My wife has just published her Christmas list. We held a small launch party attended by close members of the family. Like our two sons. The list is not as lengthy as it usually is and is dominated by refills. And a handsome Italian doctor.
My wife now has another man in her life. His presence is everywhere. She wants him for Christmas.
I come home, open the front door and I smell his unmistakable scent, and much of it emanates from upstairs. I am the one to blame. I started it all. I introduced them.
Last Valentine’s Day, when I brought his seductive musk into her life, my wife discovered “Dr Vranjes” and his scented reed diffusers.
That’s not a band. It’s a business and a very successful one. For her birthday in early November, I am thinking about framing a photograph of the maestro for her bedside table.
My wife is obsessed with Dr. Vranjes’s voguish home odors. Our house has been annexed. It is now a part of Italy.
Our hall smells of pomegranates and mint (sorry Melograno and mental), our living–room of Italian grapes and vineyards, our bedroom of “Petali di Rosa”, the spare bedroom of “Tuberosa Mughetto” (Lily of Valley with essential hyacinth) and our kitchen of Italian orchards.
My wife is addicted to Dr Vranje’s room sprays. I regularly catch her in the middle of a room pirouetting like a Zombie in its death throes and squirting highly-priced interior-enhancing Italian aromas everywhere. It’s gone too far. It’s got embarrassing.
Ours were the first children in our street to smell of ambergris and the first in their class to smell of “Pompelmo” (Grapefruit)
The family dog was the first to wear a “Florentine iris” to the park. Our Jack Russell (surprisingly, not named Vranjes) is never a passive victim of my wife’s home fragrance obsession.
I was the first member of my golf club to smell of neroli. It turned heads. Especially, the one belonging to our curious professional.
Now, I even have to buy expensive perfume for our car. Our VW Polo has gone all Ambra, Ginger, and Firenze.
Even our wardrobes and drawers have been Italianized. Open them and you are hit in the face by the Mediterranean. You are whisked off by the bergamot and butter bushes to Tuscany.
Our bed linen has gone all “Rosso Nobile”. My underwear drawer is a hymn to “Biscuit Profumati”. And bitter orange “Chinotto Pepe”, The whole house stinks of Dr. Vranjes. But very nicely.
Dr Paolo Vranjes was born and bred in Bologna, the grandson of a silk trader who brought back perfumes from his travels. As a child, Paolo was an ardent archaeologist and closet cosmetologist. In 1983 he opened up his first lab, “Antica Offician del Farmacista”. His first shop opened in the Via San Gallo in 1996, and another in 2001. The HQ is now in Antella, Bagno a Ripoli. In 2013, he opened his first outlet in Milan in the Via Fiori Chiari. His scents are now spread across over fifty countries.
And all round our home.
My wife once had a bad “Acqua di Parma” habit. She experimented with “Prada Infusion d’Iris” bath and shower gel. Then she got hooked on “Ortigia” before developing a serious “Felce Azzurra” habit.
Then it was Casa di Francisca “Fragpani” aroma diffuser in the downstairs loo. Then Di Poloma’s Fig and Grape in the utility room. Then Millefiori catalytic diffusing lamps everywhere.
My wife is an Italian junkie. From the “Recuperando” maiolica Vietri bath tiles to the “Rossignoli” cabinets and “Etrusca” new contemporary, we showpiece Italy. We now have a veiny “Simonello” Arabsecatio Cervaiole marble lavatory, a Venezian finish granite bidet, “Slabmarket” “Frapuccino” onyx toothbrush holders, Roman Traventine Alabastrina walls and Italian “Labrazel” pewter pump dispensers squirting out gouts of “Giovanni Cucumber Song“ body lotion; as well as the taupe-toned Sicilian marble soap dishes full of “Spuma di Sciameagria.”
I want my house back, as it used to be before Dr. Vranjes turned my wife’s head and Italianized our lives.
