Chanel Egoiste - An Ode to Damask Rose and Sandalwood
My Dad uses Platinum Egoiste, ( might even be his signature scent ) and it smells really nice, keeping that in mind I decided to blind buy this fragrance. All I can say is that for a fragrance released in 1990, it really impressed me.
As I sprayed this on me, I instantly realized that this fragrance is vaguely familiar, I might have smelled this somewhere on someone, can't put my finger on it, but the smell then was more bitter, sharp and rough.
The Egoiste in question here is a much more toned down, heavily reformulated, sweeter version of what once was a much more sharper scent.
Chanel's Egoiste was the brainwave of Jacques Polge who was the head perfumer at the House of Chanel, the story goes like this.
Polge was researching Chanel's archives to design a perfume and came across the formula used by Ernest Beaux ( creator of Chanel no. 5 ), which utilized a high content of Sandalwood, and hence ended up inventing Bois Noir which was a completely new diversion from the fougere fragrances Chanel was used to launching. This diversion was however short lived and disappeared a year after its launch.
In 1990, Polge decided to renovate Bois Noir and launched Egoiste to a much wider and accepting audience. The fragrance was an instant hit in Europe, however, it was a major let down in the United States, and was later revamped and sold as Platinum Egoiste.
Polge still names this as his best work at Chanel, after years of churning out one hit after another. Mentioned below is the review:
Bottle design ( 6.5 / 10 ) - The bottle is toned down and simplistic at best, with a sleek black top, having the Chanel logo engraved on it. The transparent rectangular bottle with the intense Chanel name doesn't do much to imprint an image on our creative side.
Scent ( 8.5 / 10 ) - This is a spicy/woody/oriental scent, there is no denying it. It opens with a burst of mandarin and Damask rose on me, and I really admire the ingenious mix of the two elements, especially the Rose.
Damask rose really reminds me of its more common variants such as rose oil and rose essence, but Polge brilliantly keeps the delicate balance alive through the spicy element of Cinnamon, which has a sneaking presence in the scent.
Besides Damask rose the other prevalent element is definitely Sandalwood, in its most purest form, at once recalling Polge's homage to Ernest Beaux.
Sandalwood in this fragrance is the most enduring element, sort of like the patriarch of other notes according to me, followed by the Damask rose.
As per fragrance websites, there is also the presence of vanilla and ambrette seeds, which gives it a more gourmand edge, however, my nose cannot sniff that.
Earlier versions also had Tobacco, however Chanel's official website no longer includes it in its list of notes.
The Rose/Sandalwood mix ultimately lends this fragrance its oriental touch. All in all the scent is much more sweet than what I remember.
Longevity ( 8 / 10 ) - The perfume lasts on my skin for a good 6+ hours, however after the 2-3 hour point, it lingers more closely to the skin, maybe it is due to the heavy reformulation the perfume was subjected to years after its release. Overall the performance is strictly good.
In summary, the fragrance still retains some of its old style sophistication and a mature man's conservativeness, without being an olfactory hazard. But when all is said and done, I can't help but say, the way B.B. King summed it up, " Baby the thrill is gone".
