some take spicy note primarily while others feel milk, sandalwood, butter, etc. I was expecting bakery smell mingled with sandalwood and spices, after I read Lutens' own description of this scent. I adore freshly baked baguette smell(I often bake artisanal types of breads myself) and was ready to enjoy it. This is actually more about sweet baked goods, redolent of slightly burnt sugar, little spices, and subtle sandalwood. Comforting and delicious smell for sure. "Skin game" or not, this scent is almost linear for several hours.

I like this but it was not exactly what I was hoping to smell: malty aroma of baguette, sourdough, namely lean breads.

I saw the prominent wheat note and a light bulb went on in my head *Jour de Fete*! No, it's not - bummer. But it is a very spicy sandalwood, milky. But the milky isn't the sandalwood. I think that's the Australian kind bc it's earthy. The milk and apricot are the milky notes. I guess it gets the sweet honey like tone from the osmanthus, not too powdery, but some. It's gorgeous, just not something I'd wear a lot. I have a tiny decant, but for the money I'll have to pass. I will enjoy my sample, though.

I made such an effort to get my hands on this, and was ready to love this fragrance, but sadly we didn't hit it off.

I was expecting the yumminess of baked goods, butter, soft spice and a pervasive milkiness - all I get is an overwhelmingly spicy perfume. My husband loathes it, and says it reminds him of spicy mothballs and old people. I am so disappointed :(

Guys I lost my mind over your reviews! the bell bottle with my name engraved is on its way from France to Italy (from Lutens official eshop). It is a crazy blind buy, but I could not resist after reading all your intriguing and magnificent reviews on this masterpiece. Update will follow.....

UPDATE: evocative and mesmerising. Every Lutens fragrance is a journey and this is bizzarre and addictive. Like a guy you fancy but you don't want to admit. I am hooked and the more I use it the more I love it. This concept works for all Lutens fragrances.
I have one info about the bell jar purchase: I used the name engraving service and I loved it. The only problem is that there is not a spray, so to wear it properly you have to decant it. I panicked a bit and honestly I would have likely paid more money to have the puffer available. I used a sterile medical syringe and decanted in 10 ml glass container, but somehow disappointed.

I should have grabbed this from the Serge Lutens website when it was in stock. Such a beautiful, milky fragrance. Hopefully, it gets restocked soon. If anyone wishes to part with a bottle, let me know.

“Don’t forget to buy the bread”. A childhood memory which Serge Lutens has passed on in “Jeux de peau", the gentle warmth of freshly-baked bread rising up from the basement window. The perfect feast of golden barley, wheat and dried fruit.

I want to hate it but I don't, I love it. At first it soo reminds me of indie perfumes that are intended to smell like food stuffs: bread obviously, butter, milk, baked goods in general. And there is a similarity between those cheap indie fragrances and the initial burst of bread accord here. I wanted to believe that even if I liked this, I could get it from some cheaper source. But then it starts to mellow out and relax down into the skin and by then, it's obvious, nothing can compare to it. This is such an innocent, memorable fragrance that transports you to your childhood and the comfort of your mother. This is an example of why I originally fell in love with Serge Lutens and why I will continue to consider his creations the pinnacle of art in perfumery. 9/10

Every time I get an alert it’s in stock, it’s not. Did it happen to someone else? Definitely looking to buy this one, I can’t get the smell out of my head. And so far, I didn’t find other “bread”perfumes that come close

As a fan of gourmand fragrances, I was trying to find Jeux de Peau for a while but was not lucky. Eventually, I got an alert and grabbed one. Whilst it was not in our SL's regular bottles and a Bell bottle, it's still a find.
The scent as the name indicates does play games on your skin but in a good way. Edible, comforting and warm. Just like mum's embrace, Sunday mornings with warm bread, apricot jam, milk! And wait....butter popcorn! Sounds crazy....right? But this is perhaps the best example of wheat and milk notes I have tried. The middle notes start dancing in a few minutes- coconut and immortelle. Could not smell liquorice which I don't mind.
And as I was sniffing my wrists like anything, wooden notes, apricot? And Osmanthus take over...
It was a blind buy purely based on notes, reviews and intuition 😊
In short, it's intimate, mysterious and above all kind of edible in a nice way!
P.S: A couple of hours have passed and I can no longer feel its lactonic but a deep smoky scent with a nutty feel. Still loving it

An amazingly three dimensional fragrance, Jeux de Peau is laitonic, coumarin-creamy, coconutty and unlike anything I've ever experienced - a full-bodied gourmand sensory overload: it smells intoxicating, delectable and delicious with a warm, woody foundation - I think what fascinates me about this is it delights the senses - all of them, especially taste and smell. Tantalising. Almost edible.
Serge Lutens is famous for niche quality natural ingredients and Jeux de Peau is a prime example - it smells vividly natural and realistic.

First got this about five years ago, and really liked it so I started carrying a 12ml travel spray so I could reapply as desired. While working on a film set up the coast it leaked absolutely everywhere so for the next three days it was all I could smell. In addition to indelibly imprinting Jeux de Peau on my mind - so much so that just thinking of it makes my mouth water - the effect on other people was remarkable - I've never had such an overwhelmingly positive response from so many different people.

Bit confused by the name "Jeux de peau" which literally translated is "skin games" or "leather games" - and could be an allusion to the "Jeu de Paume". which refers to both the traditional game of tennis as played by the kings of France, where it was played (a royal tennis court) as well as to a contemporary venue in the Tuileries where tennis was once played. Considering how utterly intoxicating this is, perhaps the "skin games" in question are the intimate kind.
Jeux de Peau is extremely, deliciously, sexy and so unique it transcends the conventions of traditional gender-based perfumery.
Whatever it means, it is an exquisitely beautiful fragrance that is a real pleasure for the wearer and for everyone around them.

The smell of your lover's skin early in the morning, freshly baked croissants and apricot jam from your local cafe, the scent of a mother holding her newborn child close to breastfeed. This is so intimate, so innocent and human, yet there's something so inherently erotic about it that I just can't pinpoint. It evokes images of simpler days when people would spend their days in the village, raking hay, eating bread and milk for breakfast, and expect children within weeks of their marriage.

I've never smelled something that made me so confused before. This is so pure and comforting yet somehow inappropriate.

I highly recommend it.

I abhor this fragrance.

Sandalwood, pickles and moldy licorice. I don't get milk and wheat. I don't find anything gourmand about it.

I rarely wince, I rarely scrub. I did both after sampling this on my skin.

I don't find this pleasant in the least, it's almost inconceivable to me that someone would enjoy this. I almost wonder if the sample I got (from the perfumed court) turned before it made its way to me because it is just that bad to my nose.

Sorry to those who enjoy this!

Currently having a torrid internal debate with myself because I’m nearing the end of my bottle of Jeux de Peau. I’ve bought so much perfume over the past year. So much. I had been able to get my perfume buying compulsion way down for several years. Then the Covid lockdown & isolation happened and I ramped up out of control. I do not need another bottle for at least 5 years but I know I’ll miss Jeux de Peau. It is my favorite weekend fragrance during Fall & Winter. It’s a relaxing weekend sweater fragrance for me. So cozy. Reminds me of baking bread, muffins and making soup.

Jeux de Peau literally smells like wood, wheat and hay. At the start there might be a little fruit but it dries down to a wheaty wood. I picture an autumn harvest scene, complete with bales of hay and brisk hikes in the forest. I can also see how others might smell breakfast; sort of a granola, muesli and marmalade toast spread with an April Cornell table cloth. It’s not especially sweet, it’s a barely sweetened scent that’s mostly about Sandalwood and immortelle (which I normally hate). It has a rough texture which adds to the wheat effect. After all these years of not eating carbs this becomes especially addictive and comforting!

Gah, I’ll probably end up buying it again in the next month or so. I’m just mad because it used to be part of the less expensive range and now it’s a bell jar. There are a few other wheaty wood scents out there but this is the best. A MASTERPIECE. (however definitely NOT a blind buy. odd and offbeat like most Lutens)

10/10

A masterpiece. Sampling Serge Lutens fragrances always is such an interesting experience. Jeux de Peau smells like breakfast - but not any breakfast. It’s your grandmother’s breakfast, in the winter, with milky coffee, cereal and brioche. The fragrance smells quite nutty thanks to the wheat, which is so so comforting. The spices are present but not sharp, and the sandalwood is the main note here but it stays rounded, never dry. Jeux de Peau is now #1 on my want list and I will certainly purchase it very soon. Falling temperatures make this fragrance an ideal choice!

Jeux de Peau was a blind buy, a perfume that I wanted to try for a long time and that I couldn't find.

It's Sunday morning, you're sitting on a light wooden table, it's cool and still a bit dark outside on an autumn morning. There’s wood furniture around you. You're eating hot sourdough brioches, cereals and milk. You lit a coconut and licorice candle, the ones with the wooden stick. A spiced apricot jam is nearby but nothing, nothing beats the smell of wheat, milk and spicy sandalwood. Just after a few hours you can’t smell the brioche so strongly anymore, the sandalwood took its place.

The way this perfume is balanced is a work of art. The licorice is pungent, the immortelle bitter, the milk offers thickness and comfort, the wheat creates a comfortable, homely, gourmand and almost nutty effect, the apricot offers sweetness but also lightness. The sandalwood acts like a creamy glue for all the other notes.

This perfume is a mother's hug.

It smells like a spiced hot croissants, then it changed to milky spiced sandalwood. Fantastic and another CS+SL masterpiece.

This is one of my favorite sexy-comforting scents. I pulled it out yesterday as temps in Cali are starting to normalize for "fall" here. And while we're not yet into sweater-weather I can see it coming! In Jeux de Peau, notes are blended harmoniously and the woodsy-smooth sandalwood with buttery and toasted aspects of wheat, apricot and osthmanthus are perfect in these more moderate temps. At first spritz there is a butter-popcorn, warm toast impression lasting several minutes but the heart transitions into buttery sandalwood with a bit of a bite. It enhances the wood aspects of the sandalwood smoothing and amplifying them at the same time. This perfume works well in heat, with sandalwood and osthmanthus creating a lighter clean and fruited aspect. Spice notes, while present do not turn it into a Shalimar or Coco. There's just a nice, low key thrum. On skin JdP becomes a somewhat sweet--but not overly gourmand scent--and never veers into fruity-licious or honey-sweet saccharine despite imortelle adding a dollop of bitter maple syrup. It's brightened with the osthmanthus's sunny lift to the apricot and imortelle and wards away cloying aspects. This could easily become a signature scent, and I think is fairly unisex, possibly a slight lean to the "more feminine" but the sandalwood is grounding for all. The overall effect is: sun-warmed skin, radiating a golden light, and when you hug someone that is simultaneously sexy (sandalwood and apricot/osthmanthus) and comforting (milk, wheat, imortelle) if that makes sense. It is the perfect fall-into-winter scent, extending languorous sunnier days while watching leaves turn and blow. I highly recommend. I have a back-up to my back-up, so if someone is interested in a bottle pm me.

