This might just be my fav Alexandria yet!. This ish right here is phenomenal. Gourmand delight and yes i too also get a Almond note/scent from this. Kinda reminds me of mandorlo di sicilia by Acqua Di Parma (blue bottle) but with added Chocolate and a bit more. Big man ting, As soon as this gets released in 100ml size, I'm copping 2!!.👌🏿👌🏿👌🏿🤤🤤🤤😍😍😍💪🏿
This here is banging!!!!!. Sweet jammy smooth rose with some powdery musk backbone. Honestly nothing to fault about this frag, 1 of the best from penhaligons. This and the Bewitching yasmine are bangers!.
Now this fragrance is a bit all over the place to me!. The opening is disgusting, let me just put that out there lol. Lucky opening only lasts about 2/3mins on my skin before the vanilla and sweetness starts to show. As it dries down becomes much nicer but still a bit of a mess. It's sweet, Citruses, a bit earthy with something else in there that i cannot place. Don't know if i actually like it yet. Definitely unique, that's for sure!. My advise would be to SAMPLE this first like i did cause It's DEFINITELY NOT blind buy worthy hahaha.
Smoke is not what you might think given the name, there's many different ways to evoke the feeling of smoke but niche and trendy perfume brands will try to bombard you with overly smoky birch, cade and guaiac fragrances. That's cool if that's what you like but the overdose for me often seems like it's covering for the fact it's not a very good perfume. Anyway.... This is a cool then warm, breezy incense affair which doesn't follow any kind of trope, but also without being anything too out there. It has a wafting, underlying sense of smoke, and that's what makes it a winner for me. I suppose I get the resins, olibanum, labdanum, galbanum listed here but in truth this is a true accord of incense, without a one of those being too prominent. I honestly went into trying this brand with the usual bright eyed enthusiasm I normally display and even a touch of bias because I find Lyn Harris to be a very good perfumer indeed. There's always a respect for the composition, knowing what's best, complexity and depth but with a less is more and a great sense of knowing when a perfume is finished. I thought it was excellent, shame the price point is so high (again not a critique) because they are a little out of my price range and this certainly wasn't my favourite of the three I managed to try.
I bought this beauty and wow! Smokey raspberry. When you sniff it, can understand the price and quality match. There are no more questions, about why it is so expensive. Longevity enormous on my skin +12 Can smell next day, that's sounds lovely to me. Love the presentation and was lucky enough to grab a bottle in my collection.
Do yourself a favour and just buy this!!!!, it's that good😍😍. 9.5/10
Since I first smelled Palo santo as a material I've been fascinated by it. Smells like the kind of thing that would be poisonous to humans, strangely enticing but deadly. My perception of the smell is creamier and more opulent than even the finest 80 year aged Mysore sandalwood, thick, lactonic, with lovely woody nuances. Sounds great right? However, it's SOOOO creamy it amkes you dizzyingly billious. What makes matters worse, is that weived into that is a latex rubber note and of all things mint. yeah mint. so it's mega sandalwood with milk and cookies and melted rubber gloves and then unsettling mintiness. It's fucked up frankly. I NEVER thought that anyone could tame it or use it as the focal point for a perfume and if they did they would have to negate some of the those odder facets and perhaps tame it into a great material because it has more than the potential to be something amazing or create useful effects. Up steps legendary master perfumer Bertrand Duchaufour a perfumer I associate with an eclectic commercial style but also somewhat stark, modernism as well, so it's interesting that he's doing this all natural perfume and surely NOW is the time for a great Palo Santo perfume and my wait is over yeah? NO! NO! it's not! I'm still waiting!!!! Petite Fumee is an olfactory nightmare. No that's a bit dramatic, it's a creepy smell, a really odd perfume. It has the sense in the top notes of a kind of implosion, you know something is lurking deep and heavy molecularly speaking, exactly like sandalwood perfumes do. I mean the sense of a kind of natural, hipster santal 33 only different, maybe rosewood, linalool, cuucmber, spunk? Papyrus? but minus any spicy sharpness or edge. Then the Palo santo starts to really come on, like Hunter S Thompson said '... good mescaline it takes time...' to take effect, but it creeps and crawls until it turns you into a raving madman. The only thing I can say is that Duchaufour has succeeded in taming the oil to a degree, it's much less rubbery and the composition sort of compliments the material, but it STILL manages to permeate and dominate everything else in here. It's an absolute creepshow. Strnagely though, I can't stop sniffing myself when wearing it, it's like rubbernecking an RTA, you know you shouldn't but you feel compelled to do so. I just can't hack this perfume but god love you if you can wear it, I doubt other people will thank you, unless they are oddballs too. Worth a sniff if you've never smelled Palo santo or you like briny, weird cucumber and cream cheese notes. I'm steering well clear though.
