Crush

Akro Crush opens like the air that hits you when you open an oven that's done baking pink and white macaron shells made from powdery almond flour. It smells dry and crackled, but soft like the shells. The chewy, not necessarily jammy, filling for the pink shells is a sweet rose-water lychee. While the white shells get a chewy white chocolate. The perfumer Cresp stated how long it took to get the materials to create that chocolate scent in here and it is very apparent, simultaneously existing with the almond, rose and lychee. The smell continues as an entire tray of macarons cooled and filled, then dried down to a very subtly sweet praline and rose. This is truly not overly gourmand or sickeningly sticky. The opening was a bit too almond powdery for me but not necessarily overly nutty, thank goodness. But the chewy texture of the rose filling and praline redeems it from an okay to a like. If the praline continues to praline and appear sooner as the juice matures, this might be a love. It's a nice, girly, comforting scent that has moderate soft projection and still goes strong 5-6 hours later. I prefer wearing indoors because that's when it's most chewy and sweet. The rose sometimes becomes sour and sharp wearing it outside when cool, unless sprayed on top of a vanilla/caramel dominant fragrance. Never smelled the others but Indult Manakara being compared is interesting, because I actually find the long opening to be very strange. Reviewers in the past used to describe it as a sweet powdery rose, leaving out the major weird synthetic aspect of it. It's more like sweet, jammy rose that's also weirdly dewy with a strange synthetic blast of balloon air, tire air, or any air inside some rubber inflatable. I don't think it's similar to Crush, which is a safe buy and more natural smelling. Some may not like how safe or powdery, at least in the opening, it is though. I do think the powder accord is so balanced with the other notes and actually entire fragrance is growing on me the longer I have it.

I am a self-confessed rose hater. I really, really detest rose-forward fragrances like Delina. But Crush is definitely not Delina. Not even comparable to Delina Exclusif. It is its very own unique composition, and an impressive one at that. I didn’t like this at first. It smelled too sharp, too synthetic, and too rosey. I was ready to give this up, but thankfully I didn’t because Crush really grew on me. It starts off with a juicy, mouthwatering burst of lychee. Then after a few seconds, I’m getting the very impressive interpretation of macaron with some powderiness to it. It’s not a baby powder or cosmetics type of powder, but more on the texture. Olivier Cresp really nailed the experience of biting into a perfectly-baked macaron. Imagine the crisp outer shell, gooey center and that sweet cream filling and that, to me, is very impressive. I can totally smell the rose here, but it’s more of a rose-flavored dessert rather than the actual flower. As the scent progresses, I can still smell the rose-laden confectionary but it’s now tinged and made more indulgent with that warm-smelling vanilla and the nuttiness from the praline. Despite the scent profile, it has a whipped airiness to it that perfectly balances all the indulgent notes. It’s not too cloyingly sweet and even though it has a certain playfulness to it, there is also a sense of grown-up and womanly elegance and refinement. This is a love for me!

Much to my delightful surprise this is reminding me of LDBS extreme. While the original LDBS has orange blossom the extreme version has bulgarian rose instead, as does this. The opening is a bit challenging as others noted but with a little patience it indeed softens into a powdery rose, not the lipstick iris makeup powdery rose. This is a delicious powdery marshmallow LDBS type of rose. I realize reviews are all over the place with this but that is exactly what I get. The playful rose macaron I was expecting isn't quite what I smell at all but I love it. There is a muskiness in the base, similar to LDBS, that makes this lean more sophisticated. I don't get fruit at all personally, just musky, marshmallow powdered rose. Let me emphasize that I am NOT saying this is LDBS. I saw someone compare it to Devotion and my nose doesn't get that whatsoever so your interpretation may vary BUT if you like the LDBS extreme version with the same rose as this, you may want a sample. Considering how much cheaper Akro is than Killians its a win win for me!

Like most of my absolute favorite fragrances, my relationship with Crush by Akro started off on shaky footing. I didn't "get" it at first and immediately wrote it off as another boring rose gourmand riding off the Delina hype (it smells nothing like Delina btw). But something drew me in, and then I had an "aha!" moment and realized Crush smells EXACTLY like a Dubai chocolate bar made with dried rose petals and white chocolate. Rich, creamy, decadent but not overdone or too sweet-the way I like my desserts. I understand where the comparison to Lattafa's Noble Blush is coming from, but Noble Blush is a cute, sugary cheap thrill, like a $5 drug store chocolate vs an artisan white chocolate and rose truffle from the finest Parisian confiserie. This is neither a youthful nor mature rose, I can see all ages wearing this beauty. I bought the biggest bottle and it was so worth it because I have to stop myself from wearing this every day.

this is absolutely gorgeous! when I first sprayed this I only got rose but after a few times testing it, the praline and vanilla has really come out. the roastiness of the almond adds a great warm depth to this perfume and levels out the rose to make it less "heady" like a lot of other rose-lychee perfumes. speaking of lychee- I don't get any of that in this, which I was really hoping for but then again Akro blends their fragrances so seamlessly so I'm sure that note is lurking in here somewhere, I just can't find it personally. Overall, this is a great creamy, realistic rose macaron that is so warm and delightful! it'd be great year-round as well which is always a plus. It lasted on my skin for around 2 hours and on my clothes all day, I love getting whiffs of this one!