Derby Club House

#13MFJ Armaf Derby Club House – Classy, Clean, and Seriously Underrated ★★★★☆ (4.5/5) | Longevity: 8–10 hrs | Sillage: Moderate Season: Spring / Autumn | Vibe: Masculine, timeless, low-key confident So I didn’t expect to love this one as much as I do. It started off as a curious blind buy—just wanted something barbershop-ish without spending a fortune. And now? I’ve sprayed this on five days in a row, and honestly, I keep coming back to it. It’s just so well done. The opening? Classic fougère DNA. That lavender and bergamot combo? Spot on. Clean, herbal, bright—like the scent equivalent of a freshly pressed white shirt and good posture. It has that “I’ve got my sh*t together” vibe without trying too hard. Then the spice and woods start to come through. Smooth patchouli, subtle cedar, and a soft dry spice that gives it warmth. Never screechy, never dated—it’s just... comforting in a gentlemanly way. This is where it starts feeling like a walk through a vintage library that’s been updated with central heating and better lighting. And then the drydown. God, the drydown. Tonka and vanilla and that white amber glow—it’s almost cosy, like a Mediterranean sunset wrapped in suede. Think villa on the Amalfi coast, golden hour, shirt half-unbuttoned, breeze off the sea. It’s low-key magic. Who’s this for? Guys who like fougères but don’t want to smell like their dad’s aftershave. Anyone who appreciates classic structure but wants it dialled down, made smoother, easier to wear. It doesn’t shout, it doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel. It just works. Wear it to: ⦁ The office (seriously versatile, very put-together) ⦁ Sunday coffee or vintage shopping ⦁ Evenings out when you want to feel grown but not overly dressed up Reminds me of: ⦁ A cleaner, more refined Azzaro Pour Homme ⦁ A touch of Dior Eau Sauvage, minus the florals ⦁ Beau de Jour but without the Tom Ford price tag Bonus points: ⦁ Doesn’t smell cheap ⦁ Transitions beautifully over the day ⦁ You’ll smell like someone who cares, but in a subtle way Would I buy again? Yeah, easily. This could be a signature scent for spring or autumn. It's not niche or flashy, but it’s comforting, wearable, and has real presence.

I like to smell and review fragrances blind several times before looking up the notes to advance my discernment. Then I compare my reviews to the published notes and other reviewers. The bergamot, lavender and tonka/vanilla were certainly noticeable, but I also smelled lemon, cinnamon and a bunch of violet leaf, which no one else seemed to get. I thought I was losing it. But then I remembered I had the box, and sure enough, the fourth ingredient is alpha-isomethyl-ionone (aka the aromachemical for violet leaf), even above the coumarin (tonka) and linalool (lavender). It also has limonene and citral (bergamot and lemon, collectively) and cinnamal (cinnamon). So, if you are looking for a violet/lavender fragrance with nice citrus, a smooth-spicy heart and a vanilla/amber drydown, this is one for you. This could go unisex but is not feminine. Spring and fall are ideal for this, though it will work for any weather except for hottest summer or coldest winter (and works year-round for temperature controlled environments). It has a maturity from the fougere elements but the vanilla/amber and cinnamon keep it from becoming old school. In terms of feel, it feels like a more genial, more interesting take of A&F Fierce or Montblanc Legend - with similar approachability but greater sophistication. Thumbs up!

Armaf banger. Seriously sometimes I just enjoy getting Armaf stuff as a blind buy (which this was), it came in a freakin box with velvet on it, and the bottle label is also velvet. It's so kitsch in a truly splendid life improving way. (Armaf bottle designs are a sub-genre of mental aesthetics that will one day surely have their own appreciation), and it nails a slightly surreal Brooks Brother's parallel universe Ivy League schtick hard. The juice, okay so people here say Barbershop, but I am Anglo Australian so have zero context for that. I think Barbershop and in my culture, Brut or Old Spice come to mind, I can dig how this could be a shaving smell, it is sweet and lavender, vanilla-ish but not. Rolling with the men's club theme - I think it is like one of those fougere/amber scents that were designed for guys who smoke, the pinnacle for me being Zino by Davidoff which this really reminds me of, or even like an old skool really tame less vanilla LeMale. Sort of like what a vampire might wear, but a nice one like the Count off Sesame street. This is is probably not getting you laid, unless you find a nice girl that likes purple maths obssessed Muppets, in which case...