This has the consistency of that chewy, not quite biscuit stuff you get from poland or eastern europe. This has a ginger twang to it which I like and what I percieved as resinous, a bit like myrrh but NOT myrrh. Then it dries down to a very deep hay absolute type smell and seeing the tobacco in the notes here I'm like yeah okay sure. This has a sepia hue, a chewy, tacky (texturally) brownness. I'm conflicted by it. I think I quite like it but, there's not enough breathing space in natural perfume, it hits you like a big block and you have to unpack it yourself. There's complexity there but it's strange, and this is FAR from the worst culprit of this collection.
First of all before we get into what this perfume is about I am alienated by the price point. This degree of 'luxury' is beyond my means. This perfume retails for £500 for 50ml. While that is very expensive some might try to defend it's honor by saying that it's not the most expensive perfume in the world, some are thousands, yeah and I can't afford them either. My own personal financial limits aside, and this is a very, very good perfume and much what I'd been expecting from QB in recent times. He has this cosmic, spangle of complexity in the opening, bejewelled with fruits and 'incense' (about the most nebulous accord you could describe) woody, resinous, modern, and multi faceted. That happens but it's immediately different in that it's softer, deeper and less aggressive than some of his recent efforts for Pehaligon's, Essential parfums and Marc Antoine Barrois to name a few, this is smoother and more wearble, and those are some great perfumes let me tell you. So this doesn't smell similar to those but stylistically it's in the same wheelhouse for certain. Then all of a sudden it reveals a much more settled nature after a few hours, almost like it says, 'right enough twinkling top notes, I'm gonna show you my true colours now, a pastel, powdery iris leather and woody, like sandalwood type accord. It was mildly reminiscent of DK Fuel for men, a lovely little banger from the noughties. This Iris/leather talk makes it sound atypical, but it isn't, It's pretty masculine leaning somehow and makes this perfume completely charming and if anything should be worth top money for transitioning this way and taking you on a 'journey' (puke) it's this perfume. I've actually just started a fragrance podcast (Les Odorants) which will be available to download soon in all the usual places you get your podcasts from,(PLLLLLUGGGGG!!!!!) and this was a topic of discussion along with a load of other heftily priced, smelly stuffs. Quentin Bisch has a masterful command over materials and is a superb modern perfumer, and this is a prime example, same it's so damn expensive, but if you can afford it, comes highly recommended by me.
Such an amazing gourmand!.creamy, nutty, bright, sexy and delicious 😋. May not have great performance but this is truely q summer/springtime gourmand!😍
Aldehydic, transparent, leather fragrance, feels 'dated' in that oh so brilliant way, like I want to date it/want to wear it on a date. It's soapy, snappy opening is wierdly floral, fresh but masculine, I suppose it's a sort of green leather. I actually love it. I don't get classic fougere warmth from it but it but there's a certain pine/fuel quality and it's twangy too like a saffron leather but nothing like it at the same time. haha. Yeah it's a classic, I'm sure there's other fragrances which smell this way, there's a familiarity about it but I can't say I'd ever tried this before the last year or so. I'd seek out a bottle but I know it will be outrageously expensive, for like a pretty good, discontinued fragrance, It's no Kouros or anything but it's satisfying.
Nice, but no different to most other rose oud fragrances. Although it is a lot smoother, a little sweetness and not so headache inducing.
Pomelo?....yes. Poivre? ....Not so much. (Actually, I just re-spritzed and there's a really brief peppery spice wave at the beginning of this fragrance, blink with your nose and you might miss it) The opening is a delight of citrus from grapefruit sharp to even a mandarin/melon nuance, so pomelo is pretty much spot on territory. There's pencil shavings and creamy sandalwood cedar underneath. Initially I really liked this but subsequent sprays on my arm and such, that excitement waned some, the citrus becoming less fresh on skin after a while. However, I'm coming full circle to say this is a very nicely done citrus/fruity perfume with the signature, musky, wood bases which are safe and agreeable to most tastes. This is superior to many fruity/citrus fragrances it's very good, (I've given it an okay here because it's not massively to my tastes) and I'd expect nothing less from a line which has been very good across the board.
I found this a likable sandalwood, a happy middleground piece between all out, Santal 33 trendy fuckery and sweet, creamy, musky, synth sandalwood goodness. It's basically a very pleasant, lightly spiced sandalwood open, reminiscent of the niche game becoming what the designer was 25 years ago. There's even some masculine trope from that period about it in the opening, bergamot and cardamom and such? It must be a thing with sandalwood accords and bases where they invoke that papyrus or nutty quality, this just about gets away with it. I like the brand, this is ok, I'm not overly keen, but it's okay. I put 'like' because I kinda do. Update 01/12/23 I wore this yesterday and feel my original apprasial still holds water, I sort of like the fact it has that offness of modern hipster Sandalwood (minus the horrors) because otherwise it might be giving me a bit too much of what I want. However, it's still oddly cloying and the sandalwood accord has lashings of what I perceieve as Javanol, a material I often praise but in reality is very tenacious and fatigues me massively. Still not a bad wear though and inkeeping with what is all in all a quality brand, not exactly setting the world alight creatively but still decent.
