I don’t have any tattoos so I’m ill-equipped to assess whether this smells like a tattoo parlour (which is the idea), but it definitely smells like a salon: it has a rubbery, industrial vetiver-ink note that evokes black pleather salon chairs, and a slightly ozonic quality that makes me think of hair dryers. It’s also smoky, as if from cigarettes outside the shop door. I wouldn’t have identified the jasmine note (I wouldn’t call anything in here “floral”) but I think it might be manifesting as the fragrance of hair or skin treatments. There are also woody and musky facets going on that smooth and mellow it into a velvety texture that keeps the industrial touches from feeling harsh. Overall a very interesting and well-executed perfume, cool and a little edgy but not actually “weird,” nicely balanced. It’s not quite what I want from an “inky” fragrance, though, personally. I’d want it to reference books rather than tattoos, so, something more papery and natural, maybe with a more antique leather, incense, or some green touches. (Like Perfumer H’s Ink, in other words).

Early on in my fragrance journey, I thought of rose scents—along with most florals, really—as something outside my wheelhouse. Despite being theoretically opposed to the idea of gender in perfume, in practice I still tend to gravitate towards more unisex or masc-coded smells. However, I’ve become increasingly interested in the idea that wearing a rose fragrance could be a cool flex for me and I’ve been seeking out weirder” roses (whether green, earthy, peppery, salty, or otherwise) that read as “unisex” to me. Of the ones I’ve found, Jorum’s Rose Highland might be my favourite. It’s a cool, bracing scent that opens with a startlingly realistic ocean breeze, salty and mineralic, surrounding the impression of wild rosebushes with herbaceous notes that vividly transport you to a Scottish cliff carpeted with scrubby, flowering heather, overlooking the ocean. Basil imparts an aromatic green touch as sharp pink pepper and cloves spice up the rose’s supporting florals (geranium, rhododendron, and jasmine). This isn’t some pampered hothouse rose, it’s a rugged, thorny one, with just a handful of dark-red blooms. It has a forlorn, solitary flavour, bleak but romantic, perfect for gazing longingly out to sea while swathed in a shaggy Shetland sweater and tartan scarf, listening to plaintive Scottish indie pop. As it dries down, the oceanic notes recede and the rose blooms seem to dessicate into dried petals wrapped in a woody, grassy vetiver, still salty, maybe a little tear-stained. It’s a beautiful, evocative scent that I find very unisex, and it’s also an extrait with impressive stamina: like a cliffside shrub, it’s built to last and won’t be uprooted by inclement weather. Quite possibly my overall favourite Jorum creation (though their recent release Boswellia Scotia is also a top contender).🌹 🥀 🌹

The first time I sampled Avignon, it was sweltering high summer and I was not prepared to appreciate it. I found it too clean and thin—it initially made me think less of the wooden pews, stone walls, and soaring vault of a cathedral and more of a spotless church bathroom. Being accustomed to the woodier notes of the other fragrances in CDG’s Incense series, I was a little confused by its airy, fizzy, vanilla-cola sweetness. (Having attended catholic mass exactly once in my life, I also had next to no familiarity with church incense itself). I rated Avignon as my least favourite of the series, with the caveat that I still haven’t sampled Jaisalmer. How things have changed! Now that the chill of autumn has set in, I’ve been craving warmer, sweeter, resinous aromas and seeking out more amber and incense perfumes. I’ve grown very fond of the incense bases in CDG 2 Man and Eris’ Scorpio Rising, in which incense is blended with leathery notes—also the case in Trudon’s Revolution and CDG Zagorsk, both of which I enjoy. Trudon Mortel is a dark, spicy (but still woody) take on church incense that led me down the path of appreciating ecclesiastical frankincense and myrrh as the focus of a fragrance, and Jovoy’s Liturgie des Heures is an even purer church incense with a rich, musky, slightly boozy amber sweetness. But coming back to Avignon in this frame of mind revealed a completely new experience. In cold weather, its chilly austerity unfolds its celestial wings, clean and pure. It’s relaxing and meditative, with a fine, rarefied sweetness that develops from the sparkling elemi/aldehyde c-12 opening into a subtle, resinous vanilla. The blending of the various notes (chamomile, labdanum, ambrette, cedar, patchouli, rosewood, oakmoss) is superbly smooth and unified, like the harmony of voices in a Gregorian chant—I salute Bertrand Duchaufour’s mastery! I’ve gone from being intrigued to borderline obsessed, craving a sniff of aldehydic olibanum even on days when I feel like wearing a different fragrance. I still have a list of other church-incense frags to try (with Filippo Sorcinelli at the top), but now I get why Avignon is such a revered reference. I’m a convert. 🙏

