Posted by Kevin
on
25 March 2009
The word “oud” — when relating to perfume — always makes me think of…MONTALE. Montale has won the oud wars in the West by creating more oud-centered fragrances than any company in sight (or smell). When I heard that Le Labo was releasing an oud perfume, I thought: “Poor Le Labo — you haven’t a chance!”
Le Labo launches Oud 27 this month; it’s Le Labo’s first global launch since 2006. (Oud 27 will not be associated with one city — you can buy it at all Le Labo boutiques.) Le Labo divulges only a few components of Oud 27: incense, cedar, patchouli, saffron, gaiac wood and oud…
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Posted by Robin
on
17 February 2009
Tom Ford launched the Private Blend Collection in 2007. There were 12 of them (now there are more). They were (and still are, of course) expensive; they were in very limited distribution (that has eased somewhat). I smelled four of them on blotters (a friend had small lab samples) before they were launched, didn't love any of them, and promptly decided, for the sake of my sanity (there were already over 800 fragrance releases that year), to ignore the collection entirely. Kevin apparently decided the same (are we cranky, or what?) but he eventually fell to temptation (see his review of Purple Patchouli), and passed a set of samples on to me, and I've been working my way through them slowly. My favorite so far: Oud Wood.
Tom Ford, of course, has already done oud (aka oudh aka agarwood aka aloeswood), with M7, created under his direction for Yves Saint Laurent and introduced in 2002. You might expect Oud Wood to be the edgy, niche house version of M7, but that would be hard to pull off seeing as how M7 was already pretty darned edgy…
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Posted by Kevin
on
18 June 2008
I love the richness and unabashed potency of Middle Eastern and Indian fragrances. One of my first ‘exotic’ fragrance purchases was a tiny jar of waxy sandalwood-amber paste from India; a few dabs of that dense perfume paste on my collar bone scented me all day long. The perfume paste also came in the scents of orange blossom, rose, lotus and jasmine, and the entire line was advertised using the image of a turbaned man applying the perfume paste to his throat. Slowly and, unfortunately, turban-less, I ventured into floral territory with my fragrance purchases. The simple, inexpensive Indian perfumes opened up a new world to me: I started reading about the history of perfumery, I created “to-smell lists” of individual plant and animal perfume notes, and I started burning incense and wearing fragrances from India, Nepal, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Morocco. Both Montale Red Aoud and Agallocha Tedallal Homme were inspired by Middle Eastern perfumery…
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Posted by Robin
on
15 June 2007
I had originally meant to include White Aoud in yesterday's review of Black Aoud, but ran out of time. Today's post is thus something of a postscript, and if you aren't already familiar with Montale's oudh line, you might want to start by reading the Black Aoud review. White Aoud features notes of rose, saffron, oudh, cardamom, jasmine, patchouli, sandalwood, precious wood, amber, vetiver, vanilla and labdanum.
White Aoud starts out sweet. It probably only counts as very sweet in comparison to the bone-dry Black Aoud, but still, the sweetness masks most of the medicinal notes in the opening…
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Posted by Robin
on
14 June 2007
I love deep wood fragrances, the deeper the better. I’m trying to think of a fragrance with too much wood for my taste, and probably one exists but offhand I can’t think of what it would be. You can pile on the cedar or the redwoods or the sandalwood: bring it on, I’m happy. Few woods are deeper and richer than agarwood (aka aloeswood, and sometimes called oudh). Agarwood is now threatened in the wild due to overharvesting, and scarcity and high prices mean that much of the “oudh” used in incense and perfumery today is synthetic or adulterated to one degree or another.
The French niche line Montale specializes in oudh perfumes, and their Aoud Roses Petals is a favorite of mine. Aoud Roses Petals is a study in contrasts — a light, dewy rose brightens deeper wood notes of agarwood, teak and cedar. It is rich and spicy but not at all overwhelming, and the later dry down is beautifully soft and enveloping.
Black Aoud also features rose and oudh, but the notes are handled quite differently here. As with many agarwood perfumes, a bitter medicinal haze (rather like medicated bandages) seems to float over the top notes; here, the medicinal notes are joined by heavy leather. Unless you adore leather, and the more of it the better, you may find that the first 10 minutes are rather hard to take. The blend softens considerably as the opening notes dissipate and are joined by sandalwood and rose. In keeping with the general noir atmosphere, the rose here is a dark, murky rose, nothing at all like the fresh, rosewater-ish rose of Aoud Roses Petals…
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