Lattafa have brought out their clone to this called ana Abiyedh poudree👌🏿
Gorgeous, musky, iris and gentle leather perfume. To some uneventful, and unspectacular but I think in the context of the brand, it's really fitting. Many brands are making these quality, fleshy iris perfumes and that should make them more hackneyed and even less appealing to a gnarled old cynic like me right? well no actually. The devil is in the details here and there's some nice details. Oh this perfume is now called Iris Ebene (they've made a couple of name changes in this line) it has a fresh note in the top which I swore i did discern as mandarin but when smelling again, I can't really detect but there's a general, fleeting sweet freshness which works well with the developing sweet, vegetal notes. The iris is powdery but musky and woody, not too anything for any palate, great balance is displayed in three perfumes from this line santal one, musk one and this one. I love it. But it's quite standard stuff and although I'd happily wear this I think in comparison to Crivelli's Iris that has much more strange points of interest, re:galbanum and chocolate, and if I wasn't so enamored I might consider picking this up. I liked it. I like the brand generally, I'm in love but I'm sold on the concept of them.
The stiff bristles of a manface. A jawline you could chop fire wood with. The curly mat of chest wig, poking up atop a polo collar. The chisel of a protruding Adam's apple. I am Man. Smell my Bogart. This is a classic men's fragrance in all the ways I could possibly describe leather, wood, spice etc... mildly derivative of 80's (and early) men's power juices, this one in the woody aspect of Paco...sure...Quorum...yep...but I swear I can tell the subtle difference in this hyper complex animals, which ultimately come together to be vastly similar. If you have experience wearing fragrances you will be able to distinguish between them by two crucial factors, 1) their development over time, how the signature of different notes and accords pop out of a seemingly similar soup, at different times during the wearing and 2) The way it makes to feel. Largely it's differing versions of the same feeling....like bloody, great big, hairy MAN!!!!! Loved wearing Jacques Bogart for the first time, this is one classic I've never tried, blind bought for next to nothing, the new formula is COMPLETELY fine, and I'm really satisfied with it. great addition to my wardrobe.
BR540 clone
Santal 33 clone
Creed Clone
So I got the new bottle of Obsession and I have to say it's less feisty than I recall it being years ago. Perhaps lacking that strangely animal muskiness, it's still there but a little subdued. I'm only focusing on this as I've bought some new formulations of classics recently because I refuse to pay exorbitant prices on eBay and the like. I think vintage snobs might have a point on this one, but crucially, did they 'RUIN' this perfume? No! Obsession is still excellent in it's current formulation and the sign of a great idea in the first place that even paler representations of it are great. It smells strange in that way that A heavy, amber, chypre I'd say, with a apricot yoghurt creaminess, light floral powder, and otherworldly tone similar to a Dior perfume of a similar era in Dune. They don't even smell remotely alike but the association is there as a perfume which side steps the feminine tropes and tries to do something different, and achieved it. Some say that this is much more of a masculine perfume (possibly compared to the Men's one) but I wouldn't say that this evokes any binary gender divide at all. It's just 'there', a perfume for perfumes sake, a piece of art, and not very CK for what CK became in the 90's, aside from the androgyny or unisex appeal of it of course. Style wise it's an outlier and something they've not really returned to favouring more of a minimal 'fresh' aesthetic. I really like this and such an enjoyable wear for me.
Beast mode. Nothing like BR540. Dry down is exactly like Sauvage Elixir.
Adore it. Beautiful, lovely, musky piece of perfumery. Opens like some forgotten 90's masculine fougereish thing with sandalwood and bergamot or something? Does that classic thing of sort of sucking in, it's a kind of gentle implosion that these fragrances do, then you know it's going to mushroom out into a real cracker and it does, mutates slowly into a silky smooth, embrace of musk with that gorgeous ambrette character. Very well made, considering I have similar perfumes and I love this genre Peau d'ambrette (now Bois d'ambrette) is still giving me enough originality to want to buy it. Yes it's 195 quid I think, and yes it's a fairly minimal perfume from a brand which clearly blows it's load on packaging and such, but that's all part of the reason the aesthetic appeal is so strong. But I don't care. I love it. Brilliant.
Wow! What an opening statement. A fruity cacao accord bursts out of this bottle, it's huge. Powdery but also kinda gooey, reminiscent of some dessert with cacao powder and like raspberry coulie or something? (not that this fruity note is raspberry) it's strangely Muglerish, I get a fig (more like dried) sort of feel but also something more berry tart. It's kinda a big, fruity floral, despite not being very floral on the strip now, it was more so on my skin. Smells like those big brash patchouli, chocolate gourmands that I associate with louder than life women, who are always very well put together but perhaps wear too much make up? (is that sexist? who am I to say what's too much make up huh? I basically look like a thumb in an overcoat!) No but you know what I mean? Maybe she (by that I mean He or They) works on the makeup counter and they can't get enough of spritzing themselves as it delivers their chocolate hit as well as their perfume one. I like it. It's bold, it stands out. I couldn't abide wearing it, I don't think.
