Le Septieme Parfum

The opening is just that,the opening. Very beautiful and fizzy but it lasts like 10 minutes. Then all the dirty dry notes kick in. Very earthy,smoky and downright unappealing. Vetiver and smoke are very apparent on my skin with patchouli, oud and some woods. Encre Noire is known for being the King of rainy day scents well this is the niche equal.

I've been getting into Coolife, and so far the feature I appreciate most is the house's balance of opposing qualities. Septieme is among the best of them, calibrating its fresh and heavily resinous aspects beautifully. The combination of bracing juniper and citrus atop a bed of dense and heavy woods and smoke is appealing. My first impression was that it's more feminine than I expected, but that's wrong. It's masculine-leaning unisex, but I love it so much on my skin that I interpreted it as feminine; it's the kind of fragrance that enhances the wearer's own style. Though it doesn't smell similar, it has a quality that reminds me of Penhaligon's Elixir, both expansive and cloistered. Le Septieme is very good.

The juniper (together with frankincense) is sharp, peppery, minty, and cooling, sitting on top of a smoky-woody-earthy-musky base (in order of intensity) and that nutty "oud"--A dry masculine woody fragrance (with some depth) that can easily be overlooked. The orange-amber-jasmines trio becomes more apparent in the drydown, which makes it more balanced and worthy of a second-sniff.