This is one of my favorite sexy-comforting scents. I pulled it out yesterday as temps in Cali are starting to normalize for "fall" here. And while we're not yet into sweater-weather I can see it coming! In Jeux de Peau, notes are blended harmoniously and the woodsy-smooth sandalwood with buttery and toasted aspects of wheat, apricot and osthmanthus are perfect in these more moderate temps. At first spritz there is a butter-popcorn, warm toast impression lasting several minutes but the heart transitions into buttery sandalwood with a bit of a bite. It enhances the wood aspects of the sandalwood smoothing and amplifying them at the same time. This perfume works well in heat, with sandalwood and osthmanthus creating a lighter clean and fruited aspect. Spice notes, while present do not turn it into a Shalimar or Coco. There's just a nice, low key thrum. On skin JdP becomes a somewhat sweet--but not overly gourmand scent--and never veers into fruity-licious or honey-sweet saccharine despite imortelle adding a dollop of bitter maple syrup. It's brightened with the osthmanthus's sunny lift to the apricot and imortelle and wards away cloying aspects. This could easily become a signature scent, and I think is fairly unisex, possibly a slight lean to the "more feminine" but the sandalwood is grounding for all. The overall effect is: sun-warmed skin, radiating a golden light, and skin, and when you hug someone that is simultaneously sexy (sandalwood and apricot/osthmanthus) and comforting (milk, wheat, imortelle) if that makes sense. It is the perfect fall-into-winter scent, extending languorous sunnier days while watching leaves turn and blow. I highly recommend. I have a back-up to my back-up, so if someone is interested in a bottle pm me.

This smells like a luxury bakery, a very dry, slightly sweet and slightly spicy scent. I don't find it particularly provocative but it is elegant and unique. The wheat note does stand out at first spray, and then the more woods-oriented notes settle in. Unfortunately longevity isn't great on me. I have the sample and I enjoy wearing this but don't think I would buy the full bottle.

I have both Santal Majuscule and Jeux de Peau and I don't really get the comparison (I do kinda get Rima XI though, though I'd prefer Jeux de Peau to it every day of the week).

OK Jeux de Peau- where do I start.

Jeux de Peau is a sexy, tatted pastry chef whose shift just ended and they meet you for a drink. They run some cool-ass Bushwick bakery, where they burn Palo Santo in the kitchen as they bake fresh croissants.

Jeux de Peau is what they smell like at the end of that magical shift. Edgy fresh croissants, with remnants of Palo Santo.

EDIT: the dry down on this was so unpleasant on me :(

When I first sniffed it, I hated it but couldn’t stop sniffing my wrists. I went and bought a bottle the next day. Smells like cereal or a warm brioche with dried apricots in it and drys down with a dark coffee bean note on me. I love it now, sad it’s been discontinued.

Weirdly, where others were getting bread, my first thought for this scent was apricot cobbler with cream. An expensive one, masterfully made, well browned but not burnt. I want to eat this, but am happy to settle for smelling it instead!

This is a salty gourmand, with a little bit of spicy and nutty accords. Overall: 7.5/10

Quite "one of a kind". I like it MUCH better than L'Artisan's Jour de Fete, which is another "bread" frag. The milk note here is not sweet, but there's a hint of sweetness coming from the coconut. The spices reminded me of salted almond, or some kind of nuts. When I spray this, I imagine a basket of multigrain bread with a cup of milk in the background.

SG frags are always strong in sillage, but since this is a gourmand, I found it more likeable.

Reminder to self: SL frags are complex and ever evolving so you need to let them work on your skin for some hours before judging.

At first, it was a strong dislike. It smelled like a bakery full of spicy/herbal breads... and the sugary and buttery ones as well (like croissants, brioches etc).
So very much evocative of past experiences but not something I want to be smelling on my skin.
Then, like all SL frags, it changes.
It morphs into a dry floral -immortelle- with a bitter note.
This bitter note - the sandalwood I guess - is carried along until the drydown and stays on your skin for hours.
it is a very dry scent indeed, and it's shocking compared to the gourmand-like beginning!

So beware, this is NOT a gourmand, even if you may think so by the very first notes.
I am left with a dark, bitter vetiver like note - It could be a dozen of different ingredients, as we do not know for sure: Serge has revealed just a few! - a salty note, and a kind of ozonic one; it makes me think of the sea side.
Given that I don't like aquatic notes (anything with calone makes me run away), I must confess this one is majestically interpreted.
I like it.

Now the name. Skin Games?
Probably Serge intended that this frag will play games with your skin, changing into entierely different frags within the span of an hour....

Very, very interesting frag.

One of the first Serge Lutens fragrances I bought, I realise looking at the notes on here that it's technically another woody fragrance that I like. I say "technically" because I actually experience as a fairly fresh fragrance, not citrus nor aquatic, but somehow just very clean. Also, while it's brimming with organic notes, there is something chemical about it, in a very good way. Think of that very specific, enticing smell of new cellophane wrapped around a bouquet of flowers. It's another I think of as season and occasion neutral, though I notice I wear it more in the summer during the day, but it's a go-to option for evening glam all year round.

This smells absolutely ridiculous - sandalwood flour with white sugary glaze. Overall it smells like slightly burned crepes.

-Very sweet scent.
-Opens with a punch of almond/nutty notes.
-Not a fan overall.
-Not fbw. (-)

Unusual...something about this makes my stomach churn. It has a sweet gourmand quality with wheat and milk but having that combined with this perfume floral seems wrong. I unfortunately do not like.

Unusual and interesting gourmand scent with a playful name (Skin Games). It is indeed a hide and seek game on your skin opening with a realistic bread note (wheat, milk) and then moving to other kitchen smells (spices, fruits, coconut) with some immortelle and licorice. The perfume settles on a bed of ambery wood. The unisex scent has moderate sillage and good longevity. A very nostalgic scent, this will take you back to the smells of childhood and of family gatherings around the kitchen. Incredibly well done. Enjoy!

One of Lutens's last masterpieces, with which he was allowed to bless us. At least I haven't liked that much his offerings after 2011. A couple of deviations, of course.

Jeux de peau is brilliantly pleasant, balanced and comforting. The sour lactonic and buttery wood meets deliciously toasty aromas, where you can easily smell roasted sesame seeds, popcorn and oven-warm bread, just for example.

Two sprays are enough to make me happy on a hell of a day.

Salted pretzel. I smell like a salted pretzel.

I wanted more of the notes :c
Longevity is great. Projection is close to skin.
It has a similar undertone to Un Bois Vanille but they are different. The same DNA is there though

If you like anise or immortelle this is a treat. It's unusual, not to say quirky, but skilfully done. I'm a fan of all the notes, but they have to be put together right and this is masterful, really. True niche perfumery, no one else will be wearing it, and best in winter, so you get the proper balance of those notes coming off. I don't get coconut or milk as a first response; what comes off is anise, hay, and a dry woody sweetness, reminiscent of rural Southern France. A lot of people might find this too quirky to wear; regardless, Lutens is a genius. I'll be wearing it often this winter. *love*

Skin chemistry really is something, huh. On my mother this is an absolutely stunning light, creamy sandalwood, on me this is salted butter, smoked woods, licorice, and above all IMMORTELLE- even in the dry down, when the smoke and woods have faded, and the licorice is barely a hint, I get salted butter, finally something a bit more milky, and still immortelle. On the plus side, I like immortelle.

Smells just like caramel popcorn/freshly baked bread. Like a bakery that sells gourmet popcorn on the side. The most comforting scent ever while making my mouth water. Too bad the 50ml bottles are discontinued.

If you have the chance, it is a must try from this house. Projection isn't too great; however, it really shouldn't be. It's a personal scent. Longevity doesn't seem to be that bad though, especially on clothes. I get around 6-8 hours.

Highly recommended.

If anyone likes this one, might want to try Carner Barcelona's Palo Santo. It doesn't smell similar at all, but it conjures up the same comforting, creamy vibe.

I just received this fragrance from Serge Luten's website. This fragrance smells exactly like cat urine. I was told by someone that the fragrance that I received could of gone bad but I purchased from the Serge Luten's website. I have also seen others reviews here stating the same thing the urine smell.

YEAST MODE

What a strange smell!! After AGES of searching I've found a little 5ml to satisfy my curiosity and it's most odd. I do smell like slightly burnt bread at the moment but there's a whole tangle of weirdness in there yet to unfold. I'll update this later.

I guess many of you will have the same yearning to smell a thing - I've been after this for actual centuries, it seems, it has an initial strangeness - slightly harsh, not at all sexy - that I'm finding intriguing and slightly confusing...

Watch this space.

Update: don't like it! It's bitter and weird, had to get it off in the end, it didn't magically turn into something beautiful on me. I get how it could work for some, but if I want a bakery smell I'll go for Dries Van Noten which is, oddly, sexy custard and little European side streets to explore. IF ANYONE WANTS MY 5ml PLEASE GET IN TOUCH ASAP or I'll eBay it.

My favorite SL Fragrance. The open is fresh buttery croissants. This quickly melts into a sweet spicy concoction that reads like a musk on me...but far more interesting because if you pay attention you can dissect all the different spicy golden facets.

This is the smell of the first few months of motherhood. I get the same “smelling my baby’s head” rush I get from musc raveguer.

(Also this should definitely be in the 4’s, wth fragrantica)

FWIW I purchased a new bottle and can confirm it’s identical to my old sample <3

Bread and vanilla-milk and musk and apricots and caramel and that salt-and-hay sex smell of immortelle. 
This baby is gourmand in just the most evocative and unexpected way. It's angelic and obscene and utterly beautiful.

It gives the impression that I am producing the scent rather than wearing it. I know I'm not the first person to wax poetic over it, but I simply cannot get enough of it.


Mercy, but this is an Oedipal complex in a bottle and I am right here for it. It’s quiet, but luscious and just otherworldly sexy. If you want to make somebody fall in love with you and then eat you up and still be hungry for more, you want to wear this.

In fact, I think no matter what you want, if you smell like Jeux de Peau, you have a pretty good chance of getting it.

This is an interesting comfort scent. I like the milky wheat and the slight bit of licorice. However it's quite pricey and I don't love it enough to pay that kind of price for it because of the slight bitter note. I am glad to have had the opportunity to smell this though, as I will now look for other perfumes with a wheat note.

Testing again several years later after considering buying a full bottle, and still not a love. I don't think this is one that I need.

This is really one of my favourite, it's not something that one could wear everyday.

The licorice, wheat and woody note is strong. The milk melts with the wheat, and the woody note makes it smells like breads are baking in wood fire. It really reminds me of bakery.
But it also smells a bit bitter.

An ALL time Favorite HG. You guys below!! It's on their website. Rebottled & higher priced of course. If I find out they watered it down as well, I will boycott SL for life!

Could someone please reach out if a bottle is for sale? I have been looking all over and cannot find one.

Love love love this scrumptious concoction. It's so tasty but also kinda weird, with its aniseedy, almost salty tang and warm wheaty-ness. The ultimate comfort scent in my book.

wow...this is a very muted scent. it almost comes across as a scent that is about 6 hours in, or a scent that has been washed off or something like that.

i get the sweetness from the milk, as well as the bran elements from the wheat/grain, but the sandalwood is the biggest component in this, for mine. it provides the spine to this scent which, if i'm being honest, isn't all that impressive. it feels like one aspect of the perfume, it feels incomplete. even though it is nice to smell, it doesn't really strike me as remarkable or anything like that.
it's a hard no from me, unforch.