Very nice clone of Armani Attitude. Don't see the Coffee note listed, but I believe it to be there. To me, the greatest men's cologne ever made, as you can see by the inability to find a bottle. DUA has a nice clone of Attitude, but at $20.00 a bottle for Derby Club House, you can bathe in it! Haha. Do yourself a favor and get a couple of these; you may find your new signature scent here. It was mine for many years. This is one helluva a great men's cologne. Thank you Armaf! ps Armaf's Tres Nuit ain't bad if you really like a little GIT lemon verbana, but it wonderfully changes to a floral, unlike GIT. I don't really care for Creed's GIT, but I love Tres Nuit. Worth a try.

Maybe my decant is mislabeled. I don't know what the hell you people are smelling if it isn't. Doesn't deserve such a bad rating. This is a very nice smelling fragrance. Its creamy, masculine and well blended. I just got about 80 decants of various fragrances and this one stood out from the few that I really enjoyed. It has an old time shaving cream vibe but doesn't smell dated or old. Like a modern, slightly spicy barbershop vibe.. Its pretty nice! Scent 4/5 Performance I didn't test out yet but it seems at least average performance.

I don't get the likeness with BDP. This is sweeter and not as astringent as BDP can come across in the opening. DCH is much more vanilla/tonka forward but it cannot boast the same quality ingredients as BDP. That said, it is a very pleasant and crowd-pleasing smell all the same. As a stand alone fragrance DCH is outstanding value for money without a niche vibe. But if you are OK with that and you are seeking a sweet, powdery barbershop scent I'd say try this out. Performance is excellent.

Straightup, this is impressive! For me I get a mix of 212 VIP, Reflection Man, JPG Le Male and Joop. Just by seeing this lineup of what Derby Armaf reminds me of, you already know what ingredients this beauty is made of. Just add one final ingredient to it - "uniqueness". And don't get me started on how freakishly long this lasted on my skin 15 hours+ That's nearly the whole day! Once again, Armaf, well done!!!

Masterpiece for me. Opening is bit harsh but after 15 minutes it becomes like barbar shop type fragrance. After 2 hours it becomes like a vanilla I cream. It's so versatile and signature perfume worthy beautiful bottle very heavy metallic cap and great great juice. I'm getting easily 8+ hours longevity and 2 hours of heavy 2 fit length protection. I ordered 3 more bottles just in case it gets discontinued.

Oh, I like this a lot. Old school...so vintage it smells like it should have been worn by an 18th century English nobleman. Lots of lavender balanced with tonka beans, vanilla and dark pepper. You'll certainly be unique when you step into the room. Moderate longevity on my skin but the projection is intense...I tend to wear two blasts in my hair and one on my neck.

Derby Club House is my new go-to scent! It's super versatile - I can wear it to work, out on a date, or even just hanging out at home. The lavender and bergamot are fresh and uplifting, while the spicy notes add depth and complexity. The vanilla and amber in the base make it warm and inviting without being too sweet. Highly recommend!

Ever since I was a kid I loved the Derby Clubhouse Body spray. As a kid it was nothing like I smelled before. I love how powdery it feels. Being a fan of the Body spray the perfume version is just win win! I find it pretty unique.

I bought this for my husband. This is such a beautiful scent. The lavender and Tonka bean combination is soft not over powering. It’s truly sexy to me. Can’t wait to try more Armaf fragrances.

Derby Clubhouse by Armaf.... I defer to @ sentientbeing.. the reviewer before me.... a spot-on review !!!! SCENT 9.0.....STRENGTH/LONGEVITY 8.0

I do not have Boi du Portugal so I dont know if smells the same BUT ARMAF DCH smells AMAZING!

