Al Nabha

It's an Arabic scent that doesn't smell too 'arabian'. That's an odd thing to say but bear with me. A lot of arabic scents are extremely difficult to wear. This is mostly due to a very intense oudh which is really harsh or some other weird notes which just don't work for me. Al Nabha is smooth, a little refined and sweet. It's clean and at times soapy in its character. It smells a lot more contemporary than many arabic fragrances and if like me, you're used to western designers, that makes it easy to like. I have a decent collection of many arabic oils and I find many of them unwearable. With a lot of them, there's always something that smells 'off' or unpleasant to my nose. As a result, I'm always weary of trying new oils as I fear disappointment. I can say with relative confidence that Al Nabha will not disappoint. It's approachable, easy to wear and absolutely wonderful. It's very contemporary and there's nothing 'unusual' about it. I wish I could find more arabic oils of this ilk because they are instantly likeable and secondly, they excel where most western fragrances fail; sillage and longevity. While I'm sure they exist, my blind buying experience has always left me wanting, so until I find a place to test, I'll refrain from doing so. The sillage is ridiculous. Just nuclear. The longevity.. well it lasts so long you begin to accept that your skin might just smell of Al Nabha for eternity. After 10 hours, it's still radiating masses of sillage and if it manages to catch onto your clothes, you might as well forget about it. The bottle is a thing of beauty. Heavy old thing with delightful decorations all around it. For 24 GBP, few western designer scents can do better. You won't find any designer that lasts as long or projects as well. The 40ml bottle it comes in will likely last you a few years too. Oh by the way, I'm on my second bottle. I don't normally buy twice.

To be honest, I could easily mistake Al Nabha for Bvlgari Blv- some strong similarities! Overall, Al Nabha is a delicious perfume... sweet, but not fully "gourmand"; there are complex contrasts against the fruit-cream notes that balance it nicely- the delicate, bitter touches of saffron, myrrh---as well as the patchouli, and woods---keep it smelling "refined" and not at all juvenile. My only complaint (and in disagreement with an earlier reviewer) is that the sillage is quite soft... I cannot easily smell Al Nabha beyond 3" from my skin... however, the longevity is nuclear (24+ hours). I consider this perfume more like a "skin scent", very crowd-and-closed-space-friendly, and versatile.

It might seem very fruity and sweet but it’s definitely not the typical fruity/sweet scent you’re thinking. It has the deep, oudy, earthy and leathery notes which are what you’re gonna get the most. Reminds me of Eternal Roots by Orebella, they’re both oudy and fruity & pull very masculine. Makes me feel very sexy tho, a night out type of scent imo.

I ordered blindly a bottle of this scent based upon suggestions of the previous review. It's OK, however for me it has too strong strawberry and coconut notes, while sandal, rose, oud and musk are almost inexistent. It's much more feminine rather than unisex. The features described above do not correspond to the effective impression this perfume evokes. Finally, I will definitely not be able to get used to it.