We get frequent descriptions of what lestat is wearing during his later adventures that take place in modern day. Lestat wears expensive, often custom made contemporary clothing often with detailing that recalls past eras on the ‘formal’ side by the average standard.
Lestat is a theatrical type and loves attention – he explains his choice of clothes to an unsuspecting mortal by recalling his brief career as a rock star in the Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned, saying something like ‘my desire for the stage and microphone is gone, but I won’t give up the fancy clothes.’ In this scene he is wearing a long purple coat with cameo buttons and purple sunglasses(!). He describes himself somewhat ironically as ‘goth’ which he characterises as a ‘snappy, antique dresser’. He doesn’t wear all black, he is usually in grey or purple.
He is said several times to wear coats with high, pinched waists that might recall regency era frock coats or similar.
When lestat’s band come up I always think of something like malice mizer both in fashion and musical style – reading between the lines, lestat’s band found success in the late 70s/early 80s – lestat found the band and catapaulted them to fame with his unlimited money – they are described as pale strung out young people who wear ragged black clothes whose music has thundering drums and sonorous guitars with lestat playing the violin – reading between the lines its likely lestats band were an early goth outfit with everything that implies fashion-wise.
Honorable mention ought to go to Louis, who is Lestat’s foil and shuns human attention.
Louis spends most of his time reading, transcribing and commentating on crumbling books in a dilapidated shack. We see him through Lestat’s eyes later on and he is described as being timelessly beautiful in simple threadbare black clothing; this is probably a slightly generous view of Louis who after all is a swamp dwelling neet hobo at this point.
Louis still wears antiquated clothes, but unlike Lestat it’s simply because he is too distracted to update them.
I always felt there is a lot of ‘Beat Generation’ DNA in Louis, the threadbare black clothes, aversion to society and painful sensitivity to everyday life, as well as his dedication to art and literature.
thematically maybe, but all their fragrances smell like standard modern club scents
if you want to smell like an 18th / 19th century pompous vampire, there are still scents from back then being made. e.g. Guerlain EDC Imperiale, originally made for Napoleon III
Nah, he’d definitely choose PDM over Guerlain. That’s not to say that PDM is the superior house, or even remotely close to the style of perfumery that was actually popular during the 18th century, but they are definitely more in line with who Lestat is as a character. First, while he is technically of noble birth, he comes from a remote area of France and his lifestyle as a young nobleman is far from glamorous. His family barely has food, much less an artisan perfumer to make bespoke fragrances.
He also runs away from home to join a theatre troupe early in life, and his lifestyle in Paris is that of a commoner. When he is turned against his will and inherits the fortune (and unusually powerful abilities) of the vampire who made him, he also becomes quite neurotic from having to remain in the shadows.
Eventually he would come to resent having to play by le (dead)man’s rules and adopts a super gregarious, nouveau riche infant-terrible persona and dedicates his life to exposing himself and the rest of the vampires to the world. His whole gimmick is being an undead pick-me girl. He’s the kind of person who would gravitate toward the most overpriced, loud and obnoxious perfume possible. He would want his perfume to punch you in the dick before he walked in the room and linger in the air for days afterwards. He’d smell like a Saudi Prince without the BO. He’d hecking love Parfums de Marly.
thematically maybe, but all their fragrances smell like standard modern club scents
if you want to smell like an 18th / 19th century pompous vampire, there are still scents from back then being made. e.g. Guerlain EDC Imperiale, originally made for Napoleon III
Although if we were going with the AMC timeline (it’s terrible and you should not watch it, but that’s beside the point. Also, the guy who plays Lestat is actually pretty good) where Lestat is up and running in the 40s, he’d definitely be wearing Shalimar. I’ve never actually smelled Jicky, but going from the descriptions, that also sounds very Lestat-core
Wait, I was wrong. It’s set in 1910. In that case, I guess he’s confined to Jicky.
Anonymous says:
The costume designer said she took a lot of inspiration from Leyndecker for Lestat and Louis’ costumes – I think he was a perfect choice to draw on for this material for a number of reasons.
A lot of Rice’s vampires seem to go between fetishistically throwing themselves into the new era and being deliberately modern in their affectations, and then eventually slipping back into habitual behaviours and familiar comforts.
Anonymous says:
I agree with this to a certain extent, I think it is easy to say that PDM matches his personality, but I don’t know if that’s the house he’d pick for himself. He’s quite pretentious and loves when people call him the brat prince. Infant-Terrible is a good way to describe him. Parfums de Marly makes very loud fragrances, but they have a reputation for being generic and mass appealing. That is completely antithetical to who Lestat is and he’d probably look down his nose on the brand as much as fragrance snobs do.
