Kurokami

Frankly, this has jumped into contention as one of, if not my favorite scents in my collection, competing waft for waft with Bortnikoff’s Triad, but where Triad zeros in on a contemplative rose de mai/ oud combination, this perfume perfects an entirely new composition of rose for me. Kurokami starts on my skin with clean, juicy, and herbal clementines, grapefruits, and oranges, but quickly opens up into an airy, creamy, rose masterpiece. The Japanese rose absolute and rose otto are more ethereal, visceral, and mysterious than a typical rose, and, to me, smell akin to a cloud of purple and white rose petals, with a distinct lack of pink rose, floating peacefully in the air next to me. As Kurokami dries down, the palisander and sandalwood really start to show their faces. Throughout the day, I have been greeted with wafts of white woods and rose whenever my skin moves through the air, or heats up. I also cannot believe how long this is lasting on my skin. I’m going into hour 6, and Kurokami is humming along perfectly. This is certainly a mentally cleansing and healing perfume. Cheers! PS: This is now available in the US on Luckyscent!!!!! Thanks to rbalkris for introducing me to this house!

Elegance in a bottle. Opens with juicy mandarin orange, and fresh rose similar to Rose L’Orange by April Aromatics. The rose here though has more presence than in AA, and fresher too almost green. The rose in AA smells more like potpourri whereas this smells like freshly picked rose petals you crushed in your fingers and sniff the oily residue. It is classy and much more natural. Then, you start to smell the palisander which is deeply resinous and rich, almost acting like oud, very strong smelling varnished wood. The jasmine sweetens it and bridges the bright fresh opening with the very heavy woody base notes. Spikenard adds a minty herbaceous touch lightly here and there. The jasmine fruity molecules dissolve into languid, indoles. The longevity is excellent, and the projection is elegant - just a haze above skin level. Perfection. It’s rare to actually sniff the pyramid notes and experience them in a flowing, graceful progression. Highly recommend trying if you like the scent of fresh wild rose oil, enjoy indolic jasmine, and deep woods.

Di Ser Kurokami (unknown release date) - Rose Jasmine - @diser.essentia ‘s Shinohara-san’s perfumes is one my best kept secrets. Would love them to get more recognition. An all-natural, farm to bottle perfume. But I can smell the work that the perfumer placed by probably refining the rose-jasmine balance hundreds of times. This starts with a juicy citrus of Clementines, Orange and Grapefruit. The rose & spikenard comes out quickly that lends to a rosey-herbal-camphor accord that I have never smelled before. The freshness of the rose meshes with a slightly indolic Jasmine and further rounded by Sandalwood and Rosewood.

After the citrus blast, it reminds me a lot of Opulence, a favorite from an U.S. based independent natural perfumer JoAnne Bassett; however, after side by side comparison, there are noticeable differences—This is brighter, sweeter, and more tangy while Opulence is more "mid-bottom heavy" with an almost soapy orange blossom & ambergris.

Soft, natural, and very elegant. The rose and citrus are lush without being overbearingly sweet, and there's something smooth and maybe even creamy going on in the background, I'm guessing from the jasmine and sandalwood? Something about this overall makes it smell sleek and glossy, maybe even "oily" but in good way

Kurokami (Japanese for beautiful black hair, an ode to Japanese beauty) is an ode to a lovely Japanese Rose. The perfumer surrounds natural Japanese Rose extract with subtle notes of sandalwood, rosewood, grapefruit, clementine and jatamansi in this chypre-style composition that is quite breathtaking. It is an immediate transport to a dewy fragrant floral garden. Unisex (slight feminine) with moderate to good projection and longevity. Beautifully blended. Subtle and evocative. Enjoy!

This is a mild fragrance, stays close to the skin. It's very well balanced; the fruity and the floral never overwhelm each other but instead compliment each other nicely. The orange/clementine don't stick around as long as the florals, and to my nose, the floral is more defined by the jasmine than the rose. The effect is not unlike a nice cup of jasmine tea with some orange peel.

This is a lot like a softer version of my vintage ~1960s bottle of Joy extrait? I’m sure that’s a compliment to the materials, but unfortunately the aforementioned joy doesn’t work on me either. I always assumed it was the ancient civet...but maybe it’s the rose?!

I get a little bit of orange in the opening quickly followed up by loud rose notes. As it dries down rose, rose and rose followed by more rose. Smells like this was made with 99.999% rose with .001% orange.

Accidentally spilled half the Luckyscents vial down my wrist, but still not as lingering as you might expect. Very soft, on the contrary. Smells like a orange cream soda to me. Which I guess is pleasant, but not $250 for 33mL level pleasant. A few hours later, the orange cream soda fades into a rose note uncannily similar to the drydown in Diptyque's Oud Palao, but much lighter in staying power.

Meh this combo of citruses and rose to me smells like Flinstones vitamins. Or a push pop. Not really my jam. But I appreciate the quality ingredients. 6/10.

Quite simply one of the best florals I have ever experienced. i truly wish this was available in the U.S