I agree with Blue_Lilac, I get a urine stench here. It's a 'scrubber', I couldn't get it off fast enough!

This perfume did not work for me sadly. I had my eye on it for a while, and bought as a blind buy, as I've owned other Serge Lutens fragrances before and gourmand is always up my alley. However, on me, I don't get cozy bakery, I smell more of a floral fragrance with this. Maybe the Imortelle or apricot? I do get a bit of saltiness though and it's interesting and unique. This one just didn't do it for me. Highly disappointed. Sample before you buy.

I really agree with Saatwik’s review. I smell the sandalwood and bread and a hint of the coconut. I don’t get warm bread from this necessarily but it is so yummy with a hint of a spice to it, which is probably the anise. I work from home and love wearing this around the house, but I don’t think this can’t be worn out for day to day. I wouldn’t wear this for special occasion really. I bought a partial bottle off eBay blind, but I will probably try to track down another bottle once it’s finished. This one is special. For the record I don’t get any kind of popcorn note that some people mention, just spicy sweet bready sandalwood. I sprayed once to my collarbone today and another to my wrists and it’s been wafting up for a few hours :)

Reminds me of the smell of pancakes. Not quite that, but definitely similar. It probably is supposed to smell like bread, which is probably true, if it weren't for me being hungry for pancakes. It also smells quite salty as well. The only thing that would make it better for me would be if it had vanilla in it, but I think that may take away from its uniqueness. I am addicted to this! I just wish it had better sillage..

edit: Definitely smells like a bunch of warm, salty bread that just came out of the oven at a baker's shop. I imagine hearing the crunch and feeling the crispness of the outside of the bread when breaking it apart before eating it.

I really wanted to love this but all I could smell was a synthetic lactose note that reminded me of cheap teas or soaps scented like cupcake or something similar. I can see that structurally its a good perfume but that milk-sugar note is just very fake and smells horrible.

I’m soooooo sad! I really wanted to love this, but unfortunately I am one of the few who can detect only the pungent and undeniable stench of urine. I so wanted this to be the scent of rising yeast, warm baking bread, buttered toast and crossiants. As someone who is not able to enjoy carbs regularly due to a health issue, I was excited for this perfume to fill that void in my life, a new way for my senses to experience that warm inviting aroma of a bakery...alas it was not to be. Does anyone have a recommendation for a fragrance of a similar nature?

It smells very spicy and sweet, like some indie traditional drink. Must be used very carefully

So yeasty and doughy and interesting. Sometimes buttery popcorn. Slightly fruity undertone is kind of weird. Not an easy fragrance to wear. But I love it! Smells like a salty ball of fresh dough on a flour dusted table with baked apricot pastries in the background and sometimes it is more buttery than that.
The name seems apt as it melts and blends into skin over time and fades away after an appropriate duration, your trip to the boulangerie. It's still detectable right next to your skin for a long time. I can imagine it as a metaphor for the natural skin scent of an overweight (but happy!) baker. One of the least versatile fragrances that I love !

This smells like baked goodies only at the beginning and at the dry down it’s a purified clean sweeter sandalwood. It’s very nice but it think I will have to spray it on my husband and see how it smells on him, i think it might sound nicer on a men than women. Although I do enjoy sniffing on my wrists, something is very addictive in it. This is truly unisex fragrance. I like my perfume smell true to feminine side.

MIlk and wheat combo in a good way. I have to admit i see the add of full grain butter biscuits with milky cream when i smell this, but this proves how natural scent can be made from totally different ingredients. Another great masterpiece from SL. Unfortunately it does not stay long enough on my skin (few hours max), but situation is better wearing it on clothes, but also for me it is not a daily wear, rather for occasional, cozy daytime dinner or coffee break with some dearest people.

I love smelling like a hot yeast bun.

I could bite me!

This is a bakery selling coconut bread in a sandalwood forest.

Jeux de Peau has a very interesting makeup - the notes in the note pyramid aren't what you'd find in the usual top-mid-base structure. Up top you get baked bread with prominent coconut and some licorice thrown in as well - one feels that the listed top and mid notes actually meld with each other.

In about 3-4 hours, the gorgeous sandalwood note starts emerging as the main component and takes over completely by the 6-7 hour mark, stretching till the very end.

Performance is excellent - on skin, the longevity is 10+ hours. On clothes it's far, far more - the smell of the residual sandalwood will pretty much stay on the clothes till you wash them.

While the ratings don't suggest this, for me the projection is fantastic too - more than a couple of meters for at least the first 4-5 hours.

After going through hundreds of niche perfumes, this is the first one that makes me gag. I put my nose into it and feel my stomach turn. It's not that bad of a scent, I love Santal M from SL (which also fits my skin really well), but JdP has this strange effect on me. Had to scrub it off (I had never scrubbed off anything before) before going sick.

Sam Adams Shock Top Twisted Pretzel Wheat. In the autumn I get a strong craving for this beer- its flavor is so round and full it’s almost like actually eating something- some filling, salty, carb heavy bite. A really rich soft pretzel, or maybe buttery popcorn with nutritional yeast on top (seriously, I’m not a health food person but this is an amazing combo). So, imagine my surprise when I found this comes in a fragrance! Super salty, bread-y richness that turns into milky caramel after a couple of hours. Such a comforting, satisfying fragrance to spray on after a bath and before getting into clean sheets. I would consider this a gourmand plus- it’s not like a delicate little dessert taste, it’s like a rich buttery pastry.

When i read the reviews here i am start thinking that there is something wrong with my bottle or with my nose.

There is no sweet notes or milky in it, but i have two words for that fragrance and they are truly what i feel about it when i am wearing it - the one is 'pretzel' - that SALTY baked breads and the other is 'Urine' - sorry for that, but i smell it and try to not think about that side of the scent and prefer the fist one, because i like to eat pretzels.

The dominant note from this scent for me is salt.

COMFORT SCENT WITH A BACKBONE

To me Jeux de Peau is reminiscent of a toddler's cereal by Nestle called "Nestum Wheat and Honey".

I smell toasted wheat, and comforting warm milk with sprinkled sugar. I'm missing the bread quality some mention, as I don't smell any yeast here.

If this fragrance consisted of only the notes before mentioned, I wouldn't find it wearable, but licorice adds a backbone to this corky, unusual composition and compliments its rounded soft edges, while sandalwood renders it elegance.

I also smell apricot (love) and some coconut, which I usually don't like, but in my view, it serves as a support to this fragrance, as do immortelle and spices.

I just can't stop smelling my wrist! This is the fragrance I have been reaching for most often during the colder months. I'm inlove with it and with the genius of Christopher Sheldrake <3

LONGEVITY: 6-8 hrs on skin, 48 hrs on fabric
PROJECTION: Arms length for 3-4 hrs, later sits close to the skin
VERSATILITY: Day to Night

I have sampled Jeux de Peau so often over the years, and I always think it‘s not for me, but I always come back to try it again and again. It‘s weird.
This perfume is recognizable as a Lutens from the very first spray. I think most of their oriental fragrances have a woody, spicy, sweet but dry signature DNA to them, which can be difficult for me to wear in some scents but great in others. In JdP, I get a lot of licorice and sandalwood in the beginning and it can be a bit overwhelming. Even the coconut comes off very dry and woody in the first hours.
Then there are of course the bready, wheaty notes. While they get used more often in fragrances nowadays than a few years ago, there are still not many fragrances that smell so much like savory baked goods as JdP does.
After a couple of hours the scent becomes softer and rounder. Finally, the milky notes and even a bit of apricot come out on my skin. Then it reminds me of buttered bread or bread pudding with cinnamon and warm milk. I think I always try this again because the drydown is so cozy and lovely, and them I‘m surprised by the strong opening that lasts for quite a while.

Ultimately, it‘s not something I‘d really wear outside. For a Lutens gourmand I already own Un Bois Vanille, which is easier to wear in my opinion. But I‘m glad I got a small sample of Jeux de Peau to sniff at home, and I‘d recommend every gourmand lover to try this fragrance just for the experience.

Very unique gourmand that leans of warm milk and honeyed oats at the front with some mild wood and spice at the back.

Evokes an image of cooking creamed oatmeal in a black pot over a wood fire, being served with honey and a bit of cinnamon.

Do I want to walk around the city smelling like this? Probably not but for at home when it's cold outside and you want to have a sense of comfort surrounding you this is superb.

Jeux de Peau is really good. But it’s also a weird scent.

I wouldn’t expect this to be anything else but a Serge Luten perfume. It’s very gourmand but it’s not overly sweet. The licorice note is prominent throughout the opening. I pick up the croissant with apricot compote, and wearing this I feared that I would be gorging myself with bread slathered with butter and cinnamon.

But at times I pick up something burnt. And a little rancid. It only lasts for a moment, and when I return for another scent sniff, JdP turns back to the milky buttery goodness in a matter of seconds. That’s the weird part.

The drydown is less of a seesaw ride, and I mostly pick up a foodie kind of Amber combined with sandalwood. Longevity is good but this scent stays close (not a deal breaker for me).

I don’t think this will be appealing to a mass audience, but my best friend loves this and her taste is a little more mainstream, think Poison and Angel.

I think it’s brilliant. I think it’s the definition of niche perfume. If you are a collector, this deserves consideration.

I was so close to a blind buy, but I abstained and finally managed to get a sample. There is something very strange about this fragrance, but it may be only on my skin ... at first I feel a very spicy smell (Remindes me a little bit of Hypnotic Poison Eau the Parfum), probably the mix of sandalwood and licorice, or perhaps is the slightly medicinal facet that I feel in perfumes that contain immortelle.

After that it becomes a truly foody fragrance, something I have never experienced until now. I can detect the wheat notes, the milky sandalwood and the spicy licorice. I'm not detecting the coconut and unfortunately the smell remains quite linear...

So sorry because the performances are great!

For me this is French patisseries! It's all the delicious pastries and croissants and goes beautifully with a good black coffee or espresso. I don't even really like espresso and such but with this perfume I feel Parisian and fabulous, like I'm sitting outside a patisserie in the perfect outfit with my coffee and pastry people watching.
I was unsure of this at first and wondered when I'd ever want to smell like this but it's found a spot in my heart that nothing could budge it from.

So if you are a fragrance collector, then this is very special for your collection. someone previously said that it smells like a prime ingredient of bread, and like milk too ... is absolutely right. Primary substances in a collection scent that very few will flatter you if they smell it on you. it suffices me to smell it ... love.

I just can't get enough of Jeux de peau. Like I want it to be on my skin 24/7 as if it's the very part of me. That delectable, delicious smell lingering on my skin is just too addictive.

I never thought of sipping champagne while watching a movie and eating slightly caramelized popcorn until I smelt this scent.

I recently blind bought this along with Serge Noire, which was the main scent I was looking to purchase; it was $46 and change so I figured what the heck. After I placed the order, I started researching some of the reviews for this fragrance and was pretty certain that I made a mistake with this one....

