La Collection Couturier Parfumeur Mitzah

Deep in the most ancient part of Istanbul, a honey yellow Turkish crescent moon of midnight creeps over the walls of the Topkapi palace. Summer dreams on the Bosporus are heady with the heavy exotic fragrances of the Grand Bazaar that linger in the serpentine streets as they waft toward the incense filled gardens on the edge of the city. In such gardens on just such a night as this lovers have met ever since scandalous Theadora danced before the infatuated Emperor Justinian at the dawn of Byzantium. Rare and sensuous this night is filled with promise and sweet delights of desire tinged with danger. Women of ripe beauty peek in the moon glow from behind screens of carved ebony. They whisper to one another that the night is never long enough when He is near and always unending and eternal when he is not. That is the song of longing, of loves promise never fulfilled. Desire and dust wrapped in silk put away to save for the thing that can never really be. It is the dream of love. This is all and everything I have found in the glorious perfume from Dior called Mitzah. Named for Christian Dior’s muse and friend Mitzah Bricard it is heady and hypnotic but never overwhelming. It is what I would call deep and multi layered in its design, a real stunner for me that never shouts but rather insinuates and seduces the one who wears it. And in so doing casts a spell of enchantment beyond the wrist, or from behind the ear out into a waiting world of yes. Mitzah opens in a temple garden loaded with incense where a smooth coriander feeds and supports an ethereal velvet red rose. Then suddenly oriental fresh spices scatter across the skin as if spilled from huge terracotta jars in the bazaar at Alexandria. It is so well made that the middle notes slowly unfurl like Cleopatra wrapped in an oriental rug that lay for years on the floor of a cinnamon warehouse. The highly erotic labdanum snakes over this rug and licks like a cat the creamy warm vanilla within this bowl of golden scent. You dare not close your eyes or you will be lost in a sumptuous whirlpool. There is a long lazy luxurious slow stretching dry down where the thick honey still sticks to the honey comb and drips down over a layer of pungent patchouli. All of this majesty and resplendency is carried on the remaining whisper of that first incense from ancient temples dedicated to pagan gods of love. Mitzah has a stable and long lasting silage that speaks of quality and lasts on my skin a good seven to nine hours. It comes on strong but don’t let that scare you. It is an oriental with a genteel soul and the longer it lays languorously on the skin the softer it becomes. It never powders down but rather wafts on with that incredible smoky slightly sweet incense. Mitzah is listed as a woman’s fragrance but in my experience it is remarkably masculine in a smart Near Eastern manner. When I wear it men invariably ask me what it is and where they can get a bottle. Mitzah is a sly seducer that works well on a man and is his equal on a woman and will blend with both chemistries. The chemistry it inspires is of skin upon skin that sparks the heart to a sweet madness. This meeting is in fact the Algerian love knot fragrance that two lovers could wear. Smelling of each other when they are apart and bending into a kiss of fragrance when they meet. FIVE GOLD STARS *****

Swish, swish, swish. That's me sashaying past you, with absolutely maximum attitude, just so that you can get a beautiful waft of this gorgeous thing I've got on. I was lucky to get 0.5ml of this in a samples swap - thrilled to meet it, as I'd read so much from its fans - and can absolutely see what all the fuss was about. Because this is just hip-swinging, jaw-droppingly good, no matter your gender or your usual perfume 'home base', in my view. Tour de FORCE, baby! It's a lot sweeter, more femme and more vanilla-centric than my usual turf, that's for sure, but all so incredibly well-balanced and fine-tuned that it just leaves me drooling and begging for more. The woody-mellow dryness of coriander and cistus make it almost a warm oriental; the honey and rose aren't allowed to cloy; the vanilla is classy and dry, not harsh and fakey-cakey. The patchouli's mild and manageable, not the dark/bitter/stinky/hippy kind, and kept to a minimum. On my skin, something in the mix somehow produces a note of freshness that's almost citric, almost-floral, but obviously isn't either. Overall it's almost unbelievably classy and attractive - even when playing so hard against my usual prejudices. Perfectly unisex and with really solid longevity: it rules the room on first spray, when the spice and incense are up front and thrillingly complex, but is still very much present at up to 9h in (forever, on my skin) and although it's mellowed down to a softer, more golden amber-vanilla, it's still distinctive and nuanced enough to be interesting. Wearing this is like watching one icon after another line up in sync on a fruit machine - ding! ding! ding! - because one aspect after another after another is a winner. I nit-pick for a living, I am fussy about 'fumes and I have weird taste ... and still I can find no fault with it. Not one. Just frankly spectacular. Regal. Masterful. If you ever find an old bottle of this abandoned in a millionaire aunt's estate, or a junk sale, or even on eBay, I say JUMP. You're so unlikely to be disappointed. Whenever I wear Mitzah I feel calmed and centred and capable of taking charge and acting like an adult. When you are wearing this, everything is going to be OK. (Embarassingly: I keep confusing its name with the Hebrew word MITZVAH, i.e. commandment, good conduct, good deed, like in bar/bat mitzvahs. There's no link. But my confusion is understandable because this Mitzah is, in every possible sense, a GOOD GOOD THING. )

