Eau de Parfum / Set of twin fragrances

THE STORY

In 2019, Chicago musician Zarif Wilder (stage name: theMIND) began meeting with perfumer, artist and writer Matt Morris over a love for niche fragrance. In the year leading up to the release of Wilder’s second full length album, Don’t Let it Go to Your Head (2020), the two discovered a shared bit of history — they both have an identical twin. The realization inspired the creation of a pair of fragrances based on the twins in Wilder’s astrological sign, Gemini.

Summoned from the olfactory and visual atmosphere of the neighborhood bodega, the two fragrances in GEMINI SH*T (Castor & Pollux) are designed to be worn individually or together. The pair are housed within a replica of the corner store in Wilder’s current neighborhood on the southside of Chicago, complete with a night vision security camera box interior.

THE FRAGRANCES

Castor and Pollux. Identical twins. Patron saints of the block. So inseparable that when Castor died, Pollux pleaded with the Gods to split his own immortality in two, sharing half with his sibling to keep them together forever. They were transformed into stars. Into a constellation. Into GEMINI SH*T.

Castor

A heady overdose of brightly expressed Italian lemon peel (five times distilled) and spicy Madagascan ginger fizz and exhale when you first twist Castor’s screw top after pulling it from the bodega cooler. A deconstructed cola follows, cleverly weaving together the woody terp of Indian nutmeg, crushed Ukrainian coriander, Sri Lankan cinnamon bark and leaf into chocolate, nerol, and the deep, carmel facets of vanilla. You know this drink, but you don’t. Just as Castor’s soda settles on skin, French lavender maillette appears at the edges of perception as a sweet and herbaceous floral, glowing in an earthy accord with soft green Moroccan amoise and French juniper berry, diffusing the mercurial twin somewhere between the corner store aisle and the cosmos.

NOTES

Italian Lemon
Aldehydes
Lime
Hedione
Bergamot
Neroli
Juniper
Lavender
Cinnamon
Clove
Nutmeg
Ginger
Coriander
Artemisia
Vanilla
Cocoa
Sassafras

Pollux

Pollux pulls up in a ‘73 Ford Galaxie 500 with no AC. It’s built like an eternal brick but there’s something smooth about how it drives. He steps out and the sun hits his suede jacket as he walks into the store. He smells like Tobacco, Cashmere, an airy musk. When he walks, it’s not heavy-footed, it’s grounded. His gait says he’s not going anywhere any time soon. He’ll be around like he’s been around. He’s steady, a fixture, but smells like he knows something about the world that you don’t. It’s comforting — the idea that he’s from this place, beyond this place, and still in this place. When he steps back outside the bodega, a rich and unplaceable milk, a lactonic coconut, fills the air. He walks past you swinging a plastic bag filled with Vetivers from Madagascar and France. You didn’t know you could get that here. He gets back in his car, rolls the windows down and drives away listening to Prince’s “I Would Die 4 U”. He sings every word and means it.

NOTES

Cosmetic Powders
Suede
Labdanum
Cade Oil
Styrax
Vetiver
Violet
Heliotrope
Airy Musks
Nagarmotha
Castoreum
Hyraceum

NOSE — Matt Morris

United States, 2022

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