Some people mention a butter popcorn accord, which scared me because I can not stand the smell of buttered popcorn, I'm not really a goumand fan either. This was adding up to a big swing and miss for me. Anyway, it finally arrived and I tested on paper first. I definitley got popcorn, but no buttery scent, it was more of a caramel/nutty accord reminiscent of "cracker jack", not so bad for me. So, I figured time for a skin test. Got more of the same right off the bat, that caramel, popcorn, nutty mixture. after about 15 min or so the nuttiness subsides and it does become kind of sweet, but not sickly sweet, a very wearable fresh sweetness. Then about an hour in, some woodiness creeps in along with the immortelle, which is a note I am familiar with, that has an almost maple syrup vibe. The scent pretty much remains linear with the immortelle and woody notes through to the end. It was still detectable on my skin the next morning.

For a scent that I was already writing off before I tried it, I have to say I'm really digging it. The Serge Noire However, well thats a story for another day.

Yes, it's quality, but as a guy I do not think I can pull this off. It's not unisex. It has definitely the food undertone if you smell it right where you sprayed it. It projects a lot from a small sample. For me, it resembles old school ladies perfume.

I was hoping for more cream than bread, but I got bread. No cinnamon, no Christmas, no licorice, no butter; simply a very yeasty bread.

Strangely enough, Cartier Baiser Vole EDP has a similar yeasty smell. It could be a note that my skin is playing up. I haven't the faintest idea what, since the listed notes don't overlap at all.

Serge Lutens Jeux de Peau is a bready, spicy, sweet gourmand that has vanillic overtones with bits of character via the licorice and apricot, though admittedly I don't detect much of either, specifically, and a milky transparency that makes it easy to wear. It's fun, comforting, and apt for cold-weather wearing despite not being dense, at least to me.

As far as bready scents go, I'd say that Jeux de Peau is quite agreeable, a gourmand apt for even those that usually don't like gourmands, since the sandalwood, amber, and spices bring it more back to the middle, toward most perfume, rather than specifically the gourmand. It's not as dense and deliberately delectable as, say, 4160 Tuesdays Captured by Candlelight, the first and foremost logical comparison that came to mind.

Decently-performing and quite agreeable, its scent is matched only by its great price, a mere $53 for 50ml on FragranceNet. Certainly a bargain to be had, given its quality.

7 out of 10

5/10

A little bakery-like to begin with. Bready, biscuity, with spices. And a little milk.

Then settles into predominantly cedar on my skin. Cedar and other aromatic woods, combined with an old English church interior aroma. Not my favourite of places, but I do love that deep history imbued in old furniture, found in such places, along with the resins and spices of incense.

Another place this perfume reminds me of is a cabinet maker's workshop or a saw mill. The freshly sawn wood smell it emanates, along with the older furniture of antiquity in homes and certain church pews.

I love all aromas. Hence a huge perfume collection. Woody ones are up there for me. Something inspiring and seductive at the same time. This one does it for me.

Expensive though.

I already did a review but here's what I think of it now;

I picture a woman in the kitchen, pulling a tray of freshly baked cinnamon buns out of the oven, and doesn't put the icing on them.
The smell of the milky dough with spices fills the air like a comforting blanket.
There's "Autumn Leaves" by Emmy Rossum playing in the background as snow begins to lightly fall outside.

There's something slightly romantic about this scent, I actually enjoy it though I don't get any coconut or apricot on my skin.
I accidentally spritzed this on me 3 hours before the gym and as I was training I kept getting whiffs of it, so I imagine this is a powerhouse in the summer.

The notes of this one sounded great to me, but what I got when I tested it was yeasty milk with liquorice - not anything I'd ever like to smell like.

No thanks from me.

Oh, I am so confused.

At first, I've smelled some fruit, don't know which one, blended with wood. It was weird.
Then, the milk note came out, very similar to milk note in L'Artisan Amour Nocturne, which I love. And the fruit disappeared in a second, thank god.
And then the wheat came in. But something is so strange here, I do agree that wheat comes out a bit industrial, or burnt maybe.
But at one point, it definitely smells like an old bakery. Which is yummy. But it does not smell too sweet (at least on me, but woody notes always dominate on my skin), it actually is very realistic. Bakery smells so nice from a distance, but if you come inside and go back, into the kitchen, there is really strong yeast smell, which is not so nice anymore, it burns your nostrils and the warmth makes you sleepy and a little nauseous until you get used to it. And I think this is it.
Everything in here is so european, so familiar. This is why I get shocked at the rare moments when I can sense coconut, it is so random. And I don't really understand sandalwood, it makes everything bitter and weird.

But I think weird is right. I am so repulsed by something in it, but cannot stop sniffing myself at the same time. Which I find intriguing. This is an artistic masterpiece, no doubts.

Agh, once *again* immortelle crashes in and ruins the party for me. Something really odd going on here in the collision of milky-wheaty and sandalwood notes here - for me the total end result ended up like a slightly cloying malted digestive biscuit with an oddly sweaty tinge. For gourmand fans that might end up being a good thing but for me it's the wrong , slightly sickly and high side of sandalwood, plus even more sugar syrup, rather than concentrating on more austere natural notes I like more. Sillage is positively bossy on me and staying power well within Lutens range, so if unlike me you really do love a gourmand with bit of extra class, and you're after a very very sweet sandalwood, give it a shot.

I bought this in the winter and after wearing it a few times I'm still not sure how I feel about it.
It's got major lasting power (as do all Serge Lutens fragrances), and it smells so bready.
I was really hoping for the coconut and licorice notes to come through, but I'm not even sure if I can call this a gourmand as it was basically yeasty but not in a repulsive way.
I asked my boyfriend to smell it and he first said "oh something smells good" to saying "oh. what is that?!" after 2 minutes.
I'll have to wear it some more before deciding if I like smelling like a sweet bagel.

Got it after being on sale at Costco, believe it or not. This is definitely a gourmand to me. I get a strong praline pecan ice cream from it, and I have to stay away from that stuff so I can't have it calling to me all day. Returned it.

At first it smelled like a sugary nut flavored candle, I thought oh that’s funny.

Now, sadly, it’s kind of nauseating me – I get a little of the bakery vibe – but more “back of the bakery” to me – maybe dough got caught in a greasy gear, near a dusty fan. Smells sort of industrial, or maybe like burnt dirt.

Obviously Serge Lutens grew up in a different time and place, and smelled things I have never smelled. I live in a pretty sanitary world. So I appreciate this scent, but it’s not enjoyable for me today.

Weird & wonderful Jeux de Peau. Starts out bready & homely smelling, followed by sweeter apricot danish pastry with a hint of immortelle. The middle & base notes are lovely, really creamy woods with a little floral (osmanthus?) coming through & an occasional whiff of apricot (I need to huff on my arm to catch it). These are the main accords to me, but there's more going on here that a better nose than mine could identify. As it progresses it's surprisingly easy to wear - smooth, warm & comforting.

I can see the similarity with Santal Majuscule, & based on notes alone I expected to prefer Santal Maj - but I don't! I much prefer this with its strange (for a perfume) opening, oddly cohesive complexity, & above all the gentle milky soft creaminess that I don't really get in SM.

Longevity & silage are great, it easily lasts all day but without ever being overbearing. JdP is so aptly named, but it's one to wear for your own pleasure & too unusual to be a crowd pleaser. May be not to everyones taste, but it certainly is mine. Interesting, different, & never boring! Slightly addictive, & a really clever perfume (imo) - that quickly grows on you. I love it :)

First spray on skin it smells like tuna sandwich with a lot of black pepper,fresh vegetables & dried herbs!! it takes time to settle down to a sweet creamy resinous&spicy scent,let's say a vanilla vetiver cardamom combo on dry down.so can i wear it as a perfume or it's just a nice full of good memories scent that i can't stop sniffing my arm while it is still there?!!...it definitely is a perfume cos the passive noses find it quite delicate & pleasant.

On my first full wear I am confident of 2 things:

1. I love it.
2. I will rarely wear it.

How can I be sure of those two things? Well, this is not for the mass market. It isn't one that people are going to smell and appreciate. Even for fragrance fans it is distinctly weird. Even if you aren't looking for compliments (I'm not) this is one that may get some criticism by those around you because it is so different and not what people are used to smelling.

Is it a gourmand? Not really. It has some gourmand notes, but it doesn't smell like a food as much as it does and idea or maybe a memory of food. The gourmand notes move to the back as it enters the dry down and the sandalwood takes over.

It is gorgeous, it is wearable, it is weird (in the best possible way) and it is artistic. It's the kind of scent I will wear when I want to relax on a cold, rainy day. I'm a becoming a huge fan of Serge Lutens and this one is a gem.

An undeniable and oddly unchallenging love for me. Being a gourmand, this is something I'd usually be hesitant of and perhaps not try but this is a gourmand with a twist. What smells comfort you? Do you enjoy walking past the warm doorways to a bakery, where the smell of freshly baked bread wafts out? If so... this scent is for you.

While not entirely or perfectly capturing that idea that I most likely just concocted by my own devices, it captures something that many might not particularly enjoy. Many won't, but more probably will. Like many votes and plebiscites we might have seen in our day... the margin between 'yes' and 'no' may be very narrow.

The woods are warm, the wheat is yeasty and milky. The flowers are white, luscious and creamy. The spices are soft and quite near non-existent, depending on your skin type. Fruits and mildly alcoholic aromas waft gently, suggesting something of a traditional 'down home' bakery. Coconut, which I usually abhor, is soft and milky also. Quite remarkable how immortelle is something that can work with the most noir of fragrances, but can also elevate the sweetest (or, in this case, the lack thereof. Traditional sweetness, at least) fragrances. Peppery, to the the point of a soft tickle in the back of the nose. Perhaps not there in aroma, but in texture or feeling

Quite an unusually standard scent that manages to be unlike anything I've ever smelt in a fragrance. I detect muskiness, but that may just be me. Remarkable, beautiful and perhaps my first proper 'love' from the Serge selection (save Arabie and Muscs Koublai Khan)

This scent is undeniably interesting and original. However, as a gourmand fragrance is too woody for me. The sweet milky and corny notes which I love so much are distinct just after a spray but they last just for a moment and then... I can smell nothing but the prominent sandalwood :(

Yet, all in all, Jeux de Peau remains something for connoisseurs.

Fragrance -Jeux de Peau Serge Lutens
Bottle from - 2015

Jeux de Peau opens with a delicious,sweet,warm,buttery, gourmand and caramelized notes of milk and wheat mingled with spices and with a hint of coconut.You might feel like you've stepped into a snow covered bakery in the Austrian Alpine village.Than as it lingers on the skin,it quickly moves to a woody,fruity,powdery,moderatly sweet and sensual scent with sandalwood as a dominant note fused with a spicy apricot with a wisper of amber.It has some similarities to Santal Majuscule by Serge Lutens.

Longevity - 7/10(7+ hours)
Silage/Projection - 7/10(moderate projection and silage for the first 2-3 hours)
Weather - best in autumn and winter
Age - 23+
Compliments - 7/10
Scent - 8/10

Main notes according to me - wheat,milk,sandalwood,spices,licorice,apricot,coconut.

The drydown is nice and i get some - sweetness,fruitiness,sandalwood,amber and spices.

Emotions - snow covered bakery,warm safe place,delicious, sweet,winter delights,sensual.

