Portrait of a Lady 2010 Eau de Parfum

Portrait of a Lady (Eau de Parfum) by Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle
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Ranked 8 in Women's Perfume
8.1 / 10 1334 Ratings
A popular perfume by Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle for women, released in 2010. The scent is floral-spicy. Projection and longevity are above-average. It is being marketed by Estēe Lauder Companies.
Pronunciation
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Main accords

Floral
Spicy
Woody
Oriental
Smoky

Fragrance Pyramid

Top Notes Top Notes
Turkish roseTurkish rose
Heart Notes Heart Notes
BlackcurrantBlackcurrant CloveClove RaspberryRaspberry
Base Notes Base Notes
FrankincenseFrankincense PatchouliPatchouli SandalwoodSandalwood

Perfumer

Videos
Ratings
Scent
8.11334 Ratings
Longevity
8.71131 Ratings
Sillage
8.31110 Ratings
Bottle
7.71022 Ratings
Value for money
6.7634 Ratings
Submitted by Fran, last update on 02/14/2025.

Smells similar

What the fragrance is similar to
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Portrait of a Lady Brume Cheveux
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Eau Capitale Eau de Parfum
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Radical Rose (Eau de Parfum) by Matière Première
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Chypre Sublime

Reviews

41 in-depth fragrance descriptions
7.5
Bottle
10
Sillage
10
Longevity
10
Scent
Drseid

821 Reviews
Drseid
Drseid
Top Review 14  
My Favorite Scent...
Portrait of a Lady starts with a sublime mixture of rose, incense, wood and a hint of raspberry in the background to support the rose and incense, with patchouli growing through the dry down to mix with the incense as the rose recedes. It is rather linear, but when the scent smells this good, that is a very good thing, IMO. The sillage and longevity here are absolutely spectacular (my one spray lasted well over 30 hours at near full strength and sillage on skin) and the scent smells even better from a distance. As for classification, I don't know why this is marketed as a feminine scent, as I definitely think it is unisex and if someone said it was targeted as a men's scent I would have been far from surprised.

The only drawback is the cost... I went on a top recommended fragrance testing binge in Vegas, and only put a couple favorites on skin. Portrait of a Lady won out overall, but when I came back to Barney's to make the purchase it turned out to be $210 for a 50 ml and $300 for 100 ml (now it costs even more). Ouch! I ended up still buying the 50 ml after thinking it over some more, because it really is that good and unique. Finally, as people have mentioned in other reviews, this one is potent and one spray will almost assuredly get the job done... Go easy on the trigger folks! A BIG thumbs up for this five star winner from Ropion that is my new favorite scent overall.
1 Comment
10
Sillage
10
Longevity
9
Scent
Coutureguru

223 Reviews
Coutureguru
Coutureguru
Top Review 8  
Methinks the Lady doth protest too much ...
... but as far as I'm concerned she can protest all she likes!!

WOW!!! There is a really good reason I love Dominique Ropion's work ... the man is simply a genius!! This 'portrait' is not of a demurely clad Monet-esque maiden reading innocently in a bower of trees, she's a Rubens-like scantily clad Delilah ... demanding Sampson's head on a platter after having her way with him.
Actually, I think this gal is a Drag Queen, cast in the mould of a lewd and loud Mae West :). A fragrance for a big personality, that could probably asphyxiate those within a six foot radius should the trigger not be handled gently ... just the way I like it!!
An astounding Patchouli is given a spicier twist with the accompaniment of clove in the top, the Rose here commencing as a faint floral whisper and crescendoing to a sweet, dark roar. Sandalwood and Frankincense really sing in the heart here too. Portrait of a Lady is an astoundingly modern fragrance, whilst retaining a certain 'olde-worlde' charm with it's almost irreverent power. I'm pretty sure that there is a little Oud here, even though it's not listed. It may well be a combination of the Sandalwood and Resins, but there is a similarity here to Montale's Black Aoud. There are also overtones of Ropion's Costume National Homme in the sweet and spicy nuances that this creation emanates.

Portrait of a Lady is definitely unisex in my book ... after all ... what's in a name? Definitely one to own!!
3 Comments
jtd

484 Reviews
jtd
jtd
Top Review 7  
grande dame
The rose and patchouli pairing is such a good fit that it seems like proof of fate. It’s been the basis for a range of leathery, ambery, woody and mossy perfumes spanning woody-floral, chypre and oriental genres. The Malle PR boasts that Ropion used surpassing doses of rose essence and patchouli coeur, a fractionated patchouli. Fractionated naturals are botanical materials that have been separated into their constituent parts by chemical and physical processes, especially molecular distillation, and edited to remove undesirable traits.

