The Story
Why it exists.
The beginning
Clin d'Oeil Excentric arrived in 2001 as part of Bourjois's playful Clin d'Oeil collection. The name itself, "a glance" in French, signals the kind of fragrance that catches you sideways rather than announcing itself head-on. The opening moves quickly through a bright, slightly bitter grapefruit and a clean, almost peppery ginger, giving the spray that first sharp lift you expect from a citrus-forward scent. Almost as quickly as the citrus registers, though, a warmer, more edible quality begins to push through. The toffee in the heart is what sets the composition apart. It arrives not as a heavy, sticky gourmand, but as a soft, melted caramel sweetness, the kind that seems to seep into the florals and round them off.
What makes the composition interesting is the toffee in the heart. Clin d'Oeil Excentric pushed a gourmand note, actual toffee, into the middle of a fresh, spicy citrus opening. The result reads as citrus gourmand, a blend that feels rooted in the early 2000s appetite for sweeter, more edible fragrances. Ginger and grapefruit give the top its clean heat and bitterness, mock orange and peony soften the floral layer, and the toffee does what caramel does best, wraps everything in a warm, edible sweetness that keeps the floral from drifting into soap.
The evolution
The first ten minutes are sharp. Grapefruit and ginger do their bright, slightly rude dance, citrus zest with the clean sting of grated root. There's no hiding in the opening. Around the fifteen-minute mark the sharpness starts to dissolve and toffee slides in, not heavy, more like the smell of sugar warming in a pan you forgot on the stove, soft and golden. Peony and mock orange join the toffee without fighting it, adding a cool, watery floral note that keeps the caramel from getting too rich. By hour two you're in the drydown: white musk and the ghost of the toffee, close to skin, soft, slightly powdery. It doesn't project far. It lasts about four to six hours before asking for a refresh, and on fabric the next morning there's a faint trace of warm musk and something almost like vanilla, the toffee's last quiet word.
Cultural impact
Clin d'Oeil Excentric arrived in 2001 as part of Bourjois's Clin d'Oeil collection. The toffee-and-citrus pairing marked an early turn toward more edible, dessert-like sweetness in mainstream fragrance, a direction the wider category would explore more fully later in the decade. The opening is bright and a little sharp, with grapefruit and ginger offering a clean, slightly bitter lift before the warmer heart begins to register. As the citrus settles, the toffee arrives wrapped around mock orange and peony, giving the composition a soft, caramelized warmth that lingers through the middle.
