Man Leaves Made-Up-Sounding Job For Different Made-Up-Sounding Job, Retains Third Ridiculous Position

by Hillary Busis | 5:08 pm, December 9th, 2010

» 6 comments

Sometimes these things just speak for themselves. Here’s a hilarious post from FishbowlNY about a New York Times writer who’s leaving the Gray Lady for… well, just read on:

Two words: olfactory art. Go ahead, Google it, we’ll give you a minute. Weird, right? Well not according to Chandler Burr, who is leaving his post as Perfume Critic for The New York Times to head a Center for Olfactory Art at The Museum of Arts and Design. Burr will retain his position at GQ as Scent Editor while taking on this new task.

Perfume Critic. Head of the Center for Olfactory Art at The Museum of Arts and Design. Scent Editor. These are all actual jobs. Well done, Chandler Burr: you win journalism.

Chandler Burr, FishbowlNY, GQ, Museum of Arts and Design, New York Times, Seriously, The New York Times

Harry Flashman

Olfactory art.

You know, you just can’t make things like that up. I have to tell you, though…..the smelling of perfume wasn’t the first thing that popped into my head when I heard that job title.

Gak.
dhg

How to get paid for doing something nobody needs anyone to do.
Ricia

I smell a rat
ChiliPeppersFan

reminds me of a really good, really gory book i read in college.
http://www.karimfanous.com/perfumesuskind.html
da-wdc

It’s a huge market, though. All the big fashion houses don’t make their money off selling those crazy runway clothes. They make it off accessible things like perfume and handbags, and doing those well can make or break a fashion house. People might wear perfume/cologne less than they used to, but it’s not a niche market – every department store in every town sells it, and people who’ll never set foot in a Chanel boutique in their lives still might buy No. 5 or Mademoiselle. And older brands stick around for years after their clothes are no longer popular because the perfumes still sell.
http://www.uselessbeauty.com Vidiot

Chandler Burr’s a really really good writer, by the way, and a very entertaining and insightful speaker. His book “The Emperor of Scent” is great, and his next book about the development of two different perfumes and all that goes on behind the scenes (one was an Hermes perfume, I think, and the other was one of Sarah Jessica Parker’s) is good.