Cuir de Russie II

My god!! I was lucky enough to nab this beauty, Inverno Russe 2 and Antiquity 3. They’re all attention grabbers up front. I have quite a few leathers either Spanish, Russian or modern but this bad boy is something else. The birch tar in the opening is so strong it’s certainly makes a statement, but the magic truly begins in the mid where an amazing floral bouquet begins to unfold and from there is just intoxicating, and you can wear this one on skin!! Everyone’s a winner, Adam smashes it out of the park again

I enjoyed it quite a bit, the leather is done in a raw and serious fashion and can easily become overwhelming for me, but in Cuir de Russie 2 I love it. Ofcourse the violet leaf is included and actually detectable to my nose. This scent is mainly warm which the musks help to add this sensation. The picture in my head when I smell this on my arm is a dark novel in Russia (very fitting), imagine The Brothers Karamazov by Dosotojevsky, very serious, dark, but so so good. Wonderful

Probably my favorite of the whole collection. That beaver tail oil with the natural musk and birchtar is a perfect combo. Most beautiful manly animalic, musky, smoky, leathery fragrance. So warm and comforting to me. A perfect fragrance, just like all the others from the collection. Genuinly perfect collection.

Unless you hate your family, looking for a divorce, or if you're in the market to repel anything else that breathes, then save your dough. Any decent establishment would remove you from their venue for walking into it while wearing this. It's just far too much deer. Under all of the deer I'm sure those beautiful list of florals are something wonderful, but this is a true gatekeeper's fragrance - you have to desensitize your nose to a deer nuke. Don't mind the birch tar at all.

Cuir de Russie Part II, perfume Extrait. I’m a bit cautious comparing this version of Cuir de Russie to the former simply because that one was meant as a garment perfume while this is a perfume that makes brilliant use of beaver tail oil (the most prominent note), and as is the case with natural musks, it is a material that will shine when applied on the skin. As far as the overall scent profile, I’d say this version is more floral, better balanced, more refined, and better assembled. I also feel that the leather accord is significantly improved, which might be, as mentioned, only a result of proper skin application. The DNA is the same, but the execution is better. As for the composition, I am divided on this one. While I adore the leather accord and the way he used birch tar and musk to support it, I am less enthusiastic about the other component of the fragrance, the sweet, creamy, lush floral bouquet. Make no mistake, I love florals, and I have no issue with sweetness in perfumes, but when you combine floral notes and sweetness, and tie them to a leather perfume, I’m not much of a fan. I’d take all florals paired with leather, but I don’t think I own or ever fancied a “sweet leather” fragrance. I love my leathers in all forms and shapes, except sweet. That being said, the sweetness in here isn’t overbearing, and certainly not enough for me to dismiss this perfume. It’s not a “commercial” type of sweetness but rather a result of the materials used. The beaver tail oil, the rose, the jasmine, the violet, and the amber accord all boast an inherent sweetness. Moreover, the beaver tail oil can sometimes smell very sweet and even fruity on its own. The main notes for me are the beaver and the lush floral bouquet, and they go hand in hand. At no point in time had there been a winner. Maybe with age, the animalics will come more to the front, but as it stands, even after 24 hours when there is only a faint veil of the scent hovering above the skin, the florals and the sweetness are still there battling the leather and the musks. Cuir de Russie II opens with a blast of powder on my skin. Just powder, beautifully diffusive and vintage in feel. Shortly after, you start to pick up the smokiness from the birch tar, but rest assured, it is handled with utmost care (and I am someone who struggles with birch tar). Through the gentle smoke, the first of our protagonists comes forth, the leather. This smells to me like newly polished leather boots. It’s not rugged, dusty, earthy, nor the modern interpretations. Rather, a solid and well-used pair of leather boots that just received a proper polish. Inside the boot, you take a sniff (now why would you do that?) only to find a deep rabbit hole that leads to a magical garden full of flowers. This is the second protagonist, and as I mentioned, it follows shortly after the leather enters the stage and never leaves. Adam used an impressive array of precious florals, although I mostly detect the violet accord, the rose, and the jasmine. It’s larger than life, creamy, and sweet. The way it opposes the leather accord and how they interact in perfect harmony till the very end is what I find fascinating about this fragrance. Yes, some musk creeps in toward the end, but the flowers hold their ground. If it weren’t for the extra sweetness, I would have loved this perfume far more than I do. The sweetness is what ultimately makes me rate it lower than I’d like. As a perfume composition, I feel it sits among the likes of Cuir Cannage, Cuir de Russie, Great Britain, etc, but sweeter than all the aforementioned. What sets it apart for me is the use of beaver tail oil. I have smelled a beautiful use of flowers before, but only in a few other perfumes have I tasted such a great use of natural beaver. I quite enjoy it as a leather fiend that I am, as well as a lover of vintage perfumery, and I hope that with time, the animalics will come just slightly more to the forefront. I’d consider this a slightly improved version of the original, mainly due to its skin-friendly nature and the possibility of having these precious natural materials breathe on the skin, but also for the overall improved quality of the blend. IG:@memory.of.scents