Just a really nice scent and lasts long, cant go wrong with this one!

very good old school barber shop scent

A pleasing scent, and I think it behaves and presents as a 'mass market' scent, so if you like those 'big hitters,' (L'Homme, Sauvage, Bleu etc.) then this could be for you. In my view, it's more interesting than them. The lavender top is fleeting to the point of absent, but there's a pleasant creamy underpinning oftonka, vague wood and vanilla. Just as with Landmarkvs below, this really isn't 'lavender forward' for most of the time. Despite these notes giving the 'vibe' or 'attitude' of the scent being mainstream, the specific smell unique and very much more than the sum of its parts. Its components point in one direction (mass market); and yet they actually take you in another (distinctive). It has a strange property: it's primarily a vanilla-tonka-amber-spice in terms of "smell items," and yet that is structured in such a way that it is in no way an amber. It feels like it has the tea note from Derby Club House Blanche in it too. And yet it also doesn't present really as a straightforward barbershop - lavender dialled back, no citrus, no patchouli. And you might think that lavender and vanilla would point to Pour un Homme de Caron. Just, no. Not even slightly. And as ashroloie below me says, this is very unique - I've never smelled anything like this. Performance is strong - it lasts and projects. Derby Club House isn't at all bad, despite its cheapness. In fact, it's very good - and I'm surprised at its low rating. It performs well. I don't particularly like it, but that's neither here nor there. My liking something and it being good or bad are not connected. It’s good, but I think it’s not for me.

Let me preface my review by saying that I love a lot of Armaf fragrances and own something like 16 bottles. Derby Club House was waiting for me in the mailbox this afternoon, and I quickly ripped open the package and applied it on my skin. This fragrance is pretty much a lavender bomb with some fairly strong pepper and spices, a strange plastic accord and, finally, some woody notes buried deep in the background. So it's a spiced lavender bomb! Derby Club House smells nothing like Bois du Portugal in my opinion; zero, nodda, nil, zilch. BdP is my favorite Fall gentleman's fragrance and I keep a 250ml flacon in my scent armory - so I know Bois du Porgual. Anyway, I have had this fragrance on my skin for the past hour and I am not enjoying the experience. While it is not a terrible scent, this one is is a swing-and-a-miss (Strikeout!) IMO. I'm going to place this fragrance on the table in the lunch room and see if some poor bastards takes it home. I Wouldn't be surprised if he returned it the following day. LOL! Update: I've worn this a couple more times over the Summer and I no longer disliked it, but I also don't really like it. Also, it's much, much better for the office and only applying a spray or two under the shirt. Update 2: okay, I kinda like it...not a favorite, but a nice office fragrance.

This fragrance is smooth. It doesn't have influencers raving about it like some of its better known Armaf siblings but that's OK. The lavender is front stage but it's so smoothly blended that it doesn't end up smelling like air freshener, which is my primary lavender reference. In the dry down, the vanilla, tonka bean and amber combine for a sweet (but not gourmand) tone. You'll smell like a well-groomed gentleman with this one. As an added attraction, it doesn't smell like it is trying to copy anything popular. Better for cooler weather (spring/autumn) or climate-controlled environments in the summer. Great for the office - you will smell good without announcing yourself to the whole building. I don't think it has the potency/composition needed to do well in winter. Longevity of around 4 - 6hrs with medium projection. The sprayer on my bottle absolutely coats me so it meant that I went through the bottle quite quickly. If you find this for a good price, buy it. I don't think you will regret it.

This is just the easiest-wearing old-school barbershop fragrance that is a no-brainer reach for lazy days when you want to smell good but not make a statement. It is a lavender bomb, smells powdery, and dries down to a sweet musk undertone that uplifts the mood. It does not stand out. It does not scream for attention. It exists in a peaceful corner but also holds onto its own introvert character. Honestly, everyone has days like that they can relate to. It is the scent for THOSE DAYS. I don't know how it compares to the much more expensive counterparts, and honestly, I don't want to. The quality you get for the money you pay is too damn amazing to pass this one up under the excuse "it doesn't smell close enough to whatever". It is a nostalgic fragrance and my best blind buy from Armaf so far. Highly recommend.

