![NicheOnly]()
NicheOnly
2
When you bring in a designer perfumer to create for a niche house
I'm a huge fan of David Benedek's work and also a fan of BDK as a house. Currently own 3 bottles and I suspect I'll add a couple more eventually. My expectations for Vanille Leather were already skewed due to watching the only review that we have for it in the mainstream fragcom (that of Demi). I was expecting a feminine product regardless of that review, but something that was more in the realm of a gourmand fragrance that David's fans have been patiently waiting on for years now. This is not that.
Accords: floral-woody-vanilla-smoky-leathery-powdery
The opening: I get a hefty dose of white florals right off the bat. The sweetness is not the most prominent and there are zero darker tones flanking the floral-vanilla mix in the air. Just based off of this, I am guessing the leather is not a prominent part of this profile.
When smelling the scent up-close, the primary vibe is of a dark woodiness with the most mild smokiness to flank it. Main notes that I can separate are the oak wood, the vanilla, and the floral heart. The oak wood is done in darker fashion, much like the dark woody tones in well-recognized niche vanillas like Royal Crown's "Sultan" and the extrait version of Atelier des Ors "Lune Feline". The powdery iris is moderate in the base, blending with the white floral heart. The leather eventually starts to separate itself from the oak wood, but remains a non-prominent accord. Deep drydown, in a heated environment, is mainly a dark woody vanilla with moderate sillage. It objectively doesn't compete well with any of the top niche vanillas for performance.
As a product, Vanille Leather does not smell too distant from BDK's house DNA. The base in Vanille Leather has some of the same poor blend qualities that I noticed with Ambre Safrano (which I ranked as the 4th worst niche release of 2022). This is not that bad, but you can get that quality if you go looking for it.
More than anything, Vanille Leather feels like designer product. Ropion's lack of experience within niche, basically only having created scents for Frederic Malle, is evident with Vanille Leather having a simple, linear profile that changes minimally.
Assessment: I find the scent non-impressive and don't think it brings anything new to the scene. The components smell of good quality. The sillage is moderate after the first ~1.5-2 hours, and longevity really starts to die down at around 6 hours, might make 8 hours in the end. Price-wise BDK as a house is good value, but this is priced on their upper end and I don't find the scent special enough to warrant more than an okay value. Use cases are going to be spring-fall evening and fall-winter daily. Feminine-leaning. Can't help with the comparables, because this type of a profile isn't my specialty. But my main conclusion is that this is not your typical niche vanilla, and it's not a gourmand.
Top Notes 
Violet
Pink pepper
Heart Notes 
Indian tuberose absolute
Egyptian jasmine absolute
Orange blossom absolute
Base Notes 
Bourbon vanilla
Benzoin
Iris
Indonesian patchouli
Leather
Oak wood
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