Moth Zoologist 2018

This is my Zoologist Perfumes Moth Review with Dalya. Moth by Zoologist Perfumes is one of the latest releases from this brand and I love it. Out of several fragrances from Zoologist Perfumes such as Camel and Elephant and also several impressions videos I have launched on the channel I find Moth to be quite beast mode. It’s big, it’s bold and it’s complex but dries down to a beautiful honeyed, powdery, floral fragrance. And the best parf of the fragrance is when it dries down. But be warned Moth is a big start. It’s loud and screechy as I mentioned in the video. It’s a who’s who of the spice cabinet and I love this part about the fragrance. It gives you a warning of what you’re going to experience with Moth but as previously mentioned it does dry down to a beautifully soft, fragile perfume just like the creature it’s inspired from. To find out more about Moth please watch my review on YouTube.

Zoologist is one of my favorite houses to sample because they really do make art. Even if you get something that's not a wearable perfume per se, you will get a memorable olfactory art experience.

Moth went on very smoky and after about twenty minutes, everything settled and balanced out which brought on a very specific place memory for me. The clapboard sided boathouse on the lake where I spent vacation time as a child. The linens on the bed, clean but unused for many months. The oil burning lamp on the table. The curious old dresser with drawers nearly empty other than a deck of playing cards, some beeswax candles, maybe a box of campfire matches.

And when I think of the boathouse, there is always a moth somewhere in the picture, usually a live one, resting on the screen, beating its wings demanding to be let in so it can dance with the light of the oil lamp.

Zoologist Moth brings to life every detail of the boathouse, a place I have not actually been in years.

People like to describe it as "difficult" and "unapproachable".
I don't feel like it is that extreme. I feel it mysterious and wearable, enigmatic and gorgeous.
I think the secret hides in the connection you can have with this fragrance. If you're leaning gothic, like to wear black, listening to lost Japanese post-punk bands and read Lautreamont, then it's perfect for you.
I feel this is perfect for me.

Like opening an abandoned house's wardrobe that's been locked for ages. You feel the humid smell of ancient secrets. Smoky, mossy, with hints of burnt honey.
The perfect habitat for a nocturnal moth.

Moth is the cool glooms and musty melancholy of antique lace and silks tucked away with camphoraceus mothballs, there’s a smoky rose musk aspect, the spectral embers of a rose that lit itself on fire for love, or vengeance, or maybe both, and a bittersweet powdery element, like dried honey mixed with grave dust from a tomb. But the longer this wears, the more familiar it begins to smell, and I realize I am actually just wearing the musky vanilla and dusty florals of Hypnotic Poison, or alternately, the Bewitching Yasmine from Penhaligon, or Fleur Cachée from Anatol Lebreton, which to my nose, all smell like kindred spirits. And do I really need another perfume in that vein? And then I remember that I actually only own one bottle of those three scents and that one doesn’t have the thing going for it that Moth does: ultimately, Moth smells like a twilight shadowplay of austere embraces, a haunting chorus of forgotten languages, and basically what you wear to convince the ghosts that you are in fact a ghost.

On my culture moths are told to carry back the dead souls, in a similiar way that anglosaxons speaks about the crows, for obvious influences from E.A. Poe and '90s pop cinema, and this perfume brings me back immediatly to that story.
It is dark, haunting and at the same time irresistible. It opens with an overdose of warm spices, almost intoxicating, then a honey accord emerges from the base (a thick one, sticky, non gourmand, almost resinous) because after all, beside the narration and the suggestions this is a honey fragrance, mixed with powdery flowers that remind of the dust of moth's wings while a smoke, burned, note remains present till in the woody (a little bit of synthetic? oud here) earthy (cypriol, patchouli, vetiver) resinous and slightly animalic drydown.

Wow, what a fragrance. It is so evocative, dark, intense and representative of the story of this moth looking for love but going nearer and nearer to the flame untill she burns and dies. I can't stop smelling this, I'm in love with every part of the evolution, it is so godly formulated to tell the story and yet remaining a stunning perfume in every phase.

This is for me my first 10 out of 10 review ever, and it is fully deserved.

Ok, I'll try to tone down my enthusiasm and give some practicalities: this a strong perfume, it takes the scene and can be even suffocating (and in this case they are all good qualities for me since I love it this much), so be carefull in close quarters situations (ie restaurant ecc...), it is totally narrative so totally unisex, maybe avoid 30+ temperature but beside this it is so good you can wear it four seasons; has a decent longevity (6+) in the heat and a good one in the cold times (8-10). Price is the usual zoologist and this time it is fully deserved. Not blind buy safe I must admit.