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ColinM
Helpful Review
4
Dark nostalgia
Just when I thought patchouli scents couldn’t surprise me that much anymore... now this is a peculiar, interesting and fascinating one. It opens with a musky, dusty, grayish mood, a pleasant sort of mint-balmy touch and a base which comprises nutty-spicy notes of tonka, then (I guess) vetiver, benzoin, and leather. I must say I disagree a bit with other reviews: I barely get the patchouli note initially, which in my opinion is quite well concealed among the abovementioned notes, to the point I had to “look” for it. What I get overall is a really intriguing, sophisticated, kind of decadent and fairly complex mixture that evokes to my imagination modest, dusty abandoned rooms, mostly for a really peculiar note or accord that makes me think of bitter leaves and grass grasping the walls and growing out from cracks on concrete soil. This note, which may likely be carnation, is really sharp, bitter, sour, dark-greenish, slightly salty-metallic, and gives a really vibrant, fascinating and memorable gloomy touch to the scent. Overall as I said Patchouli Bohème smells for a while more tending towards greenish-camphorous-woody territories of tonka, leather, woody balm, musk, with just a “raw shade” of patchouli; which however emerges soon, bringing the fragrance to a more conventional patchouli-centered blend, still with a peculiar and charming feel of chypre-sque nostalgia – pretty much like in Intrigant Patchouli by Parfumerie Générale, that in my opinion plays more or less the same “chords” around patchouli. Not saying they’re identical or much similar though, as Bohème is decidedly more tobacco-leathery, and also more balmy-nutty. The drydown is perfectly great as well: utterly refined, dark, with the leather note slowly morphing into an everlasting kind of “roasted” feel (like in Cuir by Mona di Orio, no surprise the nose is the same). Basically the first work by LM Parfums I find decent and interesting – and one of the few good ones by Mona di Orio. Nice!
7-7,5/10