Occasion - best for nights out,date and romantic evening.

Try before you buy.

warm milk + cedar > pastry/cookies in the oven + fenugreek and other spices > outrageous, hot buttered popcorn!

Dries down to a pleasant, softer, wood scent with a little sweetness and fenugreek like spiciness. The Immortelle and woody/cedar notes are dominant for me.

It's a fun little ride. Not something I would wear daily, but nice for a winter evening...

رایحه ای آشنا ولی به شدت خاص! بیشتر رایحه است تا ادکلن
برای من ترکیبی از رایحه گندم و شیر (بسیار مشابه بوی غذای نوزادان) با طعم شوید و شنبلیله است. بعضی دوستان می گویند حس قرمه سبزی دارد اما برای من اصلن تداعی گر قرمه سبزی نیست
-----------
Scent & Quality: 9/10
Longevity: 8/10
Sillage: 7/10
Creativity & Uniqueness: 9/10
Affordability: 5/10
-----------
Overall: 7.6/10

I adore this perfume - it’s like wearing a bakery without any sickly sweetness. You’re getting the rising dough, the slightly caramelized edges, the high-quality base instead of a sugar coating. A grown-up gourmand! Unfortunately, yesterday a sales associate at Barney’s told me it is being discontinued. I hope he’s wrong.

Come to bed babe.

& put this on.


perfect.

Not for everyday use, only on very rare occasions, and for your personal enjoyment, not office friendly and not even for a night out, don't get me wrong, I love it but I wear it on those rare "me time" occasions in winter, with lots of snow outside. It ticks a nostalgia button, smells just like a bakery with fresh bread and cinnamon buns just out of the oven. This one really has a big sillage and a satisfying longevity.

I was so excited for this one! An oriental with a bread note, what could be wrong with that . . .

Occasionally when out and about I would encounter toddlers that smell kind of like stale crackers. It's a scent that makes my stomach turn and made me question my decision to have children when I was pregnant . . . The bread note kind of smells like that.

I'm certain that this is a great scent for people who don't have this negative connotation, but I just can't unsmell it.

My feelings toward Jeux de Peau transformed from horror to true love within a few weeks. Amazing!

Warm Graham crackers!

Jeux de Peau feels like a perfect cross between Santal Majuscule and ELDO's Tilda Swinton Like This. Subtract the cocoa from Majuscule, and amp up the caramelized sugar from Like This, and voilà, JdP. Doing a side-by-side wrist comparison between JdP and the ELDO, and there are marked similarities. Bonkers-carbohydrates without the diabetes.

Peeta, the hot-buns Baker from _Hunger Games_ would smell like this.

Projection & Longevity are enormous. One spray on the wrist will last til next year's wheat harvest.

This was a failed blind buy for me. I really like gourmand scents, but this is too strange. What I smell is some kind of spicy bread. I feel this is more like an experiment with kitchen flavors than a perfume. I enjoy the smell, it's warm, spicy, but I doubt a man or a woman should smell like this. I tried to layer this with Un bois de vanille and that made it more wearable. I guess I was expecting something sweeter. I don't smell any licorice or milk, just yeast and spices. It has great longevity, I sprayed once on my wrist and it stayed there all day.

This smells like a Christmas candle!! A winter perfume for sure.

Ha ha, did someone below mention that the first notes smelled just like Jelly Belly butter popcorn jellybeans? These notes go away very fast and become a soft, camphorous, milky, woody, scent balanced by very light fruit and spices. Quite lovely and unlike anything else I've ever encountered. I blind bought four Serge Luten's including Un Bois Vanille, Bas de Soie, Feminite du Bois online for a good price and three out of four are great, interesting, unique. The Un Bois Vanille is not good, due to overwhelming coconut and weak vanilla.
Can't wait to get Une Fille de Berlin, a spicy rose oriental which I accidently found out goes great layered with Vaniglia del Madagascar by I Profumi de Firenze.

This smells so gorgeous. The wheat note is very present making it earthy but different. Everything is smooth and blended and just spiced enough. This is the first SL that really lived up to the hype in my book. The undertone feels almost leathery. I guess that is wood. Definitely unisex even though there is sweetness. On the right man, this would be dreamy too.

At first I thought the people likening SL Jeux de Peau to SL Santal Majuscule must be crazy (I know, all 50+ of them!), but now that I've had the chance to test JdP properly, I definitely see the similarity as both fragrances reach the heart and drydown.

While Santal Majuscule opens with cocoa-dusted rose on my skin, JdP starts off with a blast of something sweet and buttery. I've seen lots of mentions of bread and baking, but to me it actually smells more like buttered popcorn jelly beans! Only the most expensive, hand-crafted, artisan, niche jelly beans, of course ;) But still buttered popcorn jelly beans.

As a result, the first few minutes are a bit too on-the-nose gourmand (no pun intended!), even for my food scent-loving tastes, but fortunately the jelly beans disappear after about 5-10 minutes and the more conventional baking analogies creep to the fore. I never get licorice (a shame, since I love it) or wheat/flour (as I do in L'Artisan's Bois Farine, for example), but there's an abstract 'something good is in the oven' feeling about this phase of the scent.

About an hour in, the true gourmand phase has run its course and we're left with the Lutens sandalwood base that also appears in Santal Majuscule. At this point, the similarity really is striking - to the extent that if I owned both bottles, I might want to go back and check which one I'd used that morning. For that reason, I'm not sure it would be necessary to own both, unless you were just really enamored of the disparate opening phase of each. For me, while I enjoy the cheeky, candied opening of Jeux de Peau, I find the cocoa rose of Santal Majuscule to be just a little more interesting.

Quoting my fellow fic writer Vinora, Luten's Jeux de Peau smells like an EPIC BABY. By baby I refer to infant.

This is M.Luten's creative eeriness at its new peak. Although design for night, this soft scent reminds me morning cereal with full fat milk. Full fat, fruity, coconut synthetic milk. I do get why people wish to smell like savoury liquorice and vanilla deserts in nighttime, but morning cereal? Maybe it's some one's fetish or a thing, I'lll pass.

Imagery: embroiled soft, milky fluffiness. A kitten whom naughtily sleeps on the head of l'enfant.

Alternatively: "Huston, we have a problem...Emma spilled her cereal on my blouse again!"

Interesting combination of notes, with a gradual, structurally clean progression. Ultra soft and cozy with medium longitivtiy. I tend to spray this on during diet to create an illusion of atmospheric Carbohydrate.

7/10, for its destructive creativity.

When I read the notes and saw milk and wheat I thought that sounded disgusting, but after finding out this is the favorite scent of a friend, I had to actually give it a sniff. Lesson learned. Don't let the weird notes put you off trying this- it's soft, sweet warm and lovely! Very cozy. If you associate scent with colors this is a soft baby blue :) I think if you like freesia, you will like this.

Random association, but if you've ever had sahlep (a delicious sweet, spicy, warm milk dessert drink) this smells like what it tastes like.

Yes very cozy and sexy! Could not Even wait until fall to Get the full bottle. Could I pul it of on chilly summer nights to? I Get brioche and apicot jam and maybe wilst drinking that wonderfull tea from Yogi, the licorice one! Very unique very much a niche and very complex I'm in love! This is defo a love letter.

This is one of those fragrances I want to like so much more than I actually do. Before researching my sample (a gift from a friend), I wasn't really drawn to it. Upon realizing it might be the gourmand of my dreams, I gave it another shot. Let me say this: It's not bad in any way. Quite good, actually! But it isn't my favorite interpretation of this sort of thing.

Jeaux de Peau is like stepping into an exotic bakery! The smell of fresh baked bread, spiced milk, butter, and coconut oil. There is a sweet and creamy saltiness as well, and perhaps a hint of popcorn (like in La Fin Du Monde by Etat Libre d`Orange). I dislike licorice and I think that is what is holding this back from being something I want to wear often. But I think this could be an all season perfume, whether it warms you in cooler months or inspires picnics outside during summer.

Bath and Body Works used to make a French Baguette scented candle, and I think this is very similar. It smells like an approximation of something much more complex.

This is hot buttered pancakes with maple syrup enjoyed on a snowy winter morning with a steaming mug of hot chocolate in front of a roaring fire wearing cozy flannel PJ's
Wearing this in the wrong season would be disastrous. Saving this for the first blustery day next fall/winter.
If you're not into unique, don't bother with Uncle Serge's inventions, you just wont appreciate or admire the complexity.

the beginning is so so so tasty, like milk tea, maquiato coffee,,very delicious,

A mild, pleasantly spicy toffee on paper. A horror of powerful fenugreek on my skin. This is the first fragrance ever that I scrubbed off and I'm kind of scared to try it again.

The Siesta, by Vincent van Gogh, 1889–90

Plain pee diaper to me. A scrubber.

this smell something a bit floral (in a comforting way) to me at first sniff, but then it soon turns into smell of hot bread dipped into hot milk. Really foody but not in the way that will make you stink... Until about mid note. i don't know what the mid note is about, i just don't like it, sometimes it smells like fish sauce on me. But yeah i can still bear with that, the drydown is really nice: woody in a high-quality way. Sillage okay, longevity good.

Overall: 6.5/10
Sillage: 7/10
Longevity: 8/10

I also own Santal Majuscule and Adam Levine for women. Sorry but there is only a very vague resemblance. I wouldnt have bothered acquiring it if it was so similar.
Yes, you get the sandalwood up front then it sweetens a little to suddenly resemble the smell of fresh baked bread. I steered clear of this for a long time because of the food comments. Thankfully this stage is very brief. For the rest of its timeline its more like lightly spicey osmanthus. Its very lovely.
Low level sillage but the longevity is above average.

My experience today with this scent: I smelled a lot of BYREDOs, Frederic Malle, Diptique..."Yes, nice, beautiful, interesting... What do we have here: Jeux de peau"...Ooooo" Now, there is no way to describe the feeling of this scent better: it just grabbed me! I adore it and I had to have it. It was speaking to me :) It is such a comforting happy scent.

This is a sweet, gourmand incense. Very earthy and to bring up the earthy skin alike sensation it's good to add a tiny hint of patchouly, just a hair or it becomes cloying. I love it.

Tried a sample of this. Very pleasant colder weather scent. It is a bit sharper than Adam Levine for Women but pretty much smells the same to me.

If you use Serge Lutens perfume in the wrong weather, it would be very terrible and headaches. This perfume is not sweet, but still savoury and gourmet and woody. It is like a bread still in its packing paper, some one say it 's old papers. It is interesting, unique and can only used in cold or very cold weather.

this reminded me so much of a few perfumes all at once:
- L'Artisan Piment Broulant (I think that's the name!)
- Kilian Sacred Wood
- Serge Lutens (one of the Santal-majascule/minuscule something range)
- Serge Lutens (Santal Mysore)

Serge must use the SAME stock sandalwood base for all his santalwood perfumes, and it's so strong, because this note dominates the scent. I was hoping for more milk and/or wheat, alas, it doesn't come through as strong as i'd've hoped. Anyway, this scent is a little too delicate and dainty for mine. it's soft and wispy, and that's fine, i guess, but it needed a stronger resin or wood to complete the package.

nice, but not for me...