Mitzah is probably my favourite perfume from the Dior Prive line. Feve,Ambre Nuit and Bois D'Argent are my other faves but this is on another level for me. I have a weakness for Incense and amber notes and if you are looking for a sweet incense fragrance, for my money, this is just about as good as it gets. Upon first spray, Mitzah gives you a solid albeit short lived hit of spice, the coriander and the spice notes mentioned with a hint of bitterness. The heart is where this gorgeous frag truly comes alive with the cinnamon, incense sweetened by the rose, vanilla and honey. The dry down is also a warm balsamic labdanum and patchouli mingling with the Incense. Lots of notes mentioned but to summarize, I would say this is a sweetish cinnamon Incense frag. Some frags just have their notes tied up in beautiful harmony and this is one of those, every note in perfect balance with the other. For me this is nosegasm in a bottle every time I sniff it. Nothing More I can add to that regarding the smell. Projection on this is what I would call in the "Classy" range. Stays within arms reach but anyone who comes close to you gets strong whiffs which is what you need most of the time. Longevity like most of the heavier frags in the Dior Prive line is par excellence. I routinely get 10 hours or more with 3-4 sprays. In conclusion, I will say this is a fragrance that every Perfume lover needs to get their nose on at least once. Even if you end up not liking it, it will have given your nose an education. If you like Incense, Amber, or honey notes, Mitzah is a no brainer. 9/10

Love at first smell: Dior Mitzah is a case where the reality of this now-discontinued Dior Privee fan favorite was met by reality. Cinnamon, incense, amber, honey, and vanilla make up the main portrait of the fragrance. Rose is involved but not prominent and the coriander is similarly used in only a small quantity, fortunately. Perhaps the honey and amber are most dominant for me in the blend, which stays relatively linear, but the cinnamon and vanilla contribute to the gourmand and the incense adds its characteristic ashy darkness to the mix that grounds the otherwise foody mix in something less playful. Mitzah is smoky, sweet, and slightly spicy. While it leans toward cold weather due to the incense and cinnamon, this certainly strikes me as something that could be worn in warm weather, as well, perhaps simply with fewer sprays. Performance is excellent, as a small sampling of this on my wrists projected significantly for several hours and then closer for some hours beyond that. Attributing value to this, given its discontinued and increasingly rare status, is difficult, as prices seem to soar to double the current Dior Prive costs ($210 for 125ml) on the secondary market, but if you love it, and even this smallest offered bottle is a big one, it can surely last as long as you want it to. Scent Split is where I obtained my sample, so I'd like to credit them with still offering this, along with a variety of other discontinued scents from a handful of houses. 10 out of 10

