Ani X Nishane 2023

I was recommended this scent because I’m currently really into skin-close pleasant "human softener" fragrances. So I immediately snagged a sample at the souk to see what this is all about. It’s quite an expensive drop, so definitely test it FIRST! Please! This scent is absolutely not a blind buy.

After I received it, I tested it directly on my skin for two days, and... Well. I can really only give a "Well" here. I had high hopes, so I didn’t want to fully trust my first experience.

I grew up in rather poor circumstances during my childhood. Mother German, father Turkish. The context is important. When I first sprayed this perfume on the back of my hand (the back of my hand is my go-to spot because you can wave it around for a better opinion on sillage), I was immediately overwhelmed by memories from the past. Memories of cheap perfume, because we couldn’t afford anything better in either family. All my relatives on my father's side smelled exactly like this, just like the cheap women’s fragrances you often find next to the cash register in Turkish grocery stores. The ones for guys always just smelled like One Million, one worse than the other. The counterpart to German drugstore scents, so to speak. On my mother’s side, everyone always smelled of Jaguar and Axe fragrances.

And unfortunately, this scent embodies that very well, even though it does smell overall more valuable and pleasant. This scent initially has an intense sour apple note, with a strong honeydew melon in the sillage. At first, it’s pure headache, almost toxic green fruity.

After about 30 minutes, woody sweet notes come through closely, while the sillage shifts from pure honeydew melon to honeydew melon paired with an aquatic contrast. A few minutes later, pepper comes through on the skin, and it becomes a bit drier in the nose, with absolutely no trace of vanilla or any other note.

1 hour - Sillage becomes warmer. A very soft pleasant vanilla smiles at you from afar, paired with the melon that still jumps right into the picture. The woody notes somehow disappear again. Aquatic nuances continue, it becomes more floral, a bit more bitter.

As time goes on, the scent remains zesty, fruity melon-like, with a light vanilla in the sillage, becoming much softer, calmer, and more floral. And it stays like that.

Over the hours, nothing changes here anymore; it just gets weaker and weaker, but you can perceive musk when you breathe in REALLY DEEPLY, up close. After about 8 hours, it’s over, and it’s almost undetectable. Not a scent that stays on you overnight.

For me, this is absolutely not a scent I would ever wear, even though I am a die-hard gourmand and especially vanilla fan. Vanilla here is more of an illusion, hiding far far away in the background. For me, it’s more pure honeydew melon, slightly zesty with bergamot and green apple, with a brief lift of woody-vanilla notes. Unisex, but leaning strongly towards the female gender.