Around the time of Portrait’s launch more and more of these ‘tidied up’ botanicals were becoming available. Well understood materials like vetiver, cedar and patchouli saw their challenging attributes reduced or removed, leaving frictionless, blissful versions of the materials. They were sanded, polished and lacquered. Aroma materials manufacturers were pushing their hot new high-tech, stripped-down botanicals. They were an easy sell. They used a version of the best-of-all-worlds tactic to sidestep the endless botanical vs synthetic debate. They are ‘natural’ and therefore good but they have also been made better through chemistry and are therefore contemporary.

Used thoughtfully, fractionated botanicals allowed a measured, precise tailoring of olfactory effects. Unfortunately they also made their way into some simplistic compositions that smelled like ‘easy listening’ perfumes. The niche and mainstream markets of the time were top-heavy with a glut of radiant, synth-woody fragrances. Many perfume buyers had become accustomed to judging the quality of a perfume by how closely it approximated the properties of woody amber materials. These scrubbed versions of botanical materials matched the tone created by woody ambers. An entire fumie cohort was conditioned to respond to the ‘clarity’ of the new generation of fractionated botanicals.

Distillation of materials is not new to perfumery by any means. The recent emphasis on fractionating well-understood botanical aroma-materials stems from the attempt to dissect IFRA-designated toxic materials such as lavender, lemon and the notoriously virulent tea leaf and remove their noxious bits. Think of a fraction as a potent material that has undergone an exorcism.

**

Rose and patchouli have complementary facets that fit like a lock and key and have strong synergy. The camphorous chill of patchouli acts like an astringent to rose, keeping it from settling into the dull beauty that an uninspired rose perfume can have. Rose’s berry notes become wine-like and boozy when paired with patchouli. Resinous materials give rose a honeyed drawl and musk keeps the bloom on the rose. Camphor, berry notes, musk and amber are the olfactory attributes emphasized in coeur de vetiver and Ropion uses them along with incense, benzoin and god only knows what else to create the durable accords that allow Portrait of a Lady to last for days. It is classically Ropion in that rich natural materials and potent synthetics are focussed on the same goal: coherence. The perfume’s sillage and forcefulness hint at potent synthetics. Happily, though, the ear-ringing, gut-churning feeling I associate with over-reliance on particular synthetics to give radiance and endurance is nowhere to be found. Portrait of a Lady showcases Ropion’s exceptional capacity to calibrate synthetics toward specific compositional ends while avoiding their side-effects.

Since 2010 when it was released, Portrait of a Lady has come to stand toe-to-toe with an equally imposing patch-rose, Aromatics Elixir. While AE dominates the mossy/chypre side of the rose-patch hoards, The Lady has become the standard against which woody and oriental side of the rose family is compared. Rose-oud as well. It’s a perfume that begs to be described in superlatives and worn with abandon.
0 Comments
10
Longevity
7
Scent
Sherapop

1239 Reviews
Sherapop
Sherapop
Top Review 5  
The Lady is Elephantine
After the blaring, elephantesque opening of Frédéric Malle PORTRAIT OF A LADY, I was not surprised in the least to learn that the perfumer was none other than Kenzo JUNGLE L'ELEPHANT creator, Dominique Ropion!

Huge opening with a massive blast of patchouli along with incense and rose. The spices are quite a bit tamer here than in L'ELEPHANT, but this is still much more of an oriental than a floral perfume to my nose. I would compare this composition to Juliette Has a Gun VENGEANCE EXTREME, except that PORTRAIT OF A LADY is much sharper (partly due to clove?) and more declarative, even intense. They definitely occupy the same general neighborhood on the grand olfactory map. PORTRAIT OF A LADY is much closer to VENGEANCE EXTREME than to either LIPSTICK ROSE or UNE ROSE, the other two Frédéric Malle rose perfumes.