I've had this fragrance since 2017 now and rarely wear it. I have 2 large bottles, 1 new and 1 90% full. Mostly, I just use 1 spray every few weeks to enjoy the scent. What I find very interesting is that the scent of this fragrance has evolved since I first purchased it. I remember when I first got these bottles from Dior, I opened one in-store and shared a sample with the store manager. To be honest, we were both struck by the overload of cinnamon that hit us. I don't think either one of us was too impressed. That initial blast of cinnamon was something I tolerated until the scent dried down. Not the case anymore. As of now, 2020, the cinnamon has blended in with the other notes. The initial spray down still has cinnamon but you get as much of it as you do of the patchouli, amber, incense, vanilla, honey, rose, cardamom. I am amazed at how well balanced this fragrance is now. The dry down is even more spectacular but I can now enjoy this from beginning to end. The name fits, Mitzah. Just like a woman, or a bottle of fine wine, gets better with age. This is now something I would compare to coromandel or a more intense version of amber nuit. Delicious, beautiful, complex, warm, inviting, comforting, rich scent. I'm amazed by how much the scent has evolved inside the bottle.

Mitzah is a TOUR DE FORCE in how to do a warm spicy-sweet oriental. Take notes, this is how it’s done. I LOVE the spicy-ambery-vanilla-incensed-woods. Adore the hit of cinnamon. Feels like there’s a bit of rose elixir holding all the dry spices together in the middle. But this isn’t rosy, just that rose oil-elixir vibe that adds a roundness. Everyone mentions honey but I don’t really get honey. There is nothing else as good as Mitzah. People mention Ambre Sultan but that’s a dry, crusty bit of skeleton amber & bay leaves to me. MFK Grand Soir is also compared but that’s just the usual overload of synthetic aroma chemicals and fatty musks that he does. Mitzah is the King/Queen of them all. My bottle is from 2011, and it’s enormous, so I hope to never need to purchase another. I shudder to think it’s been reformulated. Hoping to never need to repurchase to find out. ✨10/10 A+++ Absolutely Perfect ✨ Mitzah is my top favorite autumn/winter oriental for about 10 years running. There was another Dior Privee called Cologne Blanche which was an almonds-citrus-herbal-beauty that I absolutely loved and was discontinued long ago. Anyone have a lead on Cologne Blanche please PM me! Update Oct 2022; got a bottle of Cologne Blanche with the reissue, all set :)

I don't know how vintage my decant is (got it from a colllector in Jakarta), but I get a very animalic amber reminiscent of MFK APLS, but prettier, smoother, and creamier. If it's the top that's supposed to be the animalic - smoke and coriander dipped in raw honey, with a bit of patchouli and rose on the side - then that lasts much longer on me than usual, like hours. I initially thought it's linear and stays that way, until about 6 hours in and I was getting a whiff of a beautiful creamy spiced vanilla, and to my surprise, it was indeed Mitzah. That was the heart -- and it's heavenly. The animalic is still there, but different now; the coriander, patchouli, and rose is just a shadow, smoke took a backseat, and a raunchy amber and vanilla are leading the party. It's subdued, soft, but has a bit of a skank underneath that I love. The next morning that creamy, skanky vanilla is still there, I think more powdery and creamy even, and it makes me want to go back to bed. I wish this was still available in smaller bottles, as I would definitely buy one in 50 or even 100. But I have no idea what to do with a 250mL bottle of this if I have the chance to have it bought in Paris. Maybe find someone to split it with...

I was fortunate to receive a sample of this perfume from a friend. First and foremost, this is a unisex scent, no question about it. Guys, don't be afraid of this one, it works very well on men's skin. Secondly, I come so close to wanting to call this a masterpiece. It's one of the best perfumes I've tried in ages. Mitzah grabs you by the shirt collars immediately with a sweet and gently spicy opening. I first detect coriander and labdanum, and bright hints of rose and a melange of spices. About an hour or two later, this astounding middle appears: warm wood, cool incense, smoldering nuts and berries, rubbed patchouli leaves. Not far after begins the epically long ending, where honey/beeswax plays the solo, surrounded by the echoes of other spices. Rose is prominent in the base notes, too. Every element of this perfume slides in a long horizontal line from one to the other so the experience lasts a very long time, and its changes are subtle, smooth and slow... like the unfurling of an enormous flag in a gentle wind. There is a deep red heart to this perfume, hinted at by it's gentle rose color. Such a careful hand combined these elements into a rich scent experience - sublimely stunning.

