Knew nothing of this brand or the notes of this fragrance. Sprayed it on this morning and what a treat. The masculine greenery hits with a peppery dark edge. This settles to a lightly smoked vetiver note and this is the only clearly defined note I could get and it is KO gorgeous to be fair. I said to myself.... Castana definitely has vetiver (this usually means I check the notes and it's not listed) and hoorah there it is. However, as it settles it almost completely mutates and the heart/base take over and curiously does really smell of vetiver anymore, but a men's designer fragrance....I'm gonna say from the 90's and I wracked my brains thinking of what ot was, driving along in my car and all of a sudden ah ha!!! It dries down to something in the ballpark of Versace Dreamer of all things! This is a hasty review and I will need to sample again but It smells like dreamer, shades of Le Male and maybe even reflection man? So I'd even say there's a lightly floral tobacco and even touches of vanilla scented barbershop, fougere. I always think dreamer has a hazy, chemical smell, a bit stale and unsettling but fantastic for it. This is similar. I enjoyed it. 01/03/22 Update: I can't help but read back this review and think it might, just might, be a touch unhelpful/misleading. I really stick to what I said but I can't believe I downplayed (straight up didn't mention!!!) the nutty aspect of this perfume, because it is very nutty, like a beautiful, warm, chestnut. Vetiver (and certainly sandalwood) can also have this nutty quality, folks will be familiar with Haitian and Java vetivers but I have a material from Brazil which is obviously not as popular or well known but is very characteristically nutty. I think what I was driving at was that the base of this perfume is musky and soft, the top notes are interesting, a kind of hybridized Gourmand/fougere of sorts and I think the perfumer has struck a perfect tone here of innovation and calming, reassuring, perfuminess and chic, style, making Cloon Keen the kind of Chanel or Celine of the Emerald Isle. I think it's superb in both it's subtley and creativity and no wonder Luca Turin bummed it into next week! (He does get things right occasionally, the senile old git) The creamy warm hay/coumarin character and vetiver earth to it, does make me think it's something people who enjoy Hermes Vetiver Tonka would really like. Castana is basically Vetiver Tonka but for people with more personality.

I remember seeing this bottle but it's not an immediately accessible design for a man to pick up & try, well not this man anyway, but I have sampled the bee bottle now. I'm assuming this one has been discontinued in this format? Anyway, This is a violet dominant fragrance as the colour of the perfume would suggest and it's very vibrant, yet restrained and actually fresh. This clearly resembles violet fragrances I like but I was struck by how different it is too. The opening is very fresh but no sharpness of citrus just that, mellowing into 'realistic' Iris/violet and not one that I found particularly powdery if I'm honest, Insolence is certainly no Violetta by Penhaligon's. Funnily enough I've tried another modern violet/iris this week and yet again I've been surprised at just how changeable they can be. A lovely perfume but a bit reserved for my taste.

Allow me to start with the positives here this is not just a cookie cutter, eau de cologne freshie. Nor is it the ultimately bland aroma chemical mess of a eros or Invictus, some small merciful praise can be bestowed upon Gucci Guilty Cologne for this fact. Gucci had really turned a corner injecting life into this Guilty line with the divisive release Guilty Absolute (Men's one) which people either found to be a blissfully animalic leather or an inept, antiseptic, nightmare. Stranger still that it had come from the nose of Alberto Morillas, and this one does too, with the use of a note/accord seldom found in men's designer perfumes and that's Heliotrope. All this sets us up for an interesting fragrance and cologne is not without that merit let's just let it have this credit, before I rip it to shreds! So the opening is actually very fresh, truly aquatic, fresh a bit salty but with a steady decent into more floral territory. This is that violet leaf, dry ionones sort of tinge but if this was a violet fragrance I expect I would like it. I sampled this without prior knowledge of the notes and I KNEW there was heliotrope in here....I couldn't place the name and kept saying Angelica no...mimosa, no....artemisia no....what is it?? I knew what I meant and seeing it here just validates how prominent it is in this fragrance. Three stages are... unusual fresh, seaside floral opening, into a heart that is almost a scrubber, it's that bad. Let me just say that this could be a taste thing on my part but I found it really sour and unpleasant combination. Then when nearly dead and settled right the way down comes a woody, synthetic aroma chemical heaven of timbersilk, clearwood, synth ambers? and like that.....all is well. Too little, too late and overall I have to say I plain dislike this fragrance and would never wear it, categorising it as a stinker. Just let me highlight once again that this was not a failure for any of the reasons I thought it might be, and I respect that Gucci and Morillas have tried somewhat to follow suit from the barnstorming Absolute, with something different. It fails because perfume like this should be at the least pleasant for all it's challenges and this wasn't to me. Sorry it just wasn't.

Wow! This has a bright, aldehydic, musky opening as the name might suggests couple with the growing rose note it's even slightly metallic, certainly clean and with the tinniest hint of geranium. It's vaguely chypre-esque and does have a nod to the Encens one (either new or old) in style. It's very good just not my bag...but I would try it again and give a proper wear but I doubt my feelings would change all that much.

