Okay so I went to my local perfume counter and said to some of the women there..."You know me by now...what else do you have that I will like?" I always use certain fragrances as a reference to (hopefully) help them alert me to new ones...In this case it was Robert Piguet 'Bois Noir' and Amouage Interlude Man. She came up with this one from DSquared. It was a new one to me, the He Woods are a mixed bag and I'm not overly keen really...but I figured hey I'll try it! A pale comparison with Bois Noir which is in another league(not even gonna mention Interlude) was my conclusion. It smelled cheaper, I'd figured they were the same price but when I discovered this one was half the price it changed my perspective slightly. Really not a bad effort at the high end opulence that I crave from a spicy, Oudy, smokey, Incense scent at a designer price. Also the rose strikes a pretty good balance in Potion Royal Black, all in all not bad. For me though, I like designer fragrances for being a composition that you wouldn't see in the niche realm and this attempt is slightly redundant for me. It just highlights that If I want this sort of smell I will have to be prepared to pay for it and in truth will get something much much better than this. Update: My original point above was not very objective. I'm speaking as somebody who loves dark, eastern, incense fragrances and is prepared to pay top dollar so this doesn't really appeal to me...but more broadly speaking this might be the finest designer fragrance you can get and not to be sniffed at! (If you pardon the pun...this most definitely should be sniffed at! in a really good way.) Tried this again the otherday as I was really quite impressed the by this the first time, considering it's price point. It starts out as a really smokey mess quite frankly and is very pungent with spices and I'm not sure what it's supposed to be? You can actually sniff through the layers of resinous, smoke and reveal what struck me as an almost feminine rose scent underneath. However, as it dries down it seems to get deeper and darker and in the very deep drydown 8+ hours it becomes my favorite a gorgeous leather (Think almost Tuscan leather or Clive Christian 'C' PRAISE INDEED!) but by then it's so faint it's just barely in the realms of existence. Quite a journey this fragrance takes you on...layered and really a bold outing for a designer house with awesome longevity, so well done to DSquared.