I'm so glad that I got to sniff this in person; otherwise, it would've been a very unsuccessful blind buy. I do like my fair share of sweet perfumes, but Jeux de Peau is very cloying IMO. I was expecting it to smell sweet, milky and creamy (kinda like the malt-flavoured Vitasoy milk) but it just ends up smelling like bread. Granted it's very perfume-y bread, but still.... bread. Smells very strong of wheat and yeast. Un Bois Vanille reigns as Serge Luten's best gourmand scent, and was a 100% successful blind buy for me.

I'm a hardcore serge lutens fan and I don't easily dislike any fragrance but in this case I have no choice but disliking this
It was an unsuccessful blindbuy,something that rarely happens for me..I expected jeaux de peau to be sweet,delicious and creamy..it's definitely foody and creamy but no way sweet or delicious
There is a local bread people bake here in villages and for special traditional ceremonies,it's made of wheat,milk and dill(kind of vegatative additive)..I can swear jeaux de peau smells identical to that bread,which is by the way not sweet,and not that much delicious
Even if I didn't know about that bread,I'd dislike it,I love gourmand fragrances but not all foody scents are suitable as a perfume,who wants to smell like a giant bread dough with some dill in it?!
Yes,it's creamy,very unique in fragrance world,warm and cozy but not wearable IMHO
This is definitely unisex,since I can't think of gender for a bread,I've tried this one on lots of my friends skin and they all told me"are you kidding?!is it really a perfume?"
this is all about baked wheat,milk,sandalwood and a hint of spices..I can't detect any coconut or apricot or sweetness..it's completely linear on my skin and it's buttery creamyness becomes nauseous after some time,as if you've eaten lots of unbaked bread dough
Longevity is very good on my skin but sillage is soft to moderate,it's better in colder months since in heat it becomes unpleasantly sourish
I agree it's very similar to santal majescul's top notes,they are just similar in initial minutes when santal majescul is all about creamy sandalwood it's very similar to this one minus spices but as other notes showup it goes to other way,I like santal majescul however I hate this one,so try both of them on your own skin
❤
نون محلی از اون نون تپلا ک با آرد گندم و شیر درست میشن و توش کمی شوید و سبزیجات محلی دیگه میزنن رو تصور کنید که تازه پخته شده و هنوز گرمه و توش هم خوب پخته نشده و خمیر مونده..این عطر دقیقا همون بو رو میده
این عطر رو برای بیش از بیست نفر تست کردم و همه شدیدا تعجب کردن و باورشون نمیشد با عطر طرفن..برای من ک خطی هست و ترکیبی از گندم و آرد و صندل و کمی ادویه جات..کوچکترین اثری از شیرینی اینجا نیست همینطور روایح میوه ای..نت های میوه ای فقط به کرمی تر شدن رایحه کمک کردن
کاملا نرم و گرم و بهتره بگم خمیری بجای کرمی
یه عطر کاملا گورماند ک بنظر من خوشمزه هم نیست
بنظر من ک کاملا بدون جنسیت هست اما اطرافیان معتقدن برای آقایون مناسبتره تا خانمها..موندگاری خوب و پخش تقریبا متوسطی داره و مناسب فصول سرد سال هست.تو گرما یجور ته طعم ترش ناخوشایند پیدا میکنه .باوجود اینکه هیچ تندی و تیزی نداره بعد از چند دقیقه رایحه خمیری و یکنواختش میتونه آزاردهنده بشه و دلتون رو بزنه..دقیقا مثل تند تند خوردن کلی نون نیمه خمیر..پس سعی کنید تو بالا تنه تون زیاد اسپری نکنید
رایحه اون شباهت زیادی به دقایق اولیه سنتل مجسکول داره...یعنی شروع سنتل مجسکول دقیقا همینه منهای نت های ادویه ای(شویدش!)ولی اون در ادامه مسیر کاملا مجزایی رو طی میکنه درنتیجه حتما هردو رو تست کنید و حس نکنید چون از یکی خوشتون اومد یا بدتون اومد احساس تون راجع به اون یکی مشابه خواهد بود

Wow..this perfume is cozy,sweet,and makes me feel protected.. Interesting as you meet the liquorice notes and spices. My first impression was strange, I've never heard anything like that. The opening is the part that remembers the baked bread, but after a while it evolves and feel less spicy and sweet and soft... this perfume gives me security,serenity and sweetness. Is a very special and fantastic parfum, magical harmony between the notes, Serge Lutens has created something truly extraordinary to me...... that's all I needed. Thanks Serge Lutens.

Sillage: 6.5/10
Longevity: 7./10
Scent: 9./10

Overall: 9./10

This perfume has such a rich smell and texture that it conjures up autumnal colours like plum, russet, brandy, burnished orange and toasted wheat. This perfume is rich, dark and toasty warm. It's very comforting too.

In my limited smell references, there's a similarity to Bvlgari The Rouge in the sweet woody milky oriental notes. At first smell I thought Jeux de Peau was unusual, but strangely it has grown on me, and I'm not usually a gourmand lover.

I think this is a clever reflection of nature in a gourmand fragrance. Rather than reminding me of breakfast this makes me think of late afternoon. The sort of supper you might enjoy coming home to after a productive day in the great outdoors. A simple home-baked loaf, thickly sliced and buttered, served with some apricot or maybe plum conserves.

I love it but because it is so rich I reserve this one for relaxing at home. Blissful.

This scent smells mainly like sandalwood with its powdery, dry, mild, slightly creamy and almost-edible quality. The sandalwood goes well with the nutty, grainy wheat, rendering it all very bready as opposed to cakey - in other words, not sugary at all so don't fear. The licorice is only there to support the other notes with its saltiness. All in all, a woody, comforting loaf of newly baked bread - kind of a gourmand but still kind of not. I prefer the very similar Praline de Santal, because it lacks the licorice and gives an overall richer impression, but this is most certainly one of my favourites from Serge Lutens.

My first reaction upon letting the first few molecules of this perfume hit my nostrils is a spontaneous "no". I keep telling myself that I'd like wheat notes in perfume, but in practice, this has never been the case (I guess what I'd want is the type of wheat that would remind me of some sort of breakfast cereal, but not necessarily doused in sugar). This one displays a quite realistic wheat note as the star player, and I'm not too stoked about it.

As the milky wheat slowly dissipates my enjoyment of this fragrance increases markedly, but the liquorice note in the composition still strikes me as utterly bizarre. It is pitch black, almost burned, salmiac-like. Normally I would appreciate this juxtaposition, and if I keep smelling it, I actually find it agreeable. If I rest my nose for a minute and try smelling it again, it repulses me once more. A strange one, this.

This is my love. Bought because of descriptions here (those promising milky and sweet notes) it smells nothing like that on me but it smells even better! It's like a warm bread with a fresh butter and some herbs like oregano or celery. Very delicate liquorice note on the background. For me, it's totally savoury but absolutely gourmand.

I initially liked this but after wearing it for a while it smelled like a bowl of cereal & warm milk that has sat out for a while.

I was impressed with both the longevity & sillage but my search to find a SL to add amongst my fragrances still continues.

I can't quite place it, but this definitely has a retro vibe. Late 80s early 90s. Almost like they poured melted butter and a bottle of syrup on an open bottle of Samsara.
The first couple hours of this were sickly sweet while at the same time slightly bitter. Buttery, spicy and sharp. Now, 3 hours later, the sweet has mellowed and the butter has melted to give way to the spicy.... If only it had started this way...sigh.

Blind buy for me. Thougth OMG never going to wear this! But it grew on me so much that sometimes even spray a little bit before bedtime.Love it! Still cannot discribe it though...

Do you remember buttery popcorn from jelly beans? That's it. Too sweet, like a milk with butter with spicy/coffee background. Not for me unless I'll have a bakery.

This is mega gourmand - like huffing a croissant or some sort of cake bread. It really is like walking into a stuffy bakery, which is awesome and weird at the same time.

I loved the scent from the bottle, but didn't have the chemistry to pull this one off. It kind of went doughy on me, like half baked cake that was still not done in the centre, and that centre was pure doughy mush. So I used it to spray my towels and now my bathroom smells like a delicious cake factory.

So cool though, that Serge Lutens managed to pull off such a vivid image and scent out of this one. If you want to smell like a bakery, look no further!

Coffee and sandalwood or cedar, buttery popcorn, croissant; early dry-down the smell of dark flowers comes through. Scent lightens dramatically after a few hours. On first smell didn't like it very much but the more I smelled it, and as it dried down to a more woody/resinous smell with a buttery background, I liked it more. Sophisticated in a calm, earthy, confident way. May have been put off at first because it was so unusual and unexpected but I ended up actually buying a bottle.

Jeux de Peau was released in 2011 and brings, in its concept, another childhood memory of Serge Lutens in the interpretation of the perfumer Christopher Sheldrake. This time, Serge remembers the smell of fresh bread at the bakery and the feeling of putting it, still warm, against his cheeks.

Its name means "Skin games" and I think that was one of the worst names that they could have made up for this fragrance. Particularly, this name makes me think of pheromones and accords connected, somehow, to lust, to sex, and to the burning passion between two people (or more). Who said that there are no mistakes in niche perfumery?

With respect to the result between the composition of the perfume and the concept stipulated by Serge, the perfumer deserves only compliments. With notes of wheat, spices, licorice, everlasting flowers, apricots, sandalwood, incense, amber and Woody notes, what we have on the skin is, oddly enough, a scent that exudes since the aroma of warm bread to the smell of spicy toasts with almonds, depending on the nose and on the skin of the wearer. In addition, it is possible to find texts on the internet citing the presence of milk, coconut, osmanthus, and cocoa.

On my skin, Jeux de Peau behaved linearly: a nuance of toasted bread with the Milky creaminess of sandalwood, some spices (which look like cinnamon and nutmeg), and a slightly smoky and almost caramelized base. The licorice smell, which I like, didn't appear as I expected. There is also a hidden nuance of apricots, which is only felt when the perfume projects under the heat. On me, it was almost imperceptible.

In general, it's a beautiful gourmand, very well constructed and that has great projection and amazing durability. But I did not fall in love with it as much as I'd like, even being a worshipper of perfumes of this style. Something about it is cloying and the fact that it didn't evolve over time, left me even more uncomfortable.

Finally, I return to the name matter and wonder: why not "Dream Bakery" or something similar?

The opening of this is gourmandy sweet like a glazed almond and cherry tart or pie. After a short while, the slightest hint of wood peaks out and then hides again.
It dries down to a more mellow gourmandy madeline.

The entire experience is like walking into a bakery that has just thrown everything into the oven about 15 minutes prior and all the aromas are wafting into the air of marzipan, almond croissants, and right as you walk in, the gooey buttery sweetness hits you in the face, and as you stay in there, the shock is no longer there and it mellows out to a trace of what it was. But it's still delectable and irresistible.

Sillage - low, longevity - 4 hours.

6/10

Caramel popcorn from a movie theater, it's truly delicious. I get the wheat, woods, sandalwood, slight amber, it gives off this caramel feel and it's so high quality. Amazing stuff, not bottle worthy, but maybe a decant should suffice. 9/10.

I tried this today because I've seen so many references of this perfume here on this forum.

