Astrakan

This one had me breathless! This is a note composition I have not come across before, and boy does it work well!! The overdose of cinnamon really works with the fruits - both the orange up top, and the apple in the base. In fact, for me it is the apple that is so captivating 🤩 The vanilla is essential to provide a balance to the tartness, and the black orchid is the perfect floral to compliment the fruits. I feel a white floral would have contrasted too much, and rose would overly soften. The true magic is in how this fragrance evolves through the dry down. I found as the day wore on, the scent pivots to a much dryer, woody base - the cinnamon remaining and the apple accord just a whisp of its former self yet providing essential tartness. The balancing act here is close to perfection, through each phase a single misjudgement could have resulted in something "ok"... But not the greatness that it has become. It comes across as one that went through many revisions to get just right - and I am so glad of this result!! Amazing work!

Hugo I've owned Layton for years & still love it but Astrakan is different enough that I've purchased Astrakan, as an aside the site that you are looking at if you register will send you a discount code for 10%,still going to pay over £200 but it's better than £255. This was & is love at first sniff, I can't understand why this House isn't getting more love? Of the 4 fragrances that I've tested 3 are outstanding & I can admit that whilst the 4th isn't to my taste it's still a really well put together fragrance. I've a few apple fragrances in my collection- Layton & Black phantom probably the best- but this is another level probably just a bit too heavy for heat otherwise this would be a serious consideration for my new Signature scent.

OH my word, never heard of the Brand but if they all smell like this then I need more of them! At £250 for 100ml you are not going to blind buy, only appears to be one UK stockist (Bloom in London) so not a lot of options to try or buy. Even a 1ml sample is higher end at £8 but I have to say that this will be one of my first purchases of 2024! I can't really say that I can compare it to anything, what my nose picks up is a bozzy, cinnamon,apple & spice bomb but not gourmand sweet in my opinion. Supposedly unisex but this is "Beast mode"- to give you an idea I'm currently wearing Red Tobacco which is re-nowned for its strength & I can't even smell it! I can't really tell you how impressed I am with this fragrance.

Just an update as I'm still on my tester, still love this BUT I've recently added ATH Addicted to my collection & it's sort of thrown a spanner into my plans! Same notes, same smell, if anything Addicted has a more "in your face" sillage & my wife says that Astrakan smells smoother & this is where the conundrum is- I got 30ml of Addicted for £30 (it's not a dupe, it just happens to have the same profile) but Astrakan is £250 for 100ml so is that "smoothness" worth 2.5 times the price....?

Managed to get my nose on this today and with immediate effect it put a huge smile on my face. Just because it was like a huge blast of jelly beans from the jelly bean company! Extremely fruity from the outset and had me buzzing as if I had consumed a large box of them! Good fun, fruity and very playful, but not overly gourmand as it starts to settle into a more woody apple feel. Good stuff!