This is another bit of magic. I could never afford Encens Mythique d'Orient and despite my flacon preference I have to say this reboot works out about £1 per ml, that is an absolute bargain for a masterpiece chypre like this. I don't have the capacity to portray the poetry of this fragrance. I'd say I prefer Bois Mysterieux if I had to pick simply because that is more oriental and ergo more my style but this is on an equal par creatively and affectionately recreating their forebears (if the formulas are indeed any different?) Ambergris is the stuff of magic in perfume and it rides underneath everything here unpinning and giving a slightly musky skank, which is as addictive to keep sniffing as the raw stuff. I'm amazed at the bright aldehydes in here and just how long they last in to heart and base of the fragrance. Lightly floral, brightly resinous a little touch of damp earth and moss and powder, all the trappings of a classic. Absolutely loved it, opened stong, lasted for ages just a supreme fragrance. Bravo Guerlain.

One of my greatest perfumed regrets is not buying Songe d'un bois D'Ete, the glorious smelling Guerlain presented in a beautiful flacon. It's not a unicorn by any means and still widely available online but it's a bit pricey I thought. Price shouldn't be a factor when it smells this good...Fantastic then that Bois Mysterieux is very similar smelling, I think you get more volume and the price is more reasonable...Although I haven't checked my Oud Essencial was about £120 for 125ml I recall? So if it's around that point it's a bargain! The opening is a stunning oriental incense that instantly transports you to the far east, it's magical. Has nuance of cumin and caraway, anise and licorice, powerful but with a lightness of touch, elevating it to the very highest level. The myrrh is sweet, but has some bite, the body of the scent is creating a smooth leathery, woodsy effect and hint of warm animal musk. Describing notes in this fragrance is a little reductive because of the expert balance and transition of accords into one cohesive master work. This fragrance is an absolute delight. What a treat it is and has to be top priority on my purchases list.

So clearly I forgot to post a review of this one but not because I favoured Some of the others I have penned reviews for. Strength I’d say was my third favourite from the line, and don’t be mistaken for thinking it’s dead bang mediocre in the middle because the two above it really were excellent. So comparisons to Tobacco Vanille are obvious as the big glowing neon reference point for sweetly honied, dried fruit, tobacco fragrances...and that’s what this is. I have to state for the record that there’s no way you’d ever mistake them for one another and that is to Zegna’s credit. I actually favour this over TV smell wise it’s somehow more easy going, still warm yet lighter, but performance, ballsoutness (yes!) and even price are all in Tom Ford’s favourite rendering stuff like this and Phaedon’s Tabac Rouge a touch redundant. Certain Genres I can’t write off in this way, ‘fresh vetivers’ for example I don’t just think oh I’ve got XYZ and that’s the pinnacle, I don’t need anymore. However some genres I do and that’s just my bad. If this was cheaper then for sure I’d give it more thought. I actually find the honey in this to be sublime, the Tobacco adds just enough, bitter, Woodsy qualities, the smoothness of the who affair is just lovely.

Decent. Quite linear and not really possessing the exoticism I expect from Ylang Ylang but very nice all the same and the floral opening masks just how much vanilla there is in the base! Jeez the musky/vanilla drydown is long lived. I liked it and it’s not even my scene.

I absolutely adore this! Going to have to really sample it to make sure but initial spray had me bowled over. Not much in the way of Oud synthetic or real, certain not real but I don’t doubt it’s there because there’s a woody, amber heft to this fragrance. It’s warm and stunning in the opening with quite a sweeter saffron note and I get nutmeg in there too, it’s a heady brew of stuff I like. Hugely powerful and having said all this nice stuff about it and loved it so much am I left mouth agape standing back in awe of this thing...well No. Not really. I love it. I’d like to wear it and own it and I know that love would grow into a real fondness but does it have the wild chemical attraction of a love at first sniff? Not quite. That kind of relationship is doomed to fail anyway so maybe this is ‘the one’ for me? Just a sensible one. I will update this when I acquire proper samples.

I really like this fragrance. Uncompromisingly about vetiver. Opens with that wet stone/cement to drier flint/gunpowder facets, into a plume of slightly moist, autumnal leaf mulch being burned. It's kinda fresh and alive underneath that orchard floor though, not quite green but just nice. Dries down a bit cleaner and more cedar maybe some synthetic woods come out, it's very warm and lovely as a skin scent. Performance being acceptable but surprisingly not amazing considering how it goes on and projects early on. Now having dabbled in perfumery recently I can say that vetiver is one of my go to materials. I have smelled several different types and they are very changeable and superb in their own right. The isolate I'm using at the moment is vetiveryl acetate and as much as I liked vetiver before I embarked on making my own perfumes, it wasn't the material I was itching to get cracking with. I favoured stuff like the rockstars of Rose, Iris, Oud....etc... which in hindsight are actually very hard to get right and it's a costly learning curve. In any case, Vetiver has become one of my favourite basenotes and I have a newly reinvigorated love of it shall we say. Also I can see just how special this composition is, because it's quite hard to minimally compliment and support the smokey, earthy tones of vetiver. I think this does a really good job with the top notes.