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Notes05/08/2014
ScentFan
332 Reviews
ScentFan
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7
Luxurious Persian
One day I read about the Persian menswear designer, Bijan Pakzad, and that he'd created a line of prize-winning fragrances. I shot an email to the company. Do you make samples available? (Sometimes this results in freebies). Shortly I received a polite no. Then one day I was engaging in what has become a favorite pastime -- browsing the online discount perfume sites. How surprised I was to find Bijans on sale for less than twenty dollars, given the image I'd formed of the perfumes in my mind.
Two have arrived, including this one, and another is on the way. I tried it with great curiosity. Would Bijan, like his Persian forbear Al-Kindi, credited with founding the modern perfume industry, recreate anything akin to the fabled magic of ghaliya, for instance. Both that and this perfume have amber in the base. I'm thinking Bijan must have studied Al-Kind's "Book of the Chemistry of Perfume and Distillations," because this is a beautiful scent, never mind that I'm already partial to bergamot, jasmine, amber and patchouli. The citrus and red currant top note is crisply seductive. I had to pull out my notes kit and sniff a lotus sample to appreciate how well this musty floral combines with Jasmine in the heart. And the base just thrums, like a base should, IMO.
This is way more than a skin scent, yet the fragrance doesn't shout like these ingredients could. In terms of beauty, it falls short of the greats, like BaV, L'Heure Bleue, etc. Yet it's a perfume that's a credit to its heritage, as I suspect the others are. [Search on the name Al-Kindi or his book to find Prince Charles's 1993 speech about the contributions of the Islamic world, including in perfumery). The elegant Bijan probably wanted to create fragrances that were beautiful without offending, accustomed as he was to being in elegant crowds. I wish Wicked were a tad stronger, but I know I'll return to it again and again.
Two have arrived, including this one, and another is on the way. I tried it with great curiosity. Would Bijan, like his Persian forbear Al-Kindi, credited with founding the modern perfume industry, recreate anything akin to the fabled magic of ghaliya, for instance. Both that and this perfume have amber in the base. I'm thinking Bijan must have studied Al-Kind's "Book of the Chemistry of Perfume and Distillations," because this is a beautiful scent, never mind that I'm already partial to bergamot, jasmine, amber and patchouli. The citrus and red currant top note is crisply seductive. I had to pull out my notes kit and sniff a lotus sample to appreciate how well this musty floral combines with Jasmine in the heart. And the base just thrums, like a base should, IMO.
This is way more than a skin scent, yet the fragrance doesn't shout like these ingredients could. In terms of beauty, it falls short of the greats, like BaV, L'Heure Bleue, etc. Yet it's a perfume that's a credit to its heritage, as I suspect the others are. [Search on the name Al-Kindi or his book to find Prince Charles's 1993 speech about the contributions of the Islamic world, including in perfumery). The elegant Bijan probably wanted to create fragrances that were beautiful without offending, accustomed as he was to being in elegant crowds. I wish Wicked were a tad stronger, but I know I'll return to it again and again.
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