Sweet Lavender . Derby Club House (DCH) is a sweet, chocolaty clean lavender scent with a stroke of woody spiciness. Clean, sweet, lavender, softly-spicy, vanillic, creamy, lightly-woody. I am not a big fan of Creed, so I don't know if it smells like Bios du Portugal. It is, however, a suitable sweet clean lavender scent that is just classically an office scent. If you like Pour un Homme de Caron, you might like this. It smells like Caron PUH with a layer of 1 Million's sweet spiciness. Daytime, neutral-to-cool weather wear. "Like"

"Fresh from the barbershop or fly from the beauty salon." A great nostalgia feeling from shaving lather of long ago. Old coffee mug and a short application brush. Surrounding by the hurried snip snip of scissors in motion. Hot towel at the ready once the straight razor is finished. I really like it. Great scent, ok longevity. Wish it projected more. But, for the price, who cares. Keep spraying all day.

A very unique smelling scent. Aromatic old skool shaving foam vibes with some modern woods and vanilla. It's like it circles above your head taking turns smelling like an old and then a new scent style during your daily routine. Lasts a good amount of time. Definitely good value for money. 30 years over would definitely appreciate this more.

Off the bat: first sprays smell very similar to Ramz Lataffa, due to the lavender, vanilla and amber (sweet, slightly floral scent). It is a bit more mature than Ramz as that one is overly sweet, so sweet that it feels like it is for the younger generations. Will revise my review if the scent macerates into something else...

Peppery lavender and woody drydown. I like it. It smell good on top and base. I have several Armaf's and quality is not a problem with any, and I do not love them all. Derby Clubhouse is very good for about 5 hours. 8/10 for a scale I believe there is a strong iso super e scent in this.

Powdery lavender bomb with balancing woody & vanilla facets. Leans much sweeter than a classic fougere, sticks on the skin. Best in warm weather, but can definitely be enjoyed all year round.

Many of my female friends just describe this as Men’s cologne. Nothing too special. This smells just how you’d picture your basic cologne. Not great but not bad.

Actually and surprisingly very very nice... Heavy lavender but can’t say it reminds me of anything specificaly.

A nice blend of lavender and vanilla with some patchouli. Old school but nice.

This has two distinct stages. The opening contains a lush lavender, patchouli, and bergamot blanket over the cedar. That all goes away during the drydown, when those lovely, dignified tones disappear, to be replaced by a cedar, tonka, ambery musk that is very close to Stetson original. The first blast is great, but the drydown is generic, barbershop masculinity from the 70s-80s.

i dont like it poor performance

Maybe I was unlucky with the batch (on the box 01/2024) but I can not smell them at all, very small projection, for the first hour smells like the most common shaving foam, after it goes to a faint vanilla cream smell, decided to return it back, imho not worth 18 euros. If the projection was more noticeable I would have thought about it.

Lavender bomb, and I mean BOMB. It is EXTREMELY potent and I can't get past it in the opening. Not for me.

Derby Club House OG is a spicy aromatic. This is a fragrance that really seeks to take you back to the Varsity Football era circa 1940. This is like something the captain of the football team would have worn back then. It's dark and musky, warm and loud, spicy and commanding. Aggressive, mature, and suggestively of high sport (in that time). I definitely don't get any similarities between this and Bois du Portugal. And after smelling this, it's clear that this was probably never intended as a clone of Bois du Portugal either, but moreso that was just some misinterpretation (or misinformation) that people came up with. The main notes I get are—Black Amber, Blackwood, a synthetic Indonesian Oud, and a hard brush of lavender and spices (particularly Black Liqourice). It's literally all there together front and center, and so domineering, even with just one spray. Just a dab will do ya—I guess is the gig here. A classic one-liner from back in the day, and I fear the only way of making this fragrance viable to wear. Even then, one should note the aroma profile here is a very vintage essence. Warm, musky, tangy, and abrasive—with the heady amber, woods, and black liqourice. The sense of masculinity back then was so mind-bending. I wouldn't expect this to be attractive to any modern sense of style or masculinity. This is very much like any other vintage fragrance—exclusively for people with ties to the past. And given the qualities of this formula, with the passion of an extremist.