I was very curious and having high expectations by Lutens as it is an expensive company.

Well...I didn't like it at all. My first reaction to this perfume was WTF?

By looking at the notes you can immediately understand how messy this is: Milk & cereals with licorice, amber and pepper? I mean ReALLY??

Bread and butter, alcoholic licorice, sour amber and woods. This mess isn't sweet at all...

To me, this smells like love. Love that has had a while to get comfortable with itself & with it's partner. That enjoys it's sexy times in the kitchen amoungst the brunch dishes as much as anything adventurous in the bedroom. The kind of love that understands the value of both comfort & kindness.

My skin loves basenotes, and thus I get a lot of the sandalwood, spice, & amber, but the scent of freshly baked bread remains for a significant time, occasionally twisting into slices slathered with fruit jam or like pancakes with syrup (immortelle, I assume.) The woody notes mostly show up as a 'clean human skin' illusion that I find divine. Compulsively sniffable.

This won't come off my shelf to pair with a black garter for date night, or to inspire boardroom confidence, but it will come off the shelf frequently, as comfort food so often will.

Jeux de Peau, or Skin Games. Although I've reviewed earlier this on Youtube, it's time to revisit this delicious gem. I'm at work, at my desk, and I smell like a fresh donut. Jeux de Peau is a delicious scent, however few people would like to smell like this in public. If only perfumes were edible I'd eat this.

Smells nostalgic. Warm cereal, milky, skin like, dare I say motherly? Or perhaps a childhood smell. As a child, one of my favorite feel good foods was grits with butter and sugar and Jeux de Peau reminds me of that. Jeux de Peau envokes feelings of warm comfort. Milk, wheat, hints of sandalwood and coconut, everything ties in together to give the ultimate feeling of security.

The first time I smelled it I was really disappointed, but 2 days ago I gave this frag a second chance and I was completely overwhelmed by. I felt it deep into my stomach such as I smelled the new born odour of my daughter (now she is 3 yrs old). The drydown turns into a woody note which I like.

This is a stunningly beautiful fragrance that makes me feel unbearably ill. So sad.

The opening is one of my favourite openings ever: it really is the photorealistic smell of warm buttery croissants. I think the nausea culprit here is the immortelle. After about 30-45 mins, the top bakery notes fade and an extraordinarily powerful, golden smelling, syrupy floral emerges. I have to assume this is the immortelle, and on my skin it is gigantic, and glowing. It projects massively and almost pulses with power. It made me feel faint and very ill. I've tried the fragrance another few times in the hopes that was a one off, but the same development has occurred every time. My skin does blast sweet notes, so if yours does the same, keep in mind that this can morph into a gigantic floral syrup monster.

I can see how gorgeous this would be on someone who does not have this problem and I'm very sad, because that bakery opening is one of the loveliest things I've ever sniffed.

The opening stage on my skin features wheat and apricot/osmanthus, so prominently that I am overwhelmed with buttered bakery items and synthetic fruity candles. SO not pleasant.

After it calms down a bit, I start to get more of a smooth, fruited pastry smell, with mild florals and a bit of sandalwood. This, I can take a bit better. I'll have to give it a full testing, but my initial impression is that I may not be able to take the opening to get to the better stages of the fragrance. I have been known to change my mind, however...


EDIT: The far drydown smells of florals over a deeper base of sandalwood and spice. Osmanthus shows up more like apple. It is pretty, but not necessarily what I'd expect of a Lutens, and the journey to get there is a bit rough. Because it is a journey fragrance, I am more impressed than I would otherwise be. However, the unpleasantness of the opening combined with the less than unique, though lovely, dry-down, has me wondering if this is a full bottle worthy scent. I will try it again, a few times, to see how it behaves.

This to me smells like movie popcorn. It's buttery, salty, and slightly spicy. This is very comforting, however it is slanted to the feminine side of the fragrance scale. Great nonetheless.

Here's the thing: I often find a lot of perfumes that I just "like". Not love. It is very rare that I find something I love. When I first took a whiff of this, I was extremely taken aback. It had a very very strong buttered popcorn smell. I thought, no way, I am going to hate this. But upon the second smell, the vanilla and woody accords really started to shine, until the butter was very faint and more like a salty touch. This is creamy and sexy. Would be nice for intimate moments as well as a night on the town.

Needless to say, I'm in love.

Try as I might, I never got the bakery connection from Jeux de Peau. For me this is mostly a figgy, coconutty, sweetened sandalwood with an added blunt powdery like note that must be the wheat. There is a vague salty component, but on my skin it does not smell like butter and nothing smells like croissants no matter how hard I try to extrapolate a connection.

Overall this is a pleasant, sweet and salty sandalwood with fruity facets. Very nice but not super gourmand to my nose. It has a thick viscous texture that I did find appealing. Sillage and longevity are on par with other Lutens.

I sampled this yesterday. Smells like a buttery croissant and whatever other sweet, milky, syrupy smells waft out of a bakery. The butter was too prominent on me and smells like artificial popcorn butter. This lasted for a while and I found it unpleasant. The drydown is sandalwood with a veil of maple syrup which was rather nice . I like some gourmands but prefer more abstraction in those compositions like in Frederic Malle's Dries Van Noten. Jeaux de Peau is too literal for my taste.

Jeux de Peau or Play on Skin.


First spray = VERY sweet. A wallop of synthetically thick, milky, sweet, creamy, almost maple syrup, added to warmed condensed milk, that has almost a strong almond marzipan accord to it. With in a minute or 2 ... LICORICE ...and it stands right out front. With in the first 10 minutes I smell a fruity apricot accord, faintly. There is an almost salty quality to it, while being all the same, over the top sweet. 20 min later the coconut sandalwood very noticeable.

The scent is very smack you in the face sweet and a bit odd. It is a very foody sweet interesting mix of notes. I find it tends to grate on my senses a bit. Reminds me of being in a kitchen while several thing are cooking and baking.There is licorice caramels being made, cookies and marzipan cake baking, maple syrup and sweet and condensed milk are cooking in a pan, someone is putting up apricot preserves, and your sister just walked in after working out at the gym and bathing in 2 perfumes: Hypnotic Poison and Herve Leger.

I get no bread, no toast, no croissant (I didn't even know people were saying that about this scent until I came here to review it and saw the comments).

sorry for over use of the word "sweet"

Oh, the lies we tell ourselves.

I was just now playing with my bowl of Don't-Forget-Why-You-Got-Rid-Of-This sample decants, as you do (I try to keep a little of each fragrance, just to refresh my memory). I broke the one holding Jeux de Peau. It's all over my hands now, and I'm so... amused.

When I first got this fragrance (full bottle, BLIND BUY, because I don't think like a responsible adult), I immediately thought CROISSANTS IN A BROWN PAPER BAG! Freshly baked, buttery, flaky croissants in a crisp fresh brown paper package! That amazing walking-past-a-bakery smell! So gratifying! So yummy! So delectable!
And I told myself, "oh my goodness, this can be my *thing*. I'm going to be The Girl That Smells Like A Bakery. I'm going to be unique and quirky and my hugs are going to be the stuff of legends. Let's do this."

As it turns out, that bakery smell is so great because you're not always in a bakery. Having Jeux de Peau on was great for the first ten minutes, and then it's just like "Ok, my hands smell like bread - now what?" The novelty wears off reeeeeally quick. As it wears, it becomes more and more dough-y and yeast-y, like the bread is un-baking? The eventual drydown is damp, and a little like baby's breath. Which is not a bad scent, but... at my age, do I want to smell like baby's breath?

This is the kind of scent which impresses me as far as what perfumers are capable of synthesizing and bottling, but for which I can see no practical applications. It's SO much fun to huff this out of the nozzle, but what is the actual point of a full bottle of this stuff? My hands smell like dough. Sexy.

This fragrance is so fascinating to me. I have to agree with Baldric on this: it absolutely smells like new motherhood. I disagree with how it makes me feel. This reminds me of that surge of oxytocin I would get when I had skin-to-skin contact with my brand new baby. The indescribable smell of a baby's head right under my nose. Milk and the sweet smell of skin and clothes that you've slept in. It's a warm, cozy smell that almost makes me cry.

Some unique scents get heaps of praise just for breaking new ground, with everyone seeming to ignore how unwearable they are or how quickly they grow tiresome, but thankfully this is not one of them.
Despite its sweetness, Jeux de Peau has just enough woods and liquorish to hold it down to earth, saving it from being just an occasional treat and turning it into something much more substantial.
Osmanthus, a favorite of mine which I feel is almost never used effectively in perfume, blends beautifully here with the apricot and wheat.
Unisex, warm and friendly.

I've been going through my collection lately and asking myself if I love what I own. I haven't worn perfume in a while because I recently had a baby. A baby that I breastfed, this fact is central to my opinion of this perfume. Bear with me for a moment.

So new motherhood has a smell to me, and that smell is jeux de peau. I would look down and realize I had been wearing the same clothes for 3 days. Gross, I know. These clothes would be covered in leaked breast milk. Leaked milk that had a doughy, yeasty and buttery smell. Leaked milk that was influenced by galatalogues to enhanced my supply. Namely a tincture that contained fennel and fenugreek amongst other things. How do you know you have taken enough of the tincture? It's when your skin gives off a maple syrup smell. So I smelled like doughy, buttery milk, fennel and fenugreek. I smelled like jeux de peau. It isn't a bad smell, but now that my supply has leveled out and I no longer leak randomly I have no desire to smell like this anymore. I contemplated keeping my bottle because I do like many aspects. But the immortelle is too much for me and too similar to fenugreek. It transports me to a overwhelmed and sleep deprived time in my life that I'm not sure I want to revisit.

I bought this amongst others as samples for my younger sister. She tried it on whilst I was there and it smelled lovely on her skin, I thought if there was anything that could be thought of a 'comfort' perfume to go with snuggly soft jumpers and cuddling up on the couch with a partner this is it. To me it seemed to bring out her own skin smell and didn't smell 'perfumey' at all.
I bought myself a sample and sadly it just doesn't work like that on my skin. I don't get the milky, warm sweet, coconut. I get the spicy wood not even nice incense like Sandalwood more like chewing a pencil at school type wood. Add some weird undertones and I had to wash it off. Ahh well, certainly a lesson in different skin chemistry.

Something different for gourmand lovers!

Jeux de Peau does smell like an inviting home, or an inviting bakery - some establishment where they're making fresh baked goods. The opening is a warm, doughy bready scent, some soft spicy woods notes & just the tiniest hint of honey or something sweet. I get no fleshy fruits throughout the entire composition - which is what held me back from blind-buying for SO LONG! I can't stand peachy fruits. Really warm & comforting, and something my mind has a hard time computing! "Why do I want to smell like buttery rolls? I'm not going to question it - I'm just gonna ROLL with it! Badummmm-tssss"

As it dries down, it's a little more masculine, and more "normal" - the woods dominate the scent & it's a little more hazelnutty & spicy. Similar to the dry-down of Au Gingembre from SL as well.

Most Serge Lutens scents greatly disagree with me - but I'm pleasantly surprised by this one!

Best uses: Fall/winter scent. Holiday hangouts. Roasting marshmallows by campfire. Curled up watching movies on a snowy Sunday night. Wearing big cozy sweaters.

