Yasep

The base of Yasep smells exactly like high grade Indian Motia Attar, which is made using sandalwood, musk and jasmine. It is an amazing achievement to get the deer musk and Mysore notes so close to real! I have some high grade examples of these materials and Yasep could fool me into thinking it's built on a base of real Motia. The other notes compliment and fill out the base so the Motia accord is always the star of the show. This means less modern aromachemicals and a more natural, more laid-back feel vs, for example, Tygar. I get decent longevity and modest projection from Yasep, it's elegant and a bit more restrained than average. All of the Le Gemmes by Jacques Cavallier are excellent, this is one of the best but I can also see it hard to appreciate. In some ways this is one for fragrance nerds as it takes some time and experience to appreciate fully process the complexity of sandalwood and musk. Not that Yasep is all-natural or anything, but if you aren't familiar with real, natural ingredients than it's harder to appreciate the quality of the recreation in Yasep. It might do well in Indian and Arab markets with customers who are more familiar with the smell. It'd be great for those looking for a more restrained scent of the highest quality too, it's very versatile and mass appealing. If you're in the US you can get Yasep for a very reasonable price right now, I'd say it's a safe blind buy, lol.

Albeit I stand by my initials words on this, I grossly under sold the point of how GOOD this is. I typically don't drop the "sexy" word when describing a fragrance, but, man, there are little other words I can use to describe what it is. The orange in here is so real and juicy and the vetiver is lending this earthiness to the fragrance that is out of this world in the dry down. Disclaimer: the opening can leave one with the distinct impression that this may lean feminine and is too loud and unbalanced. I mean the orange is like a bomb in the opening as well as the sandalwood. Initially those two notes do fight it out and are admittedly LOUD. But as it settles...my oh my... This becomes decidedly masculine and you'll find yourself lifting your shirt just to smell it again (and again) to confirm that the wafts you're getting is in fact emanating from your person's. Every one that I've smelled from this line has over exceeded my expectations. A fantastic line of masculine, chic and ritzy fragrances. Too bad they're so exclusionarily expensive... That's not a word but you get the point lol

Red, warm and beautiful masculine musk. It's hard to describe it as anything else, although it's quite abstract. I could best compare it to an amber-y blood orange. In the depths, a beautiful sandalwood. Particularly in the opening, a beautiful sichuan pepper mixed with mandarin orange. I don't give a lot of my personal input in this regard, but I would say you get beautiful openings from fragrances like these due to the amazing, natural fragrances used. However, naturals only last so long, and can't compare wit the lasting power of aroma-chemicals. So here, you have beautiful sichuan in the opening, but aroma-chemical musks (obviously, since real musk is prohibited to trade anyways) that take over and carry the fragrance for it's well above average life cycle.

What was I thinking? Ok, this was a blind buy after reading some reviews. I bought Gyan and Tygar and thought this would be a winner for me too. How could I go wrong with a Musky Sandalwood with fresh spices? Well, on me this was a blast of floral cucumber with a powdery dry down. For the price (ugh?) I gave this fragrance an honest try. I gave up and gave it to my daughter. Then it happened. She walked by me and her silage was amazing! I knew actually what she was wearing ... Yasep! The fragrance must have matured into a fresh ambery sandalwood with a sweet vetiver background. Not sure why this didn't work for me but it's amazing on her.

Apparently la gemme line takes inspiration from middle eastern scents and as a middle easterner this fragrance reminds me of a fruit gum I used to have as a kid. Mouthwatering mandarin, a creamy sandalwood, and a musk that gives it a rounded marshmallow like edibility. Smells like a DNA that should be prevalent in the market but it’s not. Strong longevity with soft projection (just like the man that would be wearing it). It’s quite linear, every time I spray it Marvin Gaye’s version of Sunny starts playing. I love this fragrance but no matter how natural it smells or how cool the bottle looks on my shelf, the asking price is ridiculous.