A true lavender bomb. Shocked at the quality and quantity of smooth lavender as it plays off vanilla, tonka bean and a touch of bergamot. Some cedar in the dry down but the lavender is the star here. It presents as an old school barbershop scent but it’s not really spicy enough. No pepper or clove. No sharp citrus opening. Nothing challenging. I bought out of curiosity, I’ve been on a barbershop roll lately, and really didn’t expect much for the price. If anything I expected it would be a nightmare. Instead, this could be a really nice office scent. If your skin type takes to lavender the way mine does then I think you owe it to yourself to spend the $20/100ml to try it. This turned out to be a very pleasant surprise. Edit: this is a layering king.

An unashamedly masculine and old-fashioned fragrance with amber, lavender, pepper, spices and a constant low hum of a boozy note. The boozy note isn't boozy in the way that cheap cologne has an alcohol-type opening but rather it reminds me of Amaretto (does anyone else out there smell this?) or possibly bay rum - another element which makes it reminiscent of the barbershop. Not a particularly or unique fragrance but very, very pleasant - uplifting, good value and with good staying power. Something you would have noticed your well-traveled uncle wearing when he visited back in the day.

Beautiful scent for an amazing price. I agree with previous reviews on the following points: it's barber shop:ey, it dries down into a sweet and slightly woody vanilla, I get 6-8 hours projection, it's not offensive and it's def got some bay rum feeling to it in the background. I disagree with this being a lavender bomb. It's noticeable lavender in the opening, but theres def perfumes out there that has more harsh and noticeable lavender. I get almost zero lavender 1 hour in. Great scent. Will buy again.

Old timer frag, something i’d expect an old clean shaven doctor to wear. Old meaning not 80 but like 40ish people. Inoffensive; starts of with a lush lavender, midnotes have that lavender going strong with the addition of wood and spices, but it’s a bit vague there- since you can’t make out specific wood/spice notes (Eg, cedar/cardamom) Dry down has a nice vanilla without being too sweet. Has a bit of a barbershoppy feel to it but completely different to the OGs like drakkar noir/ azzaro pH

A lavender masterpiece. Old school but not dated. Doesn’t smell like creed’s bdp at all. To me the creed has similar vibes to Polo Green Cologne. This one is more like Lalique Lion but better. It has better quality ingredients and lasts a bit longer. It is more woodsy than the Lalique and has a bit more prominent sweet notes but it is not a sweet fragrance. I’m really glad I bought it. But if you happen the Lalique and don’t mind the synthetic vibe the Armaf might be redundant.

This one is possibly been reformulated since the previous comments and ratings and does not smell to me like any of the above listed especially Bois du Portugal. I have left this on my skin for about 1 hour now and it reminds me a little of Givenchy Pi but only in some very slight ways as it smells nothing alike during the opening, i would be curious to know what this actually is a clone of though.

It has a nice, light, refined feeling with just a touch of smokiness. Elegant. But, as another user noted, it is extremely light. Couple sprays and I couldn’t even smell it on me at all. Just checked the box and my batch is also from 01/2024. So, reading other reviews makes me wonder if it actually has more to offer and this batch is problematic.

Okay...so here's my review: I like it but I don't love it. It reminds me of a holiday fragrance. It's unique and powerful. Kinda spicy...Kinda warm...Kinda deck the halls. 7/10

In all honesty do not buy this fragrance because it contains the chemical compounds cause allergies and tooth pain. Do not west your money on perfume hurt your health.

Just mark the notes , it has similarity with RASASI ROYALE BLUE ... No similarity with La male ....no sweet notes and marine notes though .

All i can smell is the lavender and a very overpowering Pepper note that last all day ... not pleasing at all. Don't blind buy it.

This is a wonderful fragrance and I like it. Reminds me of Creed Bois de Portugal

It is by no means similar to Creed. Come on guys this is a ripoff Le male.

This is Bois du Portugal in a different bottle.... excellent perfume

This is definitely a clone of PDM Darley now doubt about it

What an amazing scent, very elegant, very mature.