Mitzah is argubly the best in La Collection of Dior, an inviting incensy amber fragrance. The only issue is that it seems unnecessary to be FB worthy given Serge Lutens Ambre Sultan is a cheapie everywhere or even its iteration, i.e. Armani Ambre Orient, while Mitzah is so damn hard to find a bottle outside of France due to its weird marketing strategy. FIY, if you are familiar with Ambre Sultan or Ambre Orient, think about that Ambre Orient is much of Ambre Sultan with a few drops of Encens Satin by Armani (or the base notes of L'Air du Desert Marocain by Tauer), and similarly Mitzah is much of Ambre Sultan with a touch of SPDV by Guerlain (or the base notes of Coromandel, especially the EDP version). Rating: 8/10 (it would be 9.5/10 if there was no Ambre Sultan in this world) Note: Mizah, Eau Noire, Cuir Cannage and Granville are still in production but sell on the France market exclusively. Go check the Dior website in French.

Dior Mitzah (2010) - formidable elegance - #francoisdemachy created a fragrance from Christian Dior’s muse Mitzah Bricard. A masterpiece of a scent - Incense, Cinnamon, Amber resins, Coriander, Cardamom, Patchouli. I would say a more opulent Ambre Nuit. But how does the fragrance feel. It could be best described by a quote from an article by bbc, “She was a living incarnation of elegance. “Madame Bricard is one of those people,” Dior writes, “increasingly rare, who make elegance their sole raison d’être. Gazing at life out of the windows of the Ritz, so to speak, she is superbly indifferent to such mundane concerns as politics, finance or social change. Her moods, her extremes of behaviour, her faults, her entrances, her late appearances, her theatricality, her mode of speech, her unorthodox manner of dress, her jewels, in short her presence, bring the touch of absolute elegance so necessary to the fashion house.”

Ok this is definitely in my top 10. Its all the more strange as I had a decant of this a few years back. Why didnt it transfix me then with its deliciousness. I haven't smelt anything in ages that drives me this potty. This stuff is just so addictive. I might even put it up there with my no 1 Coromandel. I am intrigued that others see a resemblance to Lubin Akkad which I own and love. They share notes but sadly not much of a resemblance for me. If there was then I wouldn't have bothered finding Mitzah. Ok, it's not ground breaking but God it's done beautifully. Incense is king here and it creates magic with honey and cinnamon. Lots of warm resinous labdanum. Enough pepper to accent the notes. I get good longevity and sillage. Very unisex

Okay, to the reviewer about 10 below this one, I see NO SIMILARITIES between Mitzah and Tobacco Oud For starters, Mitzah has neither tobacco or oud in it and TO has no amber. What I liken this to is part Myrrhe Imperial by Armani Privee, part L'eau de Ambre Extreme by L'artisan with a touch of 'femininity' added In short, it's a heavy amber with vanilla and spice concoction, combined to make a really beautiful, 'deep' unisex perfume Simply stunning with fantastic performance. Wish the bottle sizes were smaller and more affordable. $800 is just too much for any perfume but if I could get it on the cheap, I would bathe in this gorgeous fragrance! Getting impossible to find now too. A real favorite of mine and always will be.

Comparing Mitzah, Serge Luten's Amber Sultan (OG) and Tom Ford's Amber Absolute (OG), Mitzah tops the list. It is well-rounded, refined while not losing the "amber" theme. Amber Absolute has a strong frankincense note tied to amber - giving it a rather metallic campfire vibe to it. Amber Sultan has a leafy note (smells like basil leaf or is it bay leaf & patchouli touch to its ambery note. I'm actually glad they ain't a complete re-hash of each other but they have a unique DNA of their own. If I were to rank them, Amber Absolute sits at the bottom, followed by Amber Sultan and then Mitzah. The more I revisit Mitzah, I'm getting this Feve Delicieuse with amber attached to its top & base notes vibe. I love it!

Mitzah is a perfectly blended incense and light rose oriental beauty. Gently spiced, smoky and slightly sweet. It's sumptuous and rich in an elegant, understated way. This is not loud at all. I love Youth Dew and Opