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Scandalwood Heretic 2017

7.1 / 10 37 Ratings

A perfume by Heretic for women and men, released in 2017. The scent is woody-floral. It is still in production.
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Main accords

Woody

Floral

Spicy

Resinous

Sweet

Fragrance Pyramid

Top Notes

Atlas cedar

Coriander

Rosewood

Heart Notes

Bulgarian rose

Ylang-ylang absolute

Base Notes

Sandalwood

Labdanum

Myrrh

White musk

Orris butter

Perfumer

Douglas Little

Videos

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Ratings

Scent

7.137 Ratings

Longevity

5.728 Ratings

Sillage

5.229 Ratings

Bottle

6.541 Ratings

Value for money

5.615 Ratings

Submitted by CPL · last update on 11/14/2025.

Source-backed & verified

Interesting Facts

The scent was created in collaboration with Dita von Teese.

Smells similar

What the fragrance is similar to

Erotique

Reviews

6 in-depth fragrance descriptions

09/11/2022

Mlleghoul
468 Reviews

Mlleghoul

5

very bare and barely there

Scandalwood is a fragrance that makes me a little sad. I first discovered the brand when I used Polyvore, a sort of virtual moodboard for curating imaginary closets and creating fantasy outfits. I used to play around on it every single day for nearly a decade, and then in 2018, without warning, they shut it down. I was pretty upset--I made many friends through Polyvore and it was a fun distraction that got me through some rough patches. Were any of you guys over on Polyvore? There's a few similar sites now and I've been using one called URStyle but it's just not the same. I'm ghoulnextdoor over there by the way, if you ever want to say hi. Anyway, this is a perfume review, sorry. Scandalwood is inspired by Dita von Teese and much like her own outfits, the scent is very bare and barely there. Light and close to the skin, it's a lovely blend of sandalwood, cedar, rosewood, leather, and musk. It's not really all that erotic unless you get off on quiet naps and whispered ASMR. And hey, it takes all kinds.

12/31/2024

Byrehoe
208 Reviews

Byrehoe

2

mistress hickory

Nowhere near as naughty as the name would suggest. This is a soft, varnished rosewood that transports me before a crackling hearth. Or maybe it smells like someone wearing rosewater in a cedar-wood dry sauna. For whatever reason, I can’t shake a slight hickory barbeque accord. Think more a savoury/smouldery woodfire instead of a tobacco. There’s nothing edible listed in the notes – and I wouldn’t say it smells meaty – though there’s something about the cedar-smoked rose that is borderline mouthwatering. Like most Heretics she flits away after three hours, but the final hour has the the smoothest, most satisfying transition into a singed-petal powder.

Mental Snapshot: A gourmet supper in an alpine chalet, snug inside an antique armchair. Burgundy velvet, burnished leather, library shelves gleaming with vintage trinkets. You’re dining with an old friend or a partner. Or blissfully solo. Or a tempting stranger. (Choose your own adventure). The windows are sugared in snow, but the ornate fireplace holds the room in a warm embrace. There’s not a single item on the menu the chef wouldn’t recommend, and they’re right.

tl;dr: bbq burlesque?

02/12/2025

3.5Scent

celeblas
119 Reviews

celeblas

1

Bruised Rose and Wood

This opens with a blast of rose - bruised rose petals, soaking in water. It lightens up a bit from that sour beginning as it develops, and the sandalwood begins to show up. But the musk and cedar combination creates a bit of a paint thinner accord - a resinous chemical-like fragrances with the rose and sandalwood on top. Further into the dry-down it becomes very reminiscent of an early Comme des Garçons fragrance. After just a minute or two of developing this is indistinguishable in my scent-memory from Comme des Garçons 2, if a little bit more airy and bright. Quite an achievement but not sure if it does what it set out to do!

11/14/2025

7Scent 6Longevity 6Sillage

valhelsingv
285 Reviews

valhelsingv

1

Woody classy rose

A good rose scent for those who normally dislike roses. It starts out woody but quickly switches to creamy and then the rose comes through, but this rose is not sweet, it is mysterious and dark and seductive but at the same time hidden, lurking in the shadows. I can see Dita von Teese in it. The sillage is rather intimate, like most Heretic fragrances but that's how I like it anyway.

05/29/2018

6.5Scent 7Longevity 6Sillage

Meggi
1018 Reviews

Translated · Show original

Meggi

Top Review 23

Abgeflext

Did Mr. Little accidentally slip the "c" in? I mean in the name. Because the diffused woody-rosy opening is soon joined by something strangely creamy, caramel-sweet. That must be sandalwood. Perhaps the provider had a play on words in mind? In any case, he should have left out the "c".

After barely ten minutes, the scent is indeed creamy-sweet at its core, with a hint of H-cream. The so-called rose is little more than a candy-like touch that - to its credit - bravely tries to develop a hint of Montale-leathery character, thus a touch of profile. Alongside this, there later floats a kind of bitter spiciness, which I think is some kind of wood. And if I weren't fundamentally dealing with a natural scent (see the PS), I would have guessed it was a contribution from Iso.

But these are just side effects. In the main thread, the creamy-caramel sweetness leads the scent into the nice-nondescript territory. It seems to me like a completely de-scented, almost polished version of part-time stinkers like ‘Oud Ispahan’.

By noon at the latest, however, that is also over, as a (admittedly quite decent) creamy-sweet tinted wood note takes over, its dustiness being nicely tied up. Myrrh? I can imagine it. By early afternoon, it seems to me that a primarily simple, light wood brings things to a close, which is at least pleasantly rounded off by a conceivable splash of vetiver. All not bad, just zero excitement. And it’s certainly not scandalous. Every brown belt with black shoes stirs up emotions more reliably.

Conclusion: Gradually, I am a bit saddened by Heretic. The slightly bland, light wood notes I previously thought were a privilege of chemistry. It doesn’t smell lab-like here at all, but with other natural scents, I have experienced significantly more basal richness, which Heretic cannot match.

I thank KingLui for the sample.

PS: Due to the declared synthetic musk, I have skipped the tag “#100prozentnatur” this time.

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