I’m going against the tide here, but I believe AP embodies the Beaufort style perfectly—if you know how to dissect it and move beyond the usual warlike, murky, and violent tropes. The fragrance is supremely elegant: dusty, hazy, somber, spectral. For me—and as the guys at Profumo Inchiostro also pointed out—it succeeds precisely because it so faithfully evokes the idea of a ghost.
If its siblings are detonations, AP is the silence between the notes: the Beaufort pause where a background scent lingers, unsettling and familiar to many of the London house’s base accords. There’s an accord reminiscent of Iron Duke, nods to Acrasia, the faintest hints of gunpowder from Rake & Ruin and Tonnerre, decaying and powdery florals that recall Fathom, and a narcotic undertone that echoes Vi et Armis. After the first hour, there is even a trace of Coeur de Noir’s signature boozy vanilla.
Like a spectre, AP doesn’t reveal itself to everyone—hence the supposed absence, which many read as a lack of presence and found disappointing. And yet, it’s by listening to silence that something emerges. AP is Beaufort at rest in an abandoned manor, where the ticking of old stories occasionally resurfaces.
Haunting, melancholic, ethereal.
Its trail is faint, its presence fleeting; perfect for those moments
when the wearer wishes not to speak,
but only to whisper.
