Caspian

I’ll be honest, this chypre is honestly not that bad, it’s just nothing special if you’re a perfume collector. As BeardedIris states below, it has an ozonic/spicy drydown, but think of this as herbal-adjacent (think an off, underwhelming rosemary) rather than anything remotely close to ambergris, patchouli light, etc. Besides that, it’s the most stock-standard chypre I’ve smelt. I gave my 10ml to a friend, because I felt that keeping it in a drawer forever was a waste. Fortunately, as someone with only two perfumes, both Joops blind-gifted by family members, he absolutely loves Caspian for the hottest of summer days.

A sea air accord of salt and light spices, similar to a number of other perfumes themed around salt, and competitively priced. Caspian is a pale scent, soapy lemon in the opening, with a very transparent vetiver and a cushion of moss in the base, and develops towards a mildly ozonic salt & spice accord. This was my favourite on a recent visit to the Columbia Road shop. It's not all plain sailing though. After 30 minutes or so there's a curious spice note on my skin, a stale cardamom or coriander and as it dries the scent becomes oilier, unpleasant and murky. At this point I don't enjoy it so much but it does improve again from here and by the 60 minute mark it's back to light, salty sea air, as though you spent the morning splashing in rock pools. Just the lingering dirtiness of that tricky phase marks this down. I've tried to get on with it several times and in the end it's a no.