Activate

by Nathalie Feisthauer

for Hersip

It is time.

She rises. Above the woods of Chiyoda, the morning mist has yet to come. There are the blue skies, the hues of blue ; the morning blue of Edo reigns, ere the arrival of the Sun.

It is time. The neon lights have fade, the salt and sea are awoken.

It is time. And she runs betwixt the grid of towers high.

She runs betwixt the faded silhouettes of morning dawn ; she runs, beneath the shadow of pine trees, of trees in bloom, on flowers crushed. Swiftly, she escapes the cries of the night and the clamour of heavy days. She runs to the sound of her heart  beating, like drums, beating like the taiko of gods to whom she offers herself like incense.

It is time. And she shan’t be coming back.

Thus is the heavy path of the unknown she took upon. Thus is the vertigo over which she obsesses, after which she runs. As she grows invisible to the eyes of the concrete monoliths of the city, as she abandons herself to the glowing silence of the imperial woods, it is her skin, her self, her reflexion former that she is forsaking. She seems to dwell in the past, where it’s the future she’ll embrace.

A future day, a future self, a future life, and eye, and face. Yesternight in Shinjuku, under the multicoloured lights, as she rinsed with pure water the vanity of her make-up, she caught a glance of the weary eyes of an alienating life. In the mirror, as the eastern lights danced on the curtain of glass, she saw, naked before her own reflexion, the nudity of a being detached – from herself.

Like rain have poured her tears. Like rain have her tears flooded her memories. In the heart of the night, in the heart of a silence bursting with tokyoites honking ; on the pale concrete floor, against a window of cold glass ; she cried the scalding tears of the child she had forsaken in the darkness of a cabinet filled with disillusioned dreams. She wept, she rose, she took a pair of scissors and cut – her hair.

That little girl never dreamt of becoming a princess. She dreamt of soaring in the skies, of scraggy horizons, of infinite and unlimited. She dreamt of running and moving and dancing, freed at last from her fetters and burdens. She dreamt of being alone and moving forward without suffering from the judgement – of her peers.

On the floor where she left her hair, she also left dreams that had never been hers.

It was time. And she wasn’t about to be late.

In the woods, amidst the cold silence of Chiyoda, under the watchful eye of sleeping pagodas, she left her last offering to divine idols. The cedar and pine woods, the flowers and needles : all rose over the swift sea breeze caressing the still waters and stones.

She runs, catches a train. She goes to the highest summits of mountains wite and blue. She runs, catches an airplane. She flies to the bottom of green and golden steppes. She runs, catches a friend. She flees to the heart of narrow dales of Ireland and Iran and Bhutan and Spain. Afar from cities, of fields and men – combatting the winds, the seas ; the moons, the cliffs.

Activate is a woman owning up to herself. Activate is the obliteration of fetters of a patriarchal society. Activate is the renewed desire overflowing a heart broken, washen and healen with tears.

Through the mastery of Nathalie Feisthauer, Activate uncovers beneath a veil of powdery modesty, the peppery petillance of a woman clutching her destiny. Modesty for Activate is modest, still. She is young and new, she is frail. Immaculate.

Activate is her first breath, her first glance over her new reflexion. Activate is a shiver transfiguring her febrility. Cristalline and precious like the crispy dawn licking the glassy rooftops of Edo, Activate is also carnal and warmful.

 A comfort yes, but a call to move forward. The vivifying spring of new beginnings, the thirst-quenching halt along the way. An explosion of sap moving up the tree, the mirage of resinous needles sticking to dark and mossy rocks in a zen garden.

Activate is like Japan, like its new woman proud of whom she is. A woman in motion, like her motherland. A shapeshifting woman, like her motherland. A woman constantly on the edge of the rising sun of her life – like her motherland.

Activate is at last the delicate union of Japanese rigour looking at the future, dreaming of the beyond, settled in the present.

Activate - Hersip

EDP 50ml - $128

Available in Paris at La Place and in Japan.

For more informations, visit their website : www.hersip.com