This is like a warm, glowing halo of rosy sandalwood musk. Very clean, and sits so close to the skin that you feel less like you’re wearing a fragrance and more like you just washed your whole body with a deliciously creamy soap. I didn’t notice the incense at first but it creeps out with the dry down, and it’s quite subtle, neither smoky nor too sweet. Eventually you start to pick up the vetiver but it’s very smoothly blended. I’m not sure I detect any of the listed oud, though. Overall, it’s like a more subtle, nuanced Santal 33 with a hint of soapy rose. It’s billed as “for women” but I suspect that’s just because it came out in 1999–by today’s standards, this is 100% unisex. Sophisticated and unpretentious at the same time: smells really good in a simple, unassuming way. Lovely bottle, too, and pretty affordable, which is good because you’ll want to douse yourself in it in order to get a lasting effect. A great fragrance to wear for an occasion where you expect someone to smell your skin close-up.

The ambitious, possibly deranged brief for this fragrance is that it's supposed to evoke the streets of Paris during the French revolution: smoke, gunpowder, houses ablaze, crazed horses and desperate riders, the leather of boots and saddles, oil for muskets and sabres, and touch of incense from churches offering sanctuary and promising peace after the terror. That’s a lot of drama for a perfume, and it really does feel torrid, rebellious, and uncompromising, but with an undercurrent of mystery and luxury. There’s an overpowering blast of dry, woody smoke off the top that’s a little acrid but also resinous, warm, sweet, and almost savoury—it could be gunpowder and burning buildings, but it has a touch of campfire and bbq, perhaps from the aromatic elemi, angelica, and juniper, which come close to suggesting grilled meat when combined with the flinty and fleshy smells of leather, birch tar, and cade oil. (Speaking of which, the official pyramid on this perfume seems frankly misleading—how can Lyn Harris possibly be wringing all this leather and smoke out of the five listed notes here: Elemi, Angelica, Papyrus, Juniper, and Cedarwood?) Moreover, once the ashy haze starts to clear, the warm, clean sweetness of a refined liturgical incense starts to emerge (I would swear it’s olibanum) and the leathery aroma starts to feel more like the bindings of antique books or the upholstery of polished mahogany furniture. The papyrus note begins to suggests the faintly musty, tobacco-ish sweetness of aging pages. All of a sudden, you find that you’re watching the street battle at a remove, from behind the sheltering walls of an elegant monastic library. At this point, Revolution starts to feel quite similar to another Trudon fragrance, Yann Vasnier’s Mortel, which is a delicious but much more straightforward Catholic-church incense. I’m quite divided in my opinion about Revolution. On the one hand, I find the opening excessive—I really don’t want such intense smokiness, even though I find the experience of it quite intoxicating. It’s a good perfume to apply 30 minutes before you plan to be anywhere, but even in the more tranquil drydown, a touch of the ashy charcoal turmoil persists. Mortel comes close to giving you just the drydown phase of Revolution, but it lacks the mixed threat and thrill of burning and the leathery-papery suggestion of books. Both are very good, and Revolution is a seriously impressive fragrance even if I’m not sure I could wear it often.

After sampling (and loving) a few scents from Perfumer H, I‘ve become increasingly fixated on the talents of Lyn Harris (I’ve also ordered some of the scents she produced for Trudon), but I had yet to try any of the offerings from the house that she previously founded (and then sold), Miller Harris. L’Air de Rien came freighted with praise so lavish that it attained a nearly mythic status in my mind before I was able to smell it, not least because it ranked highly in some lists of fragrances that evoke old books, and I’m eagerly searching for the perfect library/bookstore scent. This wasn’t easy to get, either—I had to prevail upon a stateside relative to procure this vial for me (so many eBay sellers won’t ship to Canada!). All this to say that expectations were high. My first sniff was a mix of thrill and disappointment: it’s a ravishing, beautiful smell, and the press and marketing don’t lie—it really does feel as intimate as a lover’s embrace, with a mix of sensuality and private quietude. It smells like skin and hair (not sweat or body odour, just the natural sweetness of a person), a tiny bit spicy, with an ever-so-slight warm, vanillic mustiness, as of slept-in sheets, a dusty room, or—yes—a stack of old books. Imagine an afternoon tryst in a sun-dappled attic full of chests of leather-bound volumes and antique furniture draped in sheets. The description of "watching dust dance in the light as you lay entwined” is amazingly accurate and feels like a remarkable avhievement: such a subtle and specific thing to evoke. The idea that this was composed for Jane Birkin (in 2006, when she would have been 60) also lends this perfume an aura that’s quite different from the Perfumer H signature, which is decidely British: minimalist, sober, artfully serious. L’Air de Rien is warm and languorous, sexy, chic, and graceful. It smells like what I imagined Musc Ravageur would be like, before I tried it (and didn’t like it). So all that accounts for the thrill. Whats the disappointment, then? The thing is, on the first spritz, I thought, “Oh, I love it, but this isn’t for me.” First off, I feel like it leans a bit more feminine than I want, but more importantly, it immediately made me feel guilty. It’s absurd to say, but it smells so much like the physical presence of a person, and not my own body. It also isn’t the familiar smell of my girlfriend, so it gives me the overwhelming sensation of having been intimate with someone else. It’s as if I expect to be accused: “Where have you been? Who were you with?” I protest: “I was just at the library! I mean, the bookstore!” "A likely story!"

