Pink and green go good together

I'll be the first to say that "I'm not really a vanilla person" - and I initially smelled this in one of my first experiences with Guerlain as a brand, and with their L'art et La Matière line as a whole. It was just after Christmas, and I had found a very well stocked counter so wanted to try a LOAD of things. In that smell-a-thon, I came away in love with Vetiver Fauve, extremely impressed with Tobacco Honey - and with a piqued interest in Cuir Beluga, whilst Angélique Noire, as well as SDV and even the much revered Vanille Planifolia weren't speaking to me. Perhaps a combination of the cold, miserable weather, the post-Christmas overeating fullness, or just a testament to my preferences and exposure at that time. Initially, I experienced Angélique Noire as "very sweet, very pink and modern" and that was (for quite a while!) my key memory and association with it. So, it surprised me no end to learn (as time and my hobby has gone on), that it's actually the complete opposite of that! This is - very famously, as it turns out! - a "green" vanilla, based on the more bitter angelica plant note, in combination with green pear and pink pepper, and created over TWENTY years ago by Daniela Andrier. Since that initial experience, I got my hands on some 2ml samples and a 10ml and wore it a few more times - picking up different things each time: a more effervescent opening, a lightness and a kind of acidity almost that keeps it out of any cloying elements that some vanillas have. I still think it presents more feminine, and feels incredibly modern (which is just testament to the incredible composition) but it's nothing so easily dismissable as "sweet, pink". (How could I have ever thought that??!)I now find it to be beautifully harmonious yin/yang balance of green and pink: the pink pepper and jasmine could easily push it into suffocating frivolity, the vanilla into sticky sickliness, but the acetonic crispness in the pear and delicious bitterness of the angelica pull it back, entwining into a refined and elegant sophistication.I now proudly have a personalised and engraved full bottle in my collection and wear it at least once weekly. I can look back and say that I was an incorrect fool: Angélique Noire is not a "very sweet, very pink" vanilla at all, and I must have been nose blind or thirsty or otherwise out of kilter to think so. It's an iconic benchmark - a green vanilla that stands out in a sea of sugar, and a timeless masterpiece.