Nuit de Megève Eight & Bob 2017

Nuit de Mégère is a fragrance that revolves around vetiver, a different interpretation of vetiver.
This is not an old fashioned scent and not even a sharp one.
The opening, without any particular character, brings to you a beautiful note of vetiver routed by iris and tonka bean which is not allowed to go sweet. There is a perfect balance. The earthy and smoky face of the vetiver is perfectly held off by the sweet tonka and the powdery iris. An hint of bitterness, probably coming from the coffe, completes the picture.
This fragrance is not loud but it is smooth and soft, it is never too much for whatever situation you have to face. A slight aurea will stay nicely around your skin without giving you headaches.
The glass of the bottle deserves an improvement: I found a lot of flaws.

When I read about the launch of "Nuit de Megève," alarm bells went off for me! As a passionate skier, Megève is of course a term I know well, and I have had the pleasure of executing the Andreas-Hofer turn here myself ;-)
Megève is a classic upscale ski resort in the Savoy Alps, particularly known for the luxury hotel "Mont d’Arbois Palace Hotel," opened in 1921 by Baron Maurice de Rothschild, which still impressively shapes the town's image today (unfortunately, my student budget didn't quite stretch to this quarter...)
It is well known that the creators of "Eight & Bob" are the uncrowned fairy tale uncles of the perfume business. We all know the story surrounding JFK and the creation of the, let's say, ambitiously mediocre "Original."
To avoid repeating the entire marketing text, just briefly:
The snobbish founder of the perfume house, Albert Fouquet, spends a wonderful night at a party during his ski vacation in the 1930s in Megève. That night, he meets a beautiful woman and spends the rest of the night with her. Fearing that he would forget the impressions of that night, he comes up with a super cool idea - he conserves it all in a fragrance. Voilà, Nuit de Megève in 2017 :-)
You may believe it or not, but at least the ladies and gentlemen of Eight & Bob are doing something for their marketing...
Nuit de Megève does not start off fresh at all, contrary to the listed notes. Perhaps a tiny citrusy tingle, but then the first dominating note emerges: coffee. Beautiful strong bitter black coffee. There’s a piece of sugar dissolved in it, but just one. The slight sweetness softens it a bit and is very well placed. In addition, iris gives the fragrance a fitting dry aura. Before the sweetness slowly but surely tries to take over and creates an impression of mustiness, vetiver robustly intervenes and grounds it.
Until then, one wonders what all this has to do with a chalet in the French Alps and skiing... The vetiver conveys the impression of fresh mountain air that thoroughly ventilates the cabin. Those who enjoy a cozy break will recognize this ;-)
Musk is also present, and the air freshening is perfect!
Would I have come to this conclusion without the name and backstory? Certainly not...
Rather, Nuit de Megève immediately reminded me of Dior's Vetiver. So the combination of coffee and vetiver is not new. But imitation is, as we know, the highest form of admiration, and I wouldn't call the two fragrance twins.
The Dior is rougher, coarser, and probably a bit more natural. I don't perceive a real progression in the Dior, which I don't consider a bad thing at all.
Nuit de Megève is, for me, the skillfully modernized reformulation of Dior's Vetiver. If they had released this fragrance, we would be discussing whether it is necessary and whether the soul of a classic has once again been sacrificed on the altar of commerce. Nice that we don't have to do that :-)
So, anyone looking for a slightly friendlier and more pleasing coffee-vetiver scent can confidently reach for Albert Fouquet's moist ski vacation dream.

For every perfumer, the combination of vetiver and coffee is likely a considerable challenge. Somehow, they don't seem to fit together, and too much of one or too little of the other can make the entire creation appear extremely clumsy.

In my opinion, Francois Demachy has accomplished this tricky little feat with "Vetiver" for the Christian Dior Collection Privée exemplary. Here, the ratio is optimal and serves as a prime example of this theme.
Unfortunately, the perfumer of "Nuit de Megève" is unknown, yet one should grant him (or the department) that they also did a decent job.

I must admit that "Nuit de Megève" did not impress me at all during my very first encounter a few weeks ago. The scent was simply too synthetic and piercing for me - completely unpleasant and quite unsuccessful. But well, that was basically the pre-test, and during yesterday's wear, I was relatively well prepared and found it exciting and charming. I'm glad I gave it a second chance.

Nuit de Megève should not be brought too close to the nose immediately after spraying. While this is generally advised against, in this case, the scent indeed comes across as extremely irritating. However, once it settles or is perceived from a greater distance, it reveals a fine fresh nuance between crisp vetiver or rather vetiveryl acetate and zesty grapefruit - underlined with a delicate layer of unsweetened coffee and tonka bean.

This has something special and will definitely polarize more with the wearer than with the surroundings. However, once you embrace it, it leaves a positive feeling. But as mentioned before: don't overthink and analyze it too much, otherwise, you might feel like you're wearing a dreadful synthetic blend, even if the good coffee is served to you a few beats later.

As I said: a very narrow ridge ... between disharmony and fascination. And since the aforementioned "Vetiver" from Dior is no longer available, this Eau de Parfum absolutely has its justification.

Coffee and vetiver? There was something... Yes, Dior's "Vetiver" may have served as a model here; however, after initial enthusiasm ("Vetiver and coffee!!:-)"), I quickly cast it aside because it felt too oppressive, too pronounced, too closed-off.

Eight & Bob takes a sportier approach, a bit more light-hearted, which may be due to the rather unsweetened coffee and the shift in emphasis towards the tonka bean.

Well, I have to admit: A few years ago, I was increasingly annoyed by oud and more recently by Iso-E-Super and Cashmeran, but currently, I’m struggling with tonka bean. It annoys me, simply put, in its often mushy, caramel-like, shallow, and contourless manner, and it manages to flatten and dull every interesting, even edgy fragrance with profile potential.

So it is here as well. The vetiver and the rather dark coffee hold up quite well for a while, but after half an hour, the tonka increasingly takes over and transforms the lovely opening note into a somewhat diffuse mishmash. Still solid and generally quite pleasant for autumn, but also a bit interchangeable. Okay.

A fragrance that sometimes trips over its own feet with its somewhat quirky scent notes. But that makes sense. The scent is hardly beatable for one's own nose. Because the very "contradictory" mix of citrus fruits, sweet tonka notes, spices, powdery iris, and rack-green-earthy vetiver hardly allows for any "olfactory blindness," as each scent ingredient differs so much from the others that the nose does not have to succumb to any habituation factor even in the long run. What also makes the Megeve night scent so special is the coffee; it surely contributes to the mentioned effect! Coffee is also used for "recalibrating" when smelling several fragrances one after the other; one sniffs coffee beans in between and is then ready to absorb new olfactory impressions.
In the midst of it all, the "brown brew" flashes in the scent and plays with perception, leading the olfactory organ practically astray in relation to the "ordinary" scent materials, only to then switch the "lamp" back on, shining all the brighter shortly thereafter. Not an easy fare?!?....some may think. But! Because the somewhat peculiar refinements sharpen the senses, heightening attention to the essence of the perfume. And it makes for a very distinctive, recognizable olfactory experience of a special kind.