Arabesque

Arabesque by Alkemia
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7.9 / 10 31 Ratings
A popular perfume by Alkemia for women and men. The release year is unknown. The scent is woody-oriental. It is still in production.
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Main accords

Woody
Oriental
Spicy
Resinous
Sweet

Fragrance Notes

BenzoinBenzoin CassiaCassia Arabian sandalwoodArabian sandalwood Mysore sandalwoodMysore sandalwood KyphiKyphi SpikenardSpikenard Orris rootOrris root
Ratings
Scent
7.931 Ratings
Longevity
7.125 Ratings
Sillage
6.025 Ratings
Bottle
5.217 Ratings
Submitted by Pipette, last update on 05/23/2025.

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Reviews

2 in-depth fragrance descriptions
ClaireV

731 Reviews
ClaireV
ClaireV
1  
Sparkling sugar dust floriental - not sandalwood
Despite the initial blast of clean, terpenic wood, Arabesque is not an especially sandalwood-forward blend. After the blond woodiness of the topnotes fades, it develops into a powdery benzoin-driven amber with the glitter of iris and lemon sugar on top. This is Alkemia’s most popular blend, and I can see why. It is sweet, sparkling, and soapy – a freshly powdered Siamese kitten in scent form.

But it is not sandalwood. Instead, it is the interaction between the iris (dusty, silvery) and the benzoin (vanillic, lemony, cinnamon-spicy) that really drives this car. Kyphi, the ancient Egyptian version of barkhour – compressed incense blocks of powdered sandalwood, resins, and aromatics – contributes a vaguely gummy, incensey sweetness that underpins the benzoin and iris.

It is a lovely perfume. But the whole ‘aged Arabian sandalwood’ backstory makes my palms itch. Arabian sandalwood, aged or otherwise, does not exist because sandalwood trees do not grow in the Middle East. There are, of course, Arabian sandalwood perfume oils. These are largely cheap sandalwood synthetics mixed with other oils to achieve a certain ‘Arabian’-flavored exoticism. Although most of the fragrance world is driven by fantasy and make-believe, indie companies like Alkemia and Nava – another serial offender – really ought to stop flogging the idea of exclusivity or rarity in connection to materials bought off the rack at The Perfumer’s Apprentice. Of course, as consumers, we should also try harder not to fall quite so hard or so fast for marketing guff like this. Given the current cost and rarity of real Mysore sandalwood oil, we should all assume that a blend costing about twenty dollars for fifteen milliliters will not contain any of it.

And to be fair, for Alkemia, and most of the American indie oil sector, sandalwood is more a fantasy of a precious raw material than the precious raw material itself. Which, by the way, is fine. It is the premise of the World Wrestling Entertainment, i.e., if we are all willingly involved in the suspension of disbelief, then nobody gets hurt. But sprinkling the word ‘Mysore sandalwood’ in the notes list willy nilly like that? Quit your bullshit, Jan.

Rant aside, Arabesque is a thoroughly loveable perfume oil and will please fans of soft spicy-ambery scents that purr rather than roar. It shares some ground with Iris Oriental (Parfumerie Generale), Fleur Oriental (Miller Harris), and even Sideris (Maria Candida Gentile), albeit far simpler than any of these.
0 Comments
6
Bottle
6
Sillage
7
Longevity
8
Scent
Floyd

361 Reviews
Translated Show original Show translation
Floyd
Floyd
Top Review 24  
Arabesque alchemical Kyphi
Excrement from lions, crocodiles and swallows? Plutarch sat shaking his head in his small scriptorium in the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, desperately trying to remember the numerous ingredients of kyphi. By Zeus, perhaps he should start taking notes after all, he really wasn't getting any younger. Four parts incense, or was it three? Two parts each of benzoin, mastic and myrrh, one part galangal or ginger, one part cedar? Or was it sandalwood? Plutarch rubbed the sweat from his forehead into his eyes and everything around him smudged and blurred. He rowed helplessly in the streaks and veils, cried feverishly, flailing for his wife Timoxena, devastated violas of oils and shells of woods and resins which he had lined up in front of him on the desk to prepare the incense. Confused and desperate, his face finally sank into the hazy vapours of the scents.
There was first this dark mass, sandalwood creamy and sweet medicinal, the woods of warm and noble origin, benzoin procured like resinous honey, in which a cinnamon oil began to draw, still indistinctly cocoa liquor.
Fascinated by the forms of herbsweet heaviness, the textures of opaque density, Plutarch revelled between inner contemplation and ancient Egyptian history, while the harsh nuances of the nard slowly permeated the black shimmering cream with earth and balsamic incense, mastic and myrrh meander in the house of Apollo. Then the mist painted ornaments of cinnamon oil and smoky chocolate, tart honey and earthy nard, red resinous sandal cream, black benzoin, for six seven hours in the temple of Delphi, Arabesque alchemical Kyphi.

(With thanks to Gschpusi)
18 Comments

Statements

2 short views on the fragrance
krdentkrdent 2 months ago
Distinctly femme to me. Woody and creamy but somehow just as sweet as the rest of the house
0 Comments
RedrotRedrot 5 months ago
4
Sillage
8
Scent
warm, mellow skin scent with a faint undergirding of fir, dries to a sugared finish. shines in its simplicity, like a clean sunlit room.
0 Comments

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