Except for the occasional pat of Old Spice in my teens, I have never been one for slapping on cologne. The problem I've always had is that whenever I tried one, it ended up following me around all day, announcing a brand more than me. People would play a guessing game, and it annoyed me—kind of like the party small-talker who feels free to flip your tie around to read the label and declare, "I knew it!" With such a purchase, there's too often a discussion of whether the wearer is well matched to a product, whether it's "you" or not. Then I heard about Lev Glazman, the cofounder of Fresh, who started the business with his wife, Alina Roytberg, 16 years ago. Glazman has made custom scents for illustrious devotees like Julia Roberts, and I thought he could help find the ideal blend for me, one that was subtle and potent at the same time.
"The scent of a man incorporates everything he is, everything he does," instructed Glazman, a small man with a big presence, whose 10-year-old daughter burst in with her latest drawings of papa during our first appointment. "What he does, where he goes, what he eats, what he drinks." And Glazman vowed to only accentuate the positive.
We talked about scent and memory, which took me back to Baltimore, where I grew up. There are several scenes in Annie Hall where Diane Kea-ton apologizes that she doesn't know much because she's from Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin. I feel the opposite way. In a city as cosmopolitan as New York, I like the fact that I'm from someplace else, with its own otherness, and Baltimore is a curious microcosm of Southern graces and ethnic peacekeeping. Many who were born there—John Waters, Barry Levinson, and Frank Zappa—can't let it go, even after they've moved away. Apparently, neither can I.
Several of the city's signature aromas suddenly wafted through my mind: the brackish Patapsco River, the flavors from the McCormick spice factory, the smoke-charred pit beef sandwich, and the sour bitterness of a can of National Bohemian. The cleanest smell I remember is the fine, fresh scent of Irish Spring, the soap that my brothers and I used. And our dad often ushered us into Tony's Barber Shop to let loud Italian guys give us "whiffles"—essentially buzz cuts—that ended with dousings of Clubman Tonic. There was a lot of pipe and cigar smoke seeping out of my grandparents' living room when my grandfather's political pals—he was a state legislator and then a judge—would drop by for roasted leg of lamb, strawberry shortcake, and after-dinner sessions of gossip, crème de menthe, and full-throated laughter.
I didn't want a bottle of anything without some of that history reflected, even the ambivalence about splashing on go-go juice in the land of web belts and Blucher moccasins from L. L. Bean. In Glazman's studio, overlooking the gentrified wharfs of Boston Harbor, I unpacked some of this narrative along with a few reference materials that might get distilled into a never-been-tried formula. First, three tins: one of saddle soap (my best friend had a horse farm), one of Old Bay seasoning (steamed crabs were a summer staple), and one of Murray's pomade (something that kept hair in place almost as well as a baseball cap). I brought Solarcaine and Carmex and a can of tennis balls just so Glazman, who grew up in Israel and other places around the world, could get a whiff of a crowded station wagon on a summer afternoon en route to Bethany Beach.
