02/24/2015
ColinM
516 Reviews
ColinM
Helpful Review
3
"Woo" indeed!
A balmy, dark, unusual and terribly fascinating contemporary scent with the “allure” and the sensual depth of an old chypre: I get jasmine, benzoin, tobacco, a fantastic powdery note of rose, a subtle salty-anisic breeze and a shady, hyper-dark veil of leather on the base, dusted with something sweet, earthy and dusty (I thought of cocoa beans but I don’t see them listed). The ambergris note is there, and for once it is quite realistic: it is not the usual, artificial, musky ambroxan-driven note, but rather the smell of real ambergris, so a rooty, animalic, “organic” and salty note with a slight sort of iodine-camphorous aftertaste. Woo has the personality of old Guerlain’s (I thought of vintage Chamade, for instance) or other prominent vintage chypres, mostly because of leather, rose and the indolic whiffs of dead flowers, and it also quite reminds me of Dzing! by L’artisan. But at the same time, it’s totally new, fresh, creative and contemporary: the creativity here, for me, lies mostly in a really genius touch of salty iodine, a crystalline azure touch on a warm, dark blend centered on jasmine, tobacco and leather. A balmy, dark, warm yet fresh and sea-inspired scent that mixes a nostalgic inspiration with a futuristic, refined “azure-blackness”. Quite nondescript; try it if you have the chance to. As much terrific as overpriced though, but apparently House of Matriarch does heavy discounts sometimes (I guess it’s the only moment they manage to sell some bottles).
7,5-8/10
7,5-8/10
