Just digging through what seems to be the hundreds of untouched samples. This is the first thing I grabbed…
WHAT I SMELL: Alien opens with a cashmere woody musk and cotton candy sweetened jasmine. It’s slightly fuzzy and kind of sticky and it feels as if it’s sitting on a layer of gauze. Very quickly I want it to tone down its sugar as the opening is just too sweet and in your face. After around 10 minutes, the fragrance still remains sweet, but the perfume loses some of the candied aspect, but what I get most of all of this clean musk dryer sheet. Is is bad? No, but it’s not great either. Does it morph much past this? Unfortunately not, there’s just lots of jasmine and woody musk. The only thing that seems to be alien about the fragrance is that it’s taking over my body. A couple of spritzes and it keeps growing and growing; enough to cake the back of my throat and burn my eyes. Help!
BOTTOM LINE: I am not the target market for Alien which harkens back to the perfumes of the 1980s where young girls would blot the local mall landscape with big hair and big perfumes. I don’t think that mall rats still exist in today’s culture, but if you’re wearing this there will be no mistaking your coming or going. As we used to say in the 80s, “just say NO.”
Bone Rating: 2.5 out of possible 5 bones
Scent: Oriental Woody
Nose: Dominique Ropion and Laurent Bruyere
Classification: Feminine
Expense: Varied. Review based on the Eau de Parfum version.
INTOXICATED – WHAT I SMELL: Intoxicatedopens with a boozy burnt coffee note that is sweet, yet flattened. It feels like it’s been sprinkled with dry nutmeg and it has a rather marshmallow thickness consistency about it. It makes me want to fire up my espresso machine, because this would make for a nice after dinner drink to go with a hot cup of coffee. As Intoxicated starts to develop, it becomes a bit nuttier, richer and it begins to rise and jump off the skin, growing with projection each minute. There’s a nice herbal quality that rests like a haze on top the layered fragrance and a bit of sweet and light caramel emerges giving it more dimension. As time progresses, the light booziness retreats, but the roasted coffee and nuttiness remains. After around a half and hour, a light vetiver appears, bringing just a bit of sharpness into the mix. As it keeps developing, it turns from the gourmand to a more woody creation. But the great thing about the by Kilian fragrances is that they are so supremely finished and silky smooth so that the different variations in the fragrance make the notes hard to define and pin down.
WHAT IT SMELLS LIKE TO ME: The most luxurious S’more with a lightly sweet refined cocoa’d chocolate with the finest of graham crackers. And when you’ve finished eating the lovely concoction, the warm, sweet and fired remains of the treat linger in the air.
THREE ADJECTIVES THAT DESCRIBE INTOXICATED: smooth, delicious, suave
LIGHT MY FIRE – WHAT I SMELL: Light My Fire opens with this dry hay like tobacco and honey. Quickly, a cumin notes comes in along with the patchouli. It’s dry and a bit sour. The honey isn’t thick, but more like a dried and crackled glaze over the hay. It’s rather comforting to me, as it’s a bit dusty too…as if the perfume has been stored in an old barn. Along with the honey, there seems to creep out a bit of a brown sugar note. There’s a tender sweetness about the fragrance that’s very muted which I find quite nice and heart-warming. After around 10 minutes, a putty note appears giving Light My Fire a bit of thickness. At this point, the initial hay that brought in the dryness begins to be filled instead with a more woody note which isn’t quite as devoid of moisture, but it’s still rather dry. Light My Fire doesn’t transform all that much, but it’s such a nice and relaxing fragrance, the kind that’s good for soothing one’s soul. Don’t get me wrong though, as relaxing as this is, there is still some power and projection behind it.
Light My Fire Notes: cumin, hay, patchouli, vetiver, honey, vanilla and tobacco
Late Day, Late Summer – Jan Schmuckal
WHAT IT SMELLS LIKE TO ME: A late summer day, where the ground is rather dry as you lay under a big tree while the sun streams all around you.
THREE ADJECTIVES THAT DESCRIBE LIGHT MY FIRE: peaceful, contented, contemplative
SMOKE FOR THE SOUL – WHAT I SMELL: Smoke for the Soul opens big with this warmed eucalyptus topped by a nutty tobacco. It’s quite thick and a bit chewy and somewhat burnt around the edges. After a bit, it begins to dry and it becomes more burnt, like the sticks of wood are actually firing up on your skin. A birch note begins to appear almost as if the already flaky bark is falling off of the perfume exposing a more sharpened cannabis note that’s quite pungent and sour. The fragrance then dries out and becomes pure wood. However, the wood continues its slow burn with a slight smoky and sharp finish sitting above a vetiver base.
Smoke for the Soul Notes: eucalyptus, grapefruit, tobacco, mate, birch, cashmirwood, cannabis and cardamom
burnt twigs
WHAT IT SMELLS LIKE TO ME: burnt twigs
THREE ADJECTIVES THAT DESCRIBE SMOKE FOR THE SOUL: crackling, aromatic, burnt
BOTTOM LINE: With the by Kilian name, you’re getting luxury not only in a scent, but also in the packaging. This new collection is no exception as each perfume comes in a case designed to look like a luxurious cigar holder. Intoxicated and Light my Fire are really smooth, refined and perfectly finished and live up to the by Kilian brand. Smoke for the Soul plays “which one of these is not like the others” with the other two. It’s nice, but it just doesn’t feel like it fits into the mix. In any case, overall, a very nice collection.
Expense: $270 for 50ml Eau de Parfum (each sold separately)
WHAT I SMELL: Cristina’s note are all there upon opening…sweet creamy vanilla, labdanum and patchouli. The fragrance feels as if it’s a big juicy gourmand cake that’s all thick and rich. Very quickly, an incense is added to the mix along with a resinous spice. After the initial cake like opening, Cristina becomes hazy, smoky, spicy and somehow familiar, yet different. As it begins to drydown, the fragrance becomes dryer and more earthy. And after around 30 minutes a salty accord adds a rather sweaty and natural component which makes it feel more real. In the end, the fragrance becomes woody and dry, with the incense just hovering above the labdanum. The development overall is not complex, but it feels like a fragrance that has a story to tell. The only real downside to Cristina is the longevity; after around an hour, it pretty much becomes a very light skin scent.
Cristina Notes: patchouli, labdanum, vanilla
WHAT IT SMELLS LIKE TO ME: Sophia Loren in 1960’s Two Woman (La Ciociara). Her heartbreaking Academy Award winning performance about a woman and her daughter in war-torn Italy in WWII supports this earthy, worn, smoky and haunting perfume.
THREE ADJECTIVES THAT DESCRIBE CRISTINA: ominous, storied, melancholy
BOTTOM LINE: I was always curious about the Hilde Soliano line, especially the Gli Invisibili series depicting a female saint on a cross with an angel kneeling by her side which is bizarrely and intriguingly different from a branding standpoint. Overall this is good, but is similar to two Maria Candida Gentile perfumes, Exultat and Sideris which I believe are executed a little better with more longevity and projection.
WHAT IT SMELLS LIKE TO ME: pretty dryer sheets
The Scented Hound 