I see him going for something like 00s era Serge Lutens. He’d like that they were weird and unique, and I feel like he’d also think cheeky names like La Couche du Diable were funny. And they’ve got the whole gothy incense thing going on and they’re bold and transgressive with their compositions. Lestat would find a fragrance that smelled like gingerbread, church incense and gunpowder called ‘Bapteme du feu’ intriguing. It’s unique, kinda gothic and kind of blasphemous. It checks pretty much all of his bases.
It was a great movie. Tom Cruise is especially good. It’s one of the few big mainstream book adaptations I can think of where you can see the amount of homework an actor did. Cruise doesn’t play Lestat the way he’s depicted in the first book, which is told through Louis’ perspective. He’s clearly playing Lestat the way Lestat (and Rice) sees himself, which you’re not going to really understand without reading, at minimum, the first three books.
To be fair, I think a good deal of that comes from the direction, too. There are a lot of things from the second two books added in. Lestat being telepathic is from the second book, and he doesn’t learn to fly until the third book. Unless I’m remembering it wrong. He learns to fly in the 80s, but it may have happened in the second book. They kind of blend together, narratively.
Thanks anon, Lestat loves all his fans so if you are enjoying the romantic atmosphere and idealised sensuality of this thread please consider buying my books I mean his books I mean Anne Rice’s books.
Any fragrance autists want to weigh in on some of the other characters? What would an ancient roman senator have smelled like?
> The most common and accessible raw materials came from Roman dominations and included roses, pomegranates, lavender, quinces, grapes, rosemary and basil. The most precious raw materials were cinnamon myrrh, opobalsam (classic incense) and finally resins and roots.
A senator would have the pick of the lot in terms of ingredients, being able to choose the finest raw materials gathered anywhere in the empire. Although in Ancient Rome, perfume was seen as effeminate and men only wore it on specific occasions. If we’re talking about Marius, I think he would likely blend ingredients popular in Rome, Gaul and especially Egypt. I’d see him wearing something dark, resinous and floral. And perhaps something with woody and green elements to pay tribute to the God of the Grove. I could see him gravitating to a rose oud composition, with dark resins and maybe a bit of honey for sweetness. Something like Honey Oud by Floris London what fit the bill. And I’m sure there are many other fragrances with a similar profile if anyone else wants to jump in.
Armand is probably my favorite character for this particular thought experiment. Specifically the Armand of the book series, he’s never been done right in any of the film or television adaptations, and he almost certainly never will for… Uh…well, you know….
I’ve always liked trying to construct an adequate picture in my mind of what exactly the experience of encountering Armand would be like, and I’ve never really been satisfied in any of my attempts. I can picture what it’s like to be in a room with Lestat. I can picture what it’s like to be in a room with Louis, Nikki, Gabrielle, Akasha, Magnus, Claudia, etc. I can’t really do it for Armand, and I’m not sure why. He’s just very elusive to my mind’s eye.
And for similar reasons, I can’t really settle on one perfume for him. I’d have to layer him up. His outward appearance is that of a youth with the otherworldly beauty of a Botticelli angel who also happens to lead an international Satanic cult of immortal beings who will kill you if you get too close. I picture him wearing something light and powdery and sweet and feminine, with rich colors over something that is deeply animalic and dangerous. His base scent wouldn’t even be unisex, it would be the perfume of a young woman. Something sweet and vanillic and fruity floral, but also sexual in a way that is designed specifically for the male gaze. /frag/ is going to hate it, but the scent I cannot get out of my head is Delina by Parfums de Marly. It’s what the Tartars would have sprayed on him in the brothel.
This would be layered over something much darker. Something downright evil. A scent that makes you deeply afraid but also intrigued. Something with blood and fire and smoke. There’s this thing that happens in the opening of T-Rex by Zoologist. If you could take the smoke and leather from that scent and cut out a lot of the base, it would be the fragrance I’m picturing in my head.
Bapteme du Feu was already brought up, but I think it is more of an Armand scent than a Lestat scent. It’s very prim and proper and classical, but it has that animalic note from the castoreum. If you took out the castoreum it would smell like a Guerlain release from the 50s, but it has this dark, almost menacing depth to it. I’ve heard it described as pissy, but I don’t get that at all. It’s very animalic, like the animal producing it might bite your throat out. Every time I hear someone review it, they will say something along the lines of "it smells beautiful and cozy, but there is a wrongness to it that is hard to explain".
I think it perfectly encapsulates Armand’s fallen angel aesthetic. He’s pretty and if you saw him on the street from afar, you’d think he was just was just a well dressed twink. You’d feel no need to cross the street to get away, and by the time he got close enough for you to realize your mistake, it would be much too late. That’s pretty much the experience of Bapteme du Feu. It’s elegant French perfumery with something evil underneath.
yeezys
We get frequent descriptions of what lestat is wearing during his later adventures that take place in modern day. Lestat wears expensive, often custom made contemporary clothing often with detailing that recalls past eras on the ‘formal’ side by the average standard.