The longevity is great and the sillage big enough to make this a wear-at-home-only perfume for me. Very voluptuous and, frankly, unladylike in its brazen, almost animalic sensuality. I like it a lot, I really do. This is a no-holds-barred oriental patchouli perfume with some rose accents. Seems omnisex to me.
1 Comment
Fqjcior

10 Reviews
Fqjcior
Fqjcior
Very helpful Review 7  
Unforgettable and unmistakable
Perfumer Dominique Ropion and Frederic Malle get on with each other quite well, which can be proved by at least 5 scents from the serie Editions De Parfums: Carnal Flower, Geranium Pour Monsieur, Une Fleur de Cassie, Vetiver Extraordinaire and the most popular one among the true connoisseurs of perfumes Portrait of a Lady. Those who are more familiar with Frederic Malle’s offer know that most of Ropion’s scents are usually those graded the highest and the most marketable ones from all the others launched by this exceptional and exclusive brand.

Both gentlemen admitted that balancing Portrait of a Lady needed a lot of time and hundreds of trials. Their actions though, of which the starting point was Geranium Pour Monsieur, brought up a rose-cantered smell, which for me is undoubtedly the best I have ever tried out. Ropion combined in this smell rose essence with patchouli note, which is not that revealing after all but highly efficient and effective – as both those components get on together as any other components in perfumery. The characteristic smell of patchouli has been cleverly modified by cinnamon and frankincense in a way that it does not dominate that clearly – the lack of dominance also concerns other used here components, apart from the previously-mentioned rose. The components create a coherent oriental theme that entwines the rose essence. The base of the scent is strongly musky with some sandal wood and benzoin. The top accord, to be clear, consists of black currant and raspberry. Still, the beautiful warm and balanced rose dominates here most of the time.

Despite the name which might indicate feminine nature of the smell, the scent proves very well on man’s skin which I tested many many times. With its oriental rose nature the smell does not differ much from Cartier’s Declaration d’Un Soir , even though it is much heavier, saturated and thick in comparison to very successful scents by Mathilde Laurent. Other similar scents based on a modern connection of rose and patchouli are earlier reviewed Hippie Rose by James Heeley and Lumiere Noire Pour Homme by Francis Kurkdjian.
Portrait of a Lady is very clear, strong and lasts over 12h. The smell is perfectly constructed in its every aspect. It presents a modern way of a rose that is not that overwhelming, perfectly balanced and beautiful. It is a great smell, that gives a lot of satisfaction. I highly recommended it.
top notes: black currant, raspberry

middle notes: turkish rose, cinammon, clove, patchouli

base notes: sandalwood, ambroxan, white musk, benzoin, incense

launched in: 2010

perfumer: Dominique Ropion
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Statements

39 short views on the fragrance
BoBoChampBoBoChamp 4 years ago
8
Sillage
9
Longevity
8
Scent
Initially spicy-fruity, this slightly smoky, spicy-earthy floral fragrance settles to a dusty resinous-woody base. 100% Unisex!
0 Comments
KuraiKurai 2 years ago
7
Sillage
7
Longevity
6
Scent
Smoky, spicy, fruity, musky. Different angles on the rose coming together in a sort of dark, moody and overall mature potpourri.
0 Comments
BertolucciKBertolucciK 3 years ago
9
Bottle
8
Sillage
8
Longevity
9
Scent
Spicy and jammy sweet rose in the opening. Then, a deep ripe rose, slightly smoky, with an earthy patchouli. Ambery and woodsy in the base.
0 Comments
SharleezeSharleeze 5 years ago
This is an absolute masterpiece created by a genius. It think it will be Chanel N°5 of the 21st century.
0 Comments
HolscentbarHolscentbar 2 years ago
8
Bottle
8
Sillage
9
Longevity
8
Scent
rose and incense. woods and benzoin. 60% woman 40% man. I would say rather elegant. classic of perfumery
0 Comments
Fragaddict12Fragaddict12 3 years ago
9
Bottle
10
Sillage
10
Longevity
10
Scent
The rose to get
0 Comments
InbnkInbnk 3 years ago
8
Bottle
9
Sillage
9
Longevity
10
Scent
Classy rose with powerful smoky. Elegant gorgious masterpiece. POAL is one of the most favorite in my little collection. Worth it.
0 Comments
Simo975gSimo975g 3 years ago
9
Scent
The opulence of the dramatic rose is offset by the darkness of patchouli, spices and incense. A gothic masterpiece.
0 Comments
T3lk4T3lk4 4 years ago
Very powerful scent, strong and imposing, never smelt anything quite like it.
0 Comments
MariaSMariaS 4 years ago
8.5
Scent
A dirty smokey animalic rose...It's a portrait of a lady so powerful, respected and imposing who doesn't need any man in her life.
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