Posted by Angela
on
20 June 2011
A long time ago, a friend who was a painter gave me a book. I can’t tell you now what the book was about, but I remember the rich scent of his work soaked in its pages. For days, I buried my nose in the book to smell the turpentine, oil paint, and raw wood of his studio. The smell brought back the giant landscape he was working on while a cat padded over the cement floor to jump into my lap as I talked and nursed a glass of red wine. This is what I think of when I smell By Kilian Incense Oud Eau de Parfum.
Incense Oud, the third in By Kilian’s Arabian Nights series, was developed by perfumer Sidonie Lancesseur and released earlier this year. By Kilian’s website lists among its notes incense, oud, cardamom, rose, and labdanum. Probably, like many fragrances, it has something citrusy and fleeting for top notes, but I don’t smell it. And probably there’s something more complex in its body, but I don’t smell that, either.
What I do smell is a surprisingly sinuous — although definitely present — incense sweetened with sandalwood…
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Posted by Angela
on
9 May 2011
Amouage describes Opus V Eau de Parfum as a “woody and floral neoclassical masterpiece.” Sure, Opus V stars a beautiful iris and has wood, but how you feel about Amouage Opus V will likely depend on how much you like oud.
Perfumer Jacques Cavallier created Opus V. It has notes of orris, agarwood, rum, rose, jasmine, civet, and dry wood accord. According to Amouage’s PR machine, “the vision and inspiration for this fragrance is the internet and how knowledge and the art of living are shared amongst the glabal community digitally. This fragrance takes inspirations from the exploration of the tradition and classical art of sharing knowledge to how knowledge becomes fragmented in the world of artificial intelligence, and which has become an acceptable way of living nowadays.” (Whew! I bet Jean Claude Ellena is thanking his lucky stars his thematic fragrances for Hermès have to do with gardens.)
When I ponder classical art, the internet, and fragmented knowledge, I come up with the smell of fried transistors…
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Posted by Robin
on
28 April 2011
The designer Tom Ford can take credit for bringing the intense, earthy smell of oud, or agarwood, to the Western mass market, but his Oud Wood perfume simply tapped into a traditional scent used in the Middle East and Asia for thousands of years.
— From For a Coveted Resin, the Scent of Rarity Takes Hold at the New York Times. (But if Tom Ford can take credit for bringing oud to the Western mass market, surely it is because of Yves Saint Laurent M7, not the Private Blend Oud Wood).
Posted by Kevin
on
16 February 2011
Oud, or (most often) a synthetic chemical resembling its aroma, has established itself as a major fragrance note (and scent category) over the last ten years, but even with all the oud perfumes for sale, few people have smelled authentic oud. I’m guessing most perfume lovers (fanatics) no longer regard oud, or ‘Middle Eastern,’ scents as ‘exotic’ — oud perfumes are just another option in an overcrowded fragrance market. (Personally, I need a break from oud!)
The company SoOud was founded by Stéphane Humbert Lucas of Nez à Nez, who describes himself as a “painter-aesthete” who “writes and sculpts aromas.” The ‘oud’ in SoOud perfumes, if there is any oud in the formulas, is conjured by rich fragrance notes delivered in a Middle Eastern style.
Asmar, “the dusky one,” contains bergamot, white honey, carnation, roasted coffee, amber cigar, Grape marc, amber, tobacco leaf, chamois, musk and vanilla. I like the first minutes of Asmar best: a bold mix of honey and “amber cigar” (a creamy, sweet tobacco note). As the perfume develops, it becomes smoother, more gourmand…
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Posted by Robin
on
18 December 2009
2009 turns out to be the year of oudh, at least in the niche perfume sector. Let’s see, there was Pure Oudh from By Kilian, and Midnight Oud from Juliette Has A Gun. Czech & Speake relaunched Dark Rose. Le Labo contributed Oud 27, and Bond no. 9 did an oudh for Harrods and then another as their first signature scent, Bond no. 9 Perfume. Indie line Soivohle did Oudh Lacquer, and Micallef did Aoud Gourmet, and Amouage did the Epic duo. Comptoir Sud Pacifique did a quartet (Aoud de Nuit, Aouda, Nomaoud & Oud Intense), but got beat out by the 8 (!) fragrances in the Boadicea the Victorious Oud Collection. For all I know, Montale beat them all — it’s so hard to keep track of new fragrances from Montale that I’ve mostly given up trying.
Al Oudh, L’Artisan Parfumeur’s latest entry from their travels series, thus joins an already overcrowded room. That, plus the fact that perfumer Bertrand Duchaufour is working with a traditional oudh palette of Middle Eastern spices and rose (the notes: cumin, cardamom, pink pepper, neroli, rose, castoreum, civet, leather, musk, oud, sandalwood, Atlas cedar, patchouli, myrrh, incense, vanilla and tonka bean), might make you suspect in advance what turns out to be true: Al Oudh is not the most original or unusual oudh fragrance of the year.
Still, Al Oudh is a bold, very enjoyable outing…
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