Hot buns straight from the oven...

Where to start with this one? Serge Lutens - Jeux de Peau opens with a beautiful smell of bread yeast which turns into the smell of freshly baked buns straight out of the oven. It's a lovely smell, and it's light! It's not so heavy or "gourmandish" even though it's sweet. In other words, it can be worn anywhere at almost any time. It's true to it's name, which when translated means "skin games", as it plays and stays on the skin, never going too far or annoying anyone. I personally love it!

Jeux de Peau opens with a host of gourmand notes. I get the wheat, the milk and the coconut, and liquorice in the background. It's very nice and pleasing. In the background I get hints of osmanthus blossom, which can smell a little like rice and a hint of apricot, and the use of an apricot note to compliment this side to the osmanthus is really great. The pairing of immortelle with liquorice is not a new one, as done before in Dior Collection Privée - Eau Noire, but here is is gentle and sweet, and compliments beautifully with the other notes. As usual, the base is made up of sandalwood, which is itself a very creamy or "milky" note, and we have seen this wood paired up with a real milk note before Hermèssence - Santal Massoïa. But here is has more substance and lasts longer.

Overall, a wonderful warm and inviting fragrance, which doesn't offend in any way, smells very alluring, and which blends really well with the skin to make you smell delicious. If you like gourmands, you'll like this, and even if you don't, you'll still like this. That's the magic of this one! A nice perfume with a unique and quite lovely smell. Like a warm smell from a bakery in winter. Just wonderful!

i guess i am growing a great liking and addiction to Serge Lutens creations!

An exotic natural wooden table of a baker soaked in a sweet sugary Licoriced creamy milky coconut white potion that has been slightly wormed in a witches kettle. magically charming and mysteriously enchanting. deliciously edible. i really wonder does the witch from Hansel and Gretel's fairy tale had anything to do with this potion!

the dry down is deliciously made, a wheat milky gluten free biscotti, slightly caramelized and harshly luring.

Wonderful! Deep but light and exotic-coconuty at the same time woodiness, miracle created on most unusual note combination. Wearable and loveable, charismatic scent.
Like for many others – milk and wheat obviously create baked bread effect, but spiced- licorice and immortelle opens for this "bakery" totally another dimension – surrealistic and urban one.
Its sort of dry and soft, like cashmere scarf around your neck, you feel snuggled, taken care of, cosy and looking forward only to positive things to happen.
And it lasts!

Ha ha - it's so nice when I'm right !
Picking the top notes just like that...
First thought Was freshly baked bread , very salty bread ...., very salty liquorice bread.Whoever would have thought of that combination and gone through with it...all I now - I would have bought it and I can certainly wear it!
Another note in there that has popped up in the note triangle lately, is immortel.
Well to sum things up in a grown up manner.
It started warm cosy baked bread and liquorice and lkind of stayed that way though with some toned down coconut. Not the suntan feeling , but the fat but slightly flat and chopped coconut peel you get when carving it with a knife.
I like it and find it kind of different from other SLs I've tested.
Thanks Amelie for a great swap !

Third time wear - this is a lovely but unusual and daring blend wich has caught my nostrils attention .It is a very comforting light gourmand that Iactually would love a bottle of in the near future...
Lovely !

I have honestly never smelled anything like this before. It's like... Kettle corn with warm butter poured over it and coconut shavings sprinkled on top. How did they do that? Simply amazing. I don't really get a baking bread smell, as some have mentioned (too sweet for that, I think), but maybe more of a coconut madeleine. I really enjoy the warm, toasted sweetness of this scent. Perfect for lounging on snowy Sunday mornings.

Sillage for me is somewhere between soft and moderate, and I find it lasts about 8 hours on my skin. Towards the end, the licorice is more apparent, like the oven cooling at the end of the day.

Composing a gourmand fragrance is, in my opinion, a true test of the perfumer's craftsmanship. I've sampled a number of food-inspired scents, most of which are sweet, typically in a loud kind of fashion. This discovery suggests that their primary (or the only?) goal is to make their wearers as well as the (lucky?/unlucky?) people who find themselves in their vicinity salivate since, arguably, this is the instinct the smell of food triggers. Nonetheless, I'm convinced a grand gourmand perfume should offer more than a simple replica of food aromas. I mean who wants to smell like a sugar factory and risk being chased around by swarms of winged insects? Maybe the choice of aromas, their subsequent blending and a drop of abstraction might do the trick. I've recently got my hands on several samples from the Serge Lutens line, including his take on the gourmand genre entitled “Jeux de Peau”. As I'm a massive fan of his brand, I was curious to smell how Lutens and his quasi-in-house perfumer Christopher Sheldrake tackled the food theme.

“Jeux de Peau” opens with an aroma of bread. Not just any bread - this loaf has just been taken out of the baker's oven and cut into steaming slices. In an instant, butter is spread onto them, with the effect of creating a dense, milky background, which “Jeux de Peau” manages to retain for the rest of its development. Other notes that pop out of the mixture are sandalwood and a barely detectable peach note, bringing to mind a tad bit of fruit jam on a buttered slice of bread. There's supposed to be a whole host of other notes, but my untrained nose just can't pick them up.

I'm glad to report the Lutens-Sheldrake collaboration led to the creation of a rather unconventional but perfectly delicious and expertly blended gourmand fragrance. What I enjoy most about “Jeux de Peau” is the fact that it makes me appreciate and savour the smell of such basic foodstuffs as bread, dairy products or jam, and thus reminds me of a frequently overlooked fact: that the best things in life are oftentimes the most commonplace ones. Yum!

That one doesn't work for me, it is too foody, not n a nice way!?like the smell isn't pretty to my nose, I couldn't wear it, because the idea of smelling like bread isn't my goal!! I have a hard time with Lutens, he easily sacrifices the prettiness in a smell for sone weird edges!? I do admit I kind of like the milkiness, but not enough to wear it..
That one is a big no for me!!

The first thing you'll notice in Jeux de Peau is its majestic, full, lush, golden wheat goodness -- very "amber waves of grain." Underneath this grand, sweeping sensation is a beautiful undercurrent of whole milk. This is bolstered by a gorgeous apricot note, that is taken to over-the-top ripeness with the addition of osmanthus, which suggests decadent fruity fleshiness. This scent taps into so many pastoral visions of a halcyon farm with fields of wheat, cows and fresh whipped cream with ripe apricots, freshly baked shortbread, dusty immortelle, and freshly cut firewood. It wears exquisitely on the skin and creates an enchanting fragrance aura. Jeux de Peau is an enthralling piece of olfactory art that I would be proud to wear.

For a perfect visual representation of this Jeux de Peau, google image search "Rodarte wheat dress." Seriously, just google it; it will only take a second. The fashion house Rodarte created a line of gowns that were screenprinted with an image of an idyllic blue sky and golden wheat. There was never a more perfect fragrance-fashion combination than this.

Some Serge Lutens scents are my favorites, but this one didn't work for me, it's just too strange and a little bit unpleasant. Something about the milk with licorice just doesn't make sense to my nose, I would never eat cereal with milk and then dazzle some licorice on the top. I like the powderyness of the wheat in this fragrance, kind of like the effect of the rice in Kenzo Amour, but it almost gets too dry and suffocating.

I like it a bit more as it dries down, it's not as sharp and unsetteling. Still don't really undertsand it though. I do appreciate the creativity and I can definitely understand how some people like it. But try before you buy.

On me this fragrance opens with the smell of roasting almonds then it slowly evolves into a sweet butter smell with a hint of coconut and licorice - always milky delicious edible -with that sweet maple immortelle steady in the background. Not overpowering feminine sweet but warm and not dry - it gives me a "grrr" in the back of my throat...Absolutely LOVE THIS fragrance on me...this winter it will be my signature scent.

I was so excited about my first meeting with Jeux de Peau. From the notes this sounded simply delicious, and it was very promising smelling the bottle cap in the store. But after only 5 minutes into the first spritz all my hope was gone:

It's not you Jeux de Peau, it's me! I'm the reason why we can't be together.

Turned out to be a TOTAL clash with my skin chemistry and after 30 min. I had to scrub it off. But the scent itself is beautiful - really! Creamy, delicious and special. Too bad the wheat (or something else in there) turned sour on me.

I really hoped this would work out, but unfortunately I have to leave this baby to you people that have better skin chemistry than I do with it. Maybe the clash is due to my hayfever (pollen allergies?). Don't know.

I would not recommend a blind buy, but I would definately recommend you trying it out! If it works, it's probably magic! :)

Absolutely unequivocal opening of fresh-baked soft pretzel: yeasty, buttery, and SALTY. This is the only perfume I've ever smelled that has truly captured the scent of salt. I've smelled so many wondering what a salt note would smell like. Gentle Readers, I have found it.

Later on it smells like buttered popcorn and white flower, which is a little disconcerting, and by late afternoon it smells simply and faintly of osmanthus.

Wild ride.

I just received a sizeable sample from this from the SL Les Salons. The notes listed are pretty accurate to my nose--but the combination is unbelievable. This is the scent, like so many of his creations, of my childhood. Specifically, this is the smell of a certain day in a certain valley or meadow in the Sierras. This one does not have the heavenly cedar that is in other SLs (and that definitely would place it at my childhood home), but the licorice and wheat, the osmanthus--the dryness of the scent are amazing. The milk disappears fast leaving a light delicate sweetness behind. This is the slightly dusty road, the scent of summer at its height, the flowers for whom spring has fled. It is far more "wearable" than say Arabie. After reading more reviews, I suppose some might find it gourmand--and it is in a way--but for me it just has associations of the outdoors, the afternoon, a breeze rippling through the fennel with the smells of nature. I love SL perfumes, and this is definitely going in my FB worthy category. The sillage is moderate and longevity moderate.

I was very eager to smell Jeux de Peau lately, to the point that I almost blind bought a bottle. I mean, sandalwood, licorice and immortelle are among my favourite notes, can also get along with the rest pretty well in most cases and it's supposed to capture the smell of a bakery? Bring it on!

At last I swapped for a decant and I wouldn't have been disappointed if it was a blind buy in the first place.

The opening seems to be much fruitier than I expected, the combination of apricot and osmanthus gives a fresh, vibrant effect and although it took me by surprise I really like it!

During the heart I expected freshly baked croissants but I get buttery cookies filled with apricot jam instead, which is still delicious of course. I don't get bread either, Bois Farine has much more prominent yeasty notes and it's more modest in sweetness.

The drydown is less gourmand, all about silky smooth milky sandalwood - still on the sweet side - and admittedly the Lutens sandalwoods are well made. The drydown here is similar to the one of Santal Blanc but Jeux de Peau is more multilayered overall. It's often compared to Santal Majuscule as well but I don't agree; the later is far drier and the cocoa powder makes it quite bittersweet.

Projection is very low after the first hour with 5-6 hours longevity. I'm not sure if I'll end up investing in a full bottle but for the time being I'm glad to own a decant of the delightfully quirky Jeux de Peau.


Edit: After finishing the decant I can definitely detect the salty yeasty scent in the drydown which I don't love that much. It was a fascinating experience but there's no need for more.