Corfu Kumquat

Where to start. I smelt this perfume in early may of this year. I fell in love with it and was thinking about it for almost two months after returning from my trip in Toronto and after smelling orange marmelade by Jo Malone. I decided to go and buy a bottle and I do not regret it. It smells walking in Greece with cumquat trees all around you near the beach. But you stop near one and you say I’ll take one bite. But that one bite makes you take more more and more that’s what it smells like to me. Korfu in a bottle. (I’ve never been to Greece but if I ever go this is coming in my suitcase)

I bought this at the Aedes store in Soho NYC. It's a lovely fragrance with a wonderful hit of citrus, but also something fresh and green. Then there's that hint of lavender and apple. I almost said it feels beachy, but it's more than that. Very wearable any time of year.

Piercingly fresh lemon zest with juicy tangerines. Brisk citrus floats effervescently while clean laundry contributes to the uplifting energy. Soft cedar and carefully balanced base notes keep it from being too shampoo, adds class, and ages it up. However, at the expense of a grandparent vibe. One of the better citrusy fresh scents. Impressive strength and projection with wide contrast from bright lemon to mature depth. Not linear or one-note, but complex and balanced. Different enough, but maybe too safe for me personally. I’m weird, though, so don’t let that stop you from trying such a solid expression.

I enjoy Corfu Kumquat, despite its intensely citrus opening Though it began as a scent bordering on cleaning spray (the natural kind that costs $7 per bottle), I enjoyed the dry down quite a bit. It gets wonderfully salty, like you're by the ocean enjoying a Fanta Limon. This would be a great vacation perfume. Can't see myself buying it, but I do enjoy smelling it!

Smells like a summer day on a tropical island. Triggered core memories of being in my grandmother's house, of freshly squeezed orange juice, the scent of flowers billowing in from the garden, and the salt spray of the ocean. It's clean, green, warm, and perfectly citrusy without anything being too overwhelming. Bottled sunshine. I really like it.

If you've ever had a Flinstones Push Up popsicle in the 90s, the opening is identical to that. It's so fun and bright and comforting, and then the dry-down has an ethereal citrus airiness kind of reminiscent of Scent of Peace

Smells like a greener version of molecule 01 + mandarin with ambroxan undertone. For a freshie, it's pretty long-lasting and projecting, but don't expect beast mode.

I just finished sampling a few AdV and before I started, this one was the one I expected to try the most. Kumquat drives me crazy and I can eat 20 in a row so smelling like it sounded my perfect match... you know, the citrus mix of sweet orange peel with that sour inside is just so sexy. Unfortunately while this is very easy to wear and nice smelling, it smells more of tangerines to me and quite generic compared to the rest of the perfumes of the house. I know I must sound harsh but if you apply JV Artisan on one hand and this one on the other, 99% of the people wouldn't tell them apart... so paying 10 times more is not something I can justify. It's a safe blindbuy if that's what you're looking for. I will give it more time and enjoy in spring but it's the only one I can't recommend from this house because it doesn't deliver anything new or special. The bottle is gorgeous though, very nice packaging and sprayer.

The fragrance is gorgeous. I love both the citrusy opening and the green drydown. I don't find it generic or too similar to other fragrances, even though I don't have vast experience with the green perfume family. I would happily buy it - if it only lasted longer than a couple of minutes :( I understand that fresh scents usually don't have such a strong projection or longevity but the performance of this one is so poor it simply cannot justify the price. Oh well...

Has a great opening but doesn't last long at all on my skin. At this price point I expect better performance

I've had kumquats a handful of times in my life, so far be it from me to present myself as an expert, but what I recall of them was that they are very pleasing. One of the few citruses where you can eat the skin/rind - and you should! Pleasantly zesty and oily in the way citrus peel should be, there is also a unique sweetness to the peel that I seem to recall being a mix of navel orange flavor and the somewhat grainy and fleshy tree fruit like sweetness of a pear. Yummy! The flesh of a kumquat is citrusy sour, like a combination of orange and lemon. They are very fragrant, sweet and sour, complex little gems. Corfu Kumquat does remind me of kumquat in its opening stage, albeit gentle whispers of the rather naturalistically loud little fruit. The strong sweet-and-sour juxtaposition is captured, with just a touch of oily zests to provide a bit of body. Then, in a matter of minutes, the descension into a very close and quiet skin scent of incohesive salty, green, swampy vetiver and standard soap musks. The whole experience takes maybe 30-45 minutes. Corfu Kumquat's top does not really do justice to the kumquat, it is missing a heart both literally and figuratively, and the base is crass and derivative in the worst way. This is an EdP at $250 for 100mL, is it, AdV? Ambivalent-bordering-on-cynical garbage. Firm pass.

Corfu Kumquat: In a small Greek village built on the slopes of the island’s highest mountain is a quietly atmospheric little ghost town with only two or three permanent inhabitants. One of them is a kumquat that never fully ripened, too sour and pithy for marmalade and liqueurs, too small and strange to be of much practical use. Perhaps it was overlooked. Perhaps it forged it's own little path in life. It’s now the local guide for the village, steering tourists hither and yon along cobblestone roads, sharing historical anecdotes and eerie legends, and finally depositing them at the gift shop once the excursion has concluded. As the crowd has disperses, it reaches into its pocket for a cigarette and lights up in the cool shade of an ancient stone cottage, exhaling smoke through its citrus peel pores, whirling and curling in satisfying vaporous salt-air swirls, while catching glimpses of the sun glinting on the sea through the undulating mountains.

This is such a bright, straight forward citrus scent. I admittedly do not know what a kumquat is like, but I have a friend from Corfu that says they are a bit like apricots. If so, I can certainly see that and tangerine being dominant here. There’s a little spice in this which strikes me as perhaps the ginger note. There’s also a substantial dose of earthy vetiver as it dries down. Lavender starts to come through as well, giving it a kind of classic cologne-y vibe. I found this to be a pleasant but unchallenging fragrance, which is not exactly what I tend to expect from Aedes. In this genre of scent, this isn’t a stand out, but it’s a strong offering all the same. If you’re looking for a citrusy, light Mediterranean scent for spring and summer, this would do the job nicely.