Beautifully fresh, woody, herbal, and aromatic.
The sandalwood here isn’t your expected creamy note, it’s dry. Mixed with the Papyrus/Cypriol that amps up the herbal, I personally love the dill / pickle vibe it gives.
Potentially one of the most controversial and polarising fragrances on the market, and yet I bloody love it. Santal 33 has all the sour, sharp and pickled gorgeousness that a lot of people hate, and while it does smell out of the ordinary there’s something about it I can’t resist. Sometimes you come across a sandalwood fragrance with that slight pickled vibe, but overall leans into its creamier facets. Not this one, this fragrance celebrates that honking pickle juice aroma and I think it’s stunning. There isn’t really much else going on scent-wise, it’s fairly straightforward but there’s something so addictive about it. As it begins to dry down it starts to get smoother and creamier, but always remains strong with the sharp sourness. This scent is like marmite at the end of the day - you either love it or hate it.
Awful, strong, nauseating, devoid of complexity, obnoxious, sour, and worst of all cheap-smelling. How this is so popular is beyond me. At first sniff I thought it was OK, but as soon as I had it on my skin and was forced to smell it for a few hours I found it intolerable. It's also completely linear and is indelible on clothes, so all in all it's a relentless, shouting, chest-beating, screeching baboon of a scent. Ghastly.
Right Santal 33 was the one Le Labo I'd really been looking forward to. I mean it's sandalwood how can you mess that up? Well they've tried their hardest here. I can see why the green, watery almost cucumber like smell of papyrus might juxtapose yet compliment the creamy, spicy, woodiness of sandalwood...but it doesn't. To me the opening was awful and nothing like the soft beautifully composed 33 note extravaganza I was anticipating. I was really disappointed that was until the sandalwood begins to develop and oh boy when it does it's really nice. It's a clean minimal, warm smell and vastly different to that awful opening. Hints of spice, cedar and a delicate iris note. Santal 33 transitions from ridiculous in the opening to sublime in the drydown but it's still doesn't quite do enough to make me want it. Doesn't come close enough to restoring my faith in Le Labo...plain bad opening to something nice but ultimately nothing special.