Lestat is a theatrical type and loves attention – he explains his choice of clothes to an unsuspecting mortal by recalling his brief career as a rock star in the Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned, saying something like ‘my desire for the stage and microphone is gone, but I won’t give up the fancy clothes.’ In this scene he is wearing a long purple coat with cameo buttons and purple sunglasses(!). He describes himself somewhat ironically as ‘goth’ which he characterises as a ‘snappy, antique dresser’. He doesn’t wear all black, he is usually in grey or purple.
He is said several times to wear coats with high, pinched waists that might recall regency era frock coats or similar.
When lestat’s band come up I always think of something like malice mizer both in fashion and musical style – reading between the lines, lestat’s band found success in the late 70s/early 80s – lestat found the band and catapaulted them to fame with his unlimited money – they are described as pale strung out young people who wear ragged black clothes whose music has thundering drums and sonorous guitars with lestat playing the violin – reading between the lines its likely lestats band were an early goth outfit with everything that implies fashion-wise.
Honorable mention ought to go to Louis, who is Lestat’s foil and shuns human attention.
Louis spends most of his time reading, transcribing and commentating on crumbling books in a dilapidated shack. We see him through Lestat’s eyes later on and he is described as being timelessly beautiful in simple threadbare black clothing; this is probably a slightly generous view of Louis who after all is a swamp dwelling neet hobo at this point.
Louis still wears antiquated clothes, but unlike Lestat it’s simply because he is too distracted to update them.
I always felt there is a lot of ‘Beat Generation’ DNA in Louis, the threadbare black clothes, aversion to society and painful sensitivity to everyday life, as well as his dedication to art and literature.
Parfums de Marly
thematically maybe, but all their fragrances smell like standard modern club scents
if you want to smell like an 18th / 19th century pompous vampire, there are still scents from back then being made. e.g. Guerlain EDC Imperiale, originally made for Napoleon III
Nah, he’d definitely choose PDM over Guerlain. That’s not to say that PDM is the superior house, or even remotely close to the style of perfumery that was actually popular during the 18th century, but they are definitely more in line with who Lestat is as a character. First, while he is technically of noble birth, he comes from a remote area of France and his lifestyle as a young nobleman is far from glamorous. His family barely has food, much less an artisan perfumer to make bespoke fragrances.
He also runs away from home to join a theatre troupe early in life, and his lifestyle in Paris is that of a commoner. When he is turned against his will and inherits the fortune (and unusually powerful abilities) of the vampire who made him, he also becomes quite neurotic from having to remain in the shadows.
Eventually he would come to resent having to play by le (dead)man’s rules and adopts a super gregarious, nouveau riche infant-terrible persona and dedicates his life to exposing himself and the rest of the vampires to the world. His whole gimmick is being an undead pick-me girl. He’s the kind of person who would gravitate toward the most overpriced, loud and obnoxious perfume possible. He would want his perfume to punch you in the dick before he walked in the room and linger in the air for days afterwards. He’d smell like a Saudi Prince without the BO. He’d hecking love Parfums de Marly.
Although if we were going with the AMC timeline (it’s terrible and you should not watch it, but that’s beside the point. Also, the guy who plays Lestat is actually pretty good) where Lestat is up and running in the 40s, he’d definitely be wearing Shalimar. I’ve never actually smelled Jicky, but going from the descriptions, that also sounds very Lestat-core
Wait, I was wrong. It’s set in 1910. In that case, I guess he’s confined to Jicky.
The costume designer said she took a lot of inspiration from Leyndecker for Lestat and Louis’ costumes – I think he was a perfect choice to draw on for this material for a number of reasons.
A lot of Rice’s vampires seem to go between fetishistically throwing themselves into the new era and being deliberately modern in their affectations, and then eventually slipping back into habitual behaviours and familiar comforts.
I agree with this to a certain extent, I think it is easy to say that PDM matches his personality, but I don’t know if that’s the house he’d pick for himself. He’s quite pretentious and loves when people call him the brat prince. Infant-Terrible is a good way to describe him. Parfums de Marly makes very loud fragrances, but they have a reputation for being generic and mass appealing. That is completely antithetical to who Lestat is and he’d probably look down his nose on the brand as much as fragrance snobs do.
I see him going for something like 00s era Serge Lutens. He’d like that they were weird and unique, and I feel like he’d also think cheeky names like La Couche du Diable were funny. And they’ve got the whole gothy incense thing going on and they’re bold and transgressive with their compositions. Lestat would find a fragrance that smelled like gingerbread, church incense and gunpowder called ‘Bapteme du feu’ intriguing. It’s unique, kinda gothic and kind of blasphemous. It checks pretty much all of his bases.