I love green fragrances and I’ve sampled quite a few now, but this one hits a real sweet spot: it’s a woody, bitter, herbal greenness that’s distinctly masculine in a vintage way. I love the presentation of wormwood here: it adds a thrilling nervous energy to the aromatic bay leaf, sage, and clove notes, like a poisonous snake slithering through undergrowth. The pine notes also blend seamlessly into the musky, leathery base, conjuring a foggy forest, not a Christmas tree. The geranium and jasmine are a surprise, as is the fact that this fragrance is so green without having any galbanum or vetiver. It feels surprisingly light and agile—effervescent, even—but it also has impressive duration and sillage. Many people have described this as a modernized version of Caron’s classic Yatagan, which I haven’t smelled, though I gather that it’s more animalic (I suspect it might lean a little too overtly masc for my taste, though I’m very curious about it). Of all the scents I’ve sniffed by Antoine Maisondieu, this is easily my favourite. I wish it wasn't discontinued! Hopefully my decanted sample lasts me until I can find a vintage bottle—or better yet, maybe ELdO will bring it back?

The overall profile of Hermann is deeply up my alley: damp earth with green elements (galbanum, black currant, vetiver), an unusual rose oil, incense, and a mysterious sheer, glassy, watery quality that’s obviously synthetic and hard to describe. Like a lot of ELdO scents, it’s challenging and paradoxical: it smells simultaneously very natural, even dirty (wet soil, decaying leaves, crushed and wilted rose petals) and like a strong “fresh”-scented soap (Ivory or Irish Spring). The rain accord reminds me strongly of the patchouli-heavy mirrored wateriness of Le Labo's Baie 19 (which I love), though without the juniper, and also of Perfumer H’s Rain Wood (and even a little bit of their Ink, since Lyn Harris loves to lace a touch of rose into her green and woody fragrances). Jorum’s Rose Highland is a similarly sharp, salty rose—herbal, rocky, marine, very masculine and redolent of chilly wind and cliffside herbs. And Aesop’s Rozu, which is supposed to embody the whole life cycle of the rose, from soil to bloom to decay, is probably the closest analogue I can think of. But Aesop, Jorum, and Perfumer H all feel very natural and organic and Hermann is much weirder, using synthetics (like Pepperwood and Geosmin) in a deliberately provocative way; rather than evoking mystery through meditative quietude, it achieves mystery by confusing your senses. (I think Baie 19 does something similar, though it’s more restrained). There are facets of this that I find really off-putting—I think one of them might be the aquatic Calypsone note, though I’ve never smelled that chemical before, so who knows—but I find 80% of the scent intoxicating. It feels polarizing to me, partly because it’s also pretty strong and definitely projects, but it also perfectly hits a mood that I love: shadowy, poetic, and enigmatic, green and earthy combined with sheer and ghostly. It’s both melancholy and mischievous. At the end of the day, I think I prefer a more natural, subdued version of this, but I appreciate that Hermann provides a thrill (and it has great longevity). Will definitely be getting use out of my sample.

Sugi has an incredibly beautiful, elegant opening of cypress, pepper, and iris. It almost sparkles! I love what the subtle floral does to the clean, refined woody notes, and the pepper gives it just a little kick without being as intense as many other peppery CDG top notes (Blackpepper especially). The cypress shifts into cedar and the iris sticks around for the heart notes as the pine starts to creep in, but—as most of the other commenters here note—the longevity on this fragrance is truly weak. You get to enjoy just a couple minutes of top notes, maybe an hour of the lovely iris+cedar heart notes, if that, and then it virtually disappears, leaving just a touch of pencil-shaving cedar and the faintest hints of pine and vetiver. By the second hour, you'll be lucky to still detect anything at all, which is really a shame, because I would otherwise say that it's my favourite of the CDG x Monocle line.