Styler

Not your regular offering from Areej Le Doré for sure. Gentle, soft, beautiful scent. The regular Areej Le Doré animalic cocktail is nowhere to be seen here. Smells really natural. Projection is low, a skin scent right from the start. But I believe “beast mode” performance and harsh animalics would ruin the main idea of this scent. At its core, it is yet another oud and rose fragrance like thousands before it and thousands that will be after it. But the quality of materials and the quality of the blend make it stand out, and I think it might be a new high for Russian Adam as a perfumer. I made a video review of this scent that you can see below if you want to hear my full thoughts. Cheers!

I guess it’s time for me to talk about my favourite Ensar Oud of all time, NO2. I only recently managed to get a full bottle of the OG PP, so that’s why only now I feel I am qualified to talk about it in depth. It joins my collection of NO2 EDP, EO2 Tonkin, and NO2 PP sample as a final NO2 boss. It’s not hard to see I love this DNA, huh? I am a bit late to talk about it, because, well… good luck getting as lucky as me and finding someone selling it to you in 2025. But after watching some reviews online from back in the day of some very respectable reviewers, as Ramsey and Nikhil, being surprisingly not so positive, I felt the need to put my two scents in.

First of all, I should state that I am very much a musk lover. My favourites of other artisanal brands out there almost always are musk fragrances. So it's no surprise that the quintessential musk fragrance from Ensar Oud is my top pick. And spoiler alert: as far as musk fragrances goes, in my personal opinion, NO2 PP is the King of them all. Yes, I am taking it over Private Blend, over Tonkin/Mongolian/Egyptian musk, and all the others out there. I will explain why - shortly. Ok, so now that we have established that this review is 100% subjective love letter to this fragrance, you can all proceed with caution.

Main NO2 feature that blows every other musk fragrance out of the water for me is its sophistication. Don't get me wrong: I love animalics as much as the next guy, perhaps even more than most. But to strike this balance of animalics and sophistication to this degree… it’s a feat I have never experienced before or since. Risking on sounding a bit corny, I will say that wearing this fragrance radiates quiet authority. The kind of authority you feel while watching Marlon Brando portrayal of Vito Corleone in The Godfather. The scent itself is not weak or close to skin at all, but the level of smoothness, the texture of the smell, firm but not overwhelming waves it comes at you, creates this atmosphere of which I can only again describe as scene in before-mentioned Godfather movie, where Vito is accepting visitors before his daughter’s wedding. Soft-spoken, polite, diplomatic… but at the same time, the atmosphere in the room demands attention, respect, and careful choice of words. There is no mistake where the power lies in these conversations, and any mistake in conducting yourself in the presence of this person can be your final one.

There is a saying: "Might shows, it does not shout." And NO2 is exactly THAT. In comparison to NO2, other Ensar musk fragrances, like Private Blend or NO2 Tonkin, have more aggression and more animalic side to them; therefore, fill a bit different bracket of perfumery. Not so suitable for your daughter wedding day. If we would say that NO2 represents "old money," then the other before-mentioned EO musk fragrances would represent "new money."

I have not talked about the notes in this review so far. It opens up with sort of a fresh-ish spicy (coriander/cumin) accord. Mid shows you some musky, woody, rose. Base greets you with oudy, woody, leathery, musky goodness. I respect every fragrance that manages to incorporate rose in its blend without letting it take over of the whole composition. Blending here is so fine that no particular notes stand out. Honestly, talking about notes in NO2 is as pointless as talking about notes in Bach – Goldberg Variations. No dissection or compartmentalisation of the experiences here can explain the magnificent beauty of the whole thing.

These features make it wearable on any occasion. I could truly see it being my signature scent for the rest of my life. And as any collectors of anything would tell you: to be satisfied with ONE when you have MANY - is the highest praise there is for that particular piece. There are only like 3 fragrances in my collection I could be happy with for the rest of my life, and NO2 is one of them.

I should start by stating that my experience with Oud Luwak OG is very limited. Small sample years ago, so by now I would almost say I do not really remember what it was like. What I can compare this Oud Luwak II to is Agar de Noir. But let me start from the beginning. Oud Luwak opens up very dry. Almost zero sweetness. Probably the most unique and interesting opening to me in this collection. If some of you still do your coffee the old school way, just pouring hot water on ground coffee beans directly into the cup—imagine you drank your coffee, forgot to wash the cup. The cup with coffee dust is just standing there for a week. The coffee dust completely dried out, some mold started to form on it. Smell it. That’s the opening of Oud Luwak II. This zero sweetness, coffee-with-a-bit-of-mold trend goes on for some time, like 3–5 hours. I enjoy this part of the fragrance very much. Eventually the sweetness shows up and by the end of life on your skin, scent dries down to some sweet resins. In the air, Oud Luwak reminds me of Agar de Noir minus the lavender and powderiness. Scent has very little lift. So at least on my skin, longevity and projection were the weakest of the whole collection. I can imagine people around you won’t pick it up at all, so on that aspect it is kind of a safe scent—you won’t annoy anybody.

First of all, I would like to say that in my opinion Royal Barn was born of Adam trying to recreate War and Peace but instead getting inspired in the middle of the process to create something new. So yeah, War and Peace III to me has some aspects of Royal Barn in it. Especially for the first like 10 minutes, Royal Barn hits my mind faster than War and Peace OG does. That being said, the main Royal Barn accord fades into the background pretty fast. GOOD. I have Royal Barn and I enjoy it, but let’s say one Royal Barn is enough in anybody’s collection. As far as comparisons to the OG go, War and Peace III to me is like a child of Royal Barn and War and Peace OG. There are similarities for sure, but it won’t replace the OG in anyone’s collection. I can somewhat see why Adam did this. Original War and Peace shares some similarities to Cuir de Russie OG. Being that both of them are in this classics collection, recreating War and Peace to the T might seem a bit redundant with Cuir de Russie II in the same box. In general, the more time War and Peace III has to dry down, the less Royal Barn is left in it and the more of War and Peace OG shows up. To someone who is a fan of Royal Barn, War and Peace III might even be considered an improvement over the OG. I am not one of those people though. Like with Antiquity, I would say War and Peace III is more aggressive than the original. Maybe after some years of maturation it will smooth itself out and be as smooth and deep as the OG, but at the time of this review it is not. That being said, it is not lacking in depth, nor performance departments at all. Safety of blind buying this depends on how you feel about Royal Barn.

Well, Cuir de Russie OG is my favourite Areej le Doré fragrance of all time. So I am bound to like this one as well. And I do! It is pretty similar to the original too. The core idea is definitely there. Blindfolded I could guess that it is in fact Cuir de Russie OG-inspired fragrance. Blindfolded I could never guess Antiquity II is inspired by Antiquity OG. So yeah, this one is like 8.5/10 similarity wise. Main differences are probably due to impossible-to-get ingredients. OG has more texture, more animalics, more lift, more power, more sweetness to balance the animalics—more of everything. But that makes the new one easier to wear (and not only because now it is actually a skin-friendly fragrance . If I had to guess, I would say this will be the best received of this collection. Ofc again, this being my favourite Areej DNA, I may not be the most objective guy to talk about it. But if someone asked me which ones of these are safest to blind buy, I would say Cuir de Russie. Decent lift, decent projection. Dark floral-forward leather fragrance.