>without the BO
I thought you said he was french
oh. u rite
full rick
this movie was so hecking /fashion/ truly fashion has went downhill since the 18th century
It was a great movie. Tom Cruise is especially good. It’s one of the few big mainstream book adaptations I can think of where you can see the amount of homework an actor did. Cruise doesn’t play Lestat the way he’s depicted in the first book, which is told through Louis’ perspective. He’s clearly playing Lestat the way Lestat (and Rice) sees himself, which you’re not going to really understand without reading, at minimum, the first three books.
To be fair, I think a good deal of that comes from the direction, too. There are a lot of things from the second two books added in. Lestat being telepathic is from the second book, and he doesn’t learn to fly until the third book. Unless I’m remembering it wrong. He learns to fly in the 80s, but it may have happened in the second book. They kind of blend together, narratively.
Painties
are those painted panties?
best thread on /fashion/ this year
Thanks anon, Lestat loves all his fans so if you are enjoying the romantic atmosphere and idealised sensuality of this thread please consider buying my books I mean his books I mean Anne Rice’s books.
Any fragrance autists want to weigh in on some of the other characters? What would an ancient roman senator have smelled like?
> The most common and accessible raw materials came from Roman dominations and included roses, pomegranates, lavender, quinces, grapes, rosemary and basil. The most precious raw materials were cinnamon myrrh, opobalsam (classic incense) and finally resins and roots.
A senator would have the pick of the lot in terms of ingredients, being able to choose the finest raw materials gathered anywhere in the empire. Although in Ancient Rome, perfume was seen as effeminate and men only wore it on specific occasions. If we’re talking about Marius, I think he would likely blend ingredients popular in Rome, Gaul and especially Egypt. I’d see him wearing something dark, resinous and floral. And perhaps something with woody and green elements to pay tribute to the God of the Grove. I could see him gravitating to a rose oud composition, with dark resins and maybe a bit of honey for sweetness. Something like Honey Oud by Floris London what fit the bill. And I’m sure there are many other fragrances with a similar profile if anyone else wants to jump in.
Armand is probably my favorite character for this particular thought experiment. Specifically the Armand of the book series, he’s never been done right in any of the film or television adaptations, and he almost certainly never will for… Uh…well, you know….
I’ve always liked trying to construct an adequate picture in my mind of what exactly the experience of encountering Armand would be like, and I’ve never really been satisfied in any of my attempts. I can picture what it’s like to be in a room with Lestat. I can picture what it’s like to be in a room with Louis, Nikki, Gabrielle, Akasha, Magnus, Claudia, etc. I can’t really do it for Armand, and I’m not sure why. He’s just very elusive to my mind’s eye.
And for similar reasons, I can’t really settle on one perfume for him. I’d have to layer him up. His outward appearance is that of a youth with the otherworldly beauty of a Botticelli angel who also happens to lead an international Satanic cult of immortal beings who will kill you if you get too close. I picture him wearing something light and powdery and sweet and feminine, with rich colors over something that is deeply animalic and dangerous. His base scent wouldn’t even be unisex, it would be the perfume of a young woman. Something sweet and vanillic and fruity floral, but also sexual in a way that is designed specifically for the male gaze. /frag/ is going to hate it, but the scent I cannot get out of my head is Delina by Parfums de Marly. It’s what the Tartars would have sprayed on him in the brothel.
This would be layered over something much darker. Something downright evil. A scent that makes you deeply afraid but also intrigued. Something with blood and fire and smoke. There’s this thing that happens in the opening of T-Rex by Zoologist. If you could take the smoke and leather from that scent and cut out a lot of the base, it would be the fragrance I’m picturing in my head.
Bapteme du Feu was already brought up, but I think it is more of an Armand scent than a Lestat scent. It’s very prim and proper and classical, but it has that animalic note from the castoreum. If you took out the castoreum it would smell like a Guerlain release from the 50s, but it has this dark, almost menacing depth to it. I’ve heard it described as pissy, but I don’t get that at all. It’s very animalic, like the animal producing it might bite your throat out. Every time I hear someone review it, they will say something along the lines of "it smells beautiful and cozy, but there is a wrongness to it that is hard to explain".
I think it perfectly encapsulates Armand’s fallen angel aesthetic. He’s pretty and if you saw him on the street from afar, you’d think he was just was just a well dressed twink. You’d feel no need to cross the street to get away, and by the time he got close enough for you to realize your mistake, it would be much too late. That’s pretty much the experience of Bapteme du Feu. It’s elegant French perfumery with something evil underneath.
>What would an ancient roman senator have smelled like?
spaghetti and body odor
Same shit
?
whatever he was wearing at the end of the movie