LA in a bottle

The fragrance masters at Le Labo accomplished the unthinkable - they captured the beauty, the grime, the chaos, the sex, the beauty and the sinful desire that makes up our town, and put it in a bottle marked Musc 25.

Launched last year Musc 25 is exclusively for us LA Pretties. Live out of town? Too bad, they won't ship it, and you can't get it online either. And not because they don't like you, actually the peeps at Le Labo are quite friendly and wonderful. It's just well, this is for LA, so you have to fight the traffic, find the perfect a spot at one of the meters - I learned the hard way that the surrounding neighborhood is a permit only zone - and actually walk into their shop on 3rd Street to get yourself a whiff of this sexy scent.

I experienced Musc 25 last night from Le Labo LA's lab manager Heather. This lovely lady knows fragrances inside and out and will happily pass on her knowledge with whomever stops by the shop. I left with a strip of paper that carries a couple of spritzes of Musc 25. Well now the thing actually has a lipstick stain on it courtesy of my Partner in Pretty who couldn't tear herself away from whiffing the paper all morning. Yes, this is what Musc 25 does to us ladies, so you can imagine the lipstick stains that will be left on the collar of a man who wears it.

Heather described it as "white, angelic, and a little bit dirty." Plus it's a unisexual fragrance, which we love since we're partial to musky, masculine scents anyway. With notes of ambergris, rose, amber and vetiver, Musc 25 is named for the 25 blends of musk in its formula. Le Labo co-founcer Fabrice Penot told the LA Times that he "had this idea of doing a while ball of musk with a black, dirty symbol that would be the symbol of the city." And oh, how we love it.

Le Labo, 8385 W. 3rd St, Los Angeles; (323) 782-0411.