5
Helpful Review
Purity of Purpose with Some Cautions
Bottom Line -
Declaration d'un Soir is a real break from the original Declaration, featuring an almost Rose soliflore structure this time around. A dark, silky Rose dominates the scent from top to bottom. The masculine categorization is just wrong, honestly; it's at a minimum unisex - and I'd argue feminine-leaning. It's beautiful taken in the right context, but has limited wearability for men. Buyer beware, and test before purchasing.
It earns moderately-high marks for purity of purpose, but comes with some cautions.
Scent -
The opening has a strong, dark Rose with a bit of generic spice as window-dressing. Within the first few minutes, the super-robust Rose all but pushes every other note aside to assert itself. The mids are essentially the same, all Rose. I know there's supposed to be pepper and nutmeg along the way, but I can't uniquely identify those notes under the heavy Rose blanket. The base introduces a meek sandalwood, which seems creamy and nice but very understated.
If you love your Rose dark, strong and in a featured position, Declaration d'un Soir is a worthy candidate. If you are looking for a more complex or balanced Rose-centric frag, this may not meet your requirements. See Other Notes below for potential alternatives.
Wear Performance -
The top notes are a bit strong, but not quite off-putting, just don't spray immediately before walking into the office. The combination of STRONG and ROSE might make you the talk of the office over lunch, but maybe not in the best way. After 10 minutes to settle though, projection and sillage are moderate to strong for a couple of hours, pulling back to a skin scent for the rest of the ride. Total longevity seems to be in the 8+hr range. It's a realistic all-day or all-night option. There's not much development, to my nose, until the very end when the basenotes make a vague appearance.
Wear Scenarios -
This is where this frag becomes tricky, and "personal satisfaction" becomes a very central measure. As usual, if you just love it, then figure out a way to wear it. However, short of that I would recommend cool days, cool nights, for up-scale dress occasions and pretty much no other times.
As this scent comes across as a bit strong and formal, I'd prefer to dress it up, rather than wearing this over jeans & t-shirt for the movies. I would both caution and encourage this one as a date fragrance. To elaborate:
From the man's perspective, I could see certain women really appreciating this as a nice Rose and lapping this up; maybe asking to borrow it. The moderate projection also works well for close-quarters enjoyment.
There's a very real possibility though that other ladies may find this a little less than masculine (not unfairly so), and discourage it's wear on future dates.
From the ladies' perspective, this should wear beautifully on feminine skin, as it really is a nice Rose and I know that I personally am looking forward to asking the GF to try it soon.
I am actually wearing this at work today, and while I'm totally enjoying the aroma in my office, I'm having second thoughts about wearing this in any closed-door meetings. Possibly an unpopular choice for conservative workplaces.
This cologne is in my opinion, as a man, more for personal enjoyment and was obviously not conceived as a general-purpose crowd-pleaser, so I think the key phrase here is "pick your spots". Maybe not to the extreme of Black Afgano, but approaching that.
Other Notes -
From the reviews I'd read, and the note breakdown, I would've expected this to be much closer to Le Labo Rose 31 - a spicy Rose. But to my nose, this is much closer to a pure Rose scent. It's a bit pricey at rack prices for a pretty common designer fragrance: $80 for 50ml or $105 for 100ml.
Other worthy competitors in this space that I've smelled, and do this at least as well, would include: Rose 31, Rose Anonyme, Lumiere Noire, Noire de Noire.
Declaration d'un Soir is a real break from the original Declaration, featuring an almost Rose soliflore structure this time around. A dark, silky Rose dominates the scent from top to bottom. The masculine categorization is just wrong, honestly; it's at a minimum unisex - and I'd argue feminine-leaning. It's beautiful taken in the right context, but has limited wearability for men. Buyer beware, and test before purchasing.
It earns moderately-high marks for purity of purpose, but comes with some cautions.
Scent -
The opening has a strong, dark Rose with a bit of generic spice as window-dressing. Within the first few minutes, the super-robust Rose all but pushes every other note aside to assert itself. The mids are essentially the same, all Rose. I know there's supposed to be pepper and nutmeg along the way, but I can't uniquely identify those notes under the heavy Rose blanket. The base introduces a meek sandalwood, which seems creamy and nice but very understated.
If you love your Rose dark, strong and in a featured position, Declaration d'un Soir is a worthy candidate. If you are looking for a more complex or balanced Rose-centric frag, this may not meet your requirements. See Other Notes below for potential alternatives.
Wear Performance -
The top notes are a bit strong, but not quite off-putting, just don't spray immediately before walking into the office. The combination of STRONG and ROSE might make you the talk of the office over lunch, but maybe not in the best way. After 10 minutes to settle though, projection and sillage are moderate to strong for a couple of hours, pulling back to a skin scent for the rest of the ride. Total longevity seems to be in the 8+hr range. It's a realistic all-day or all-night option. There's not much development, to my nose, until the very end when the basenotes make a vague appearance.
Wear Scenarios -
This is where this frag becomes tricky, and "personal satisfaction" becomes a very central measure. As usual, if you just love it, then figure out a way to wear it. However, short of that I would recommend cool days, cool nights, for up-scale dress occasions and pretty much no other times.
As this scent comes across as a bit strong and formal, I'd prefer to dress it up, rather than wearing this over jeans & t-shirt for the movies. I would both caution and encourage this one as a date fragrance. To elaborate:
From the man's perspective, I could see certain women really appreciating this as a nice Rose and lapping this up; maybe asking to borrow it. The moderate projection also works well for close-quarters enjoyment.
There's a very real possibility though that other ladies may find this a little less than masculine (not unfairly so), and discourage it's wear on future dates.
From the ladies' perspective, this should wear beautifully on feminine skin, as it really is a nice Rose and I know that I personally am looking forward to asking the GF to try it soon.
I am actually wearing this at work today, and while I'm totally enjoying the aroma in my office, I'm having second thoughts about wearing this in any closed-door meetings. Possibly an unpopular choice for conservative workplaces.
This cologne is in my opinion, as a man, more for personal enjoyment and was obviously not conceived as a general-purpose crowd-pleaser, so I think the key phrase here is "pick your spots". Maybe not to the extreme of Black Afgano, but approaching that.
Other Notes -
From the reviews I'd read, and the note breakdown, I would've expected this to be much closer to Le Labo Rose 31 - a spicy Rose. But to my nose, this is much closer to a pure Rose scent. It's a bit pricey at rack prices for a pretty common designer fragrance: $80 for 50ml or $105 for 100ml.
Other worthy competitors in this space that I've smelled, and do this at least as well, would include: Rose 31, Rose Anonyme, Lumiere Noire, Noire de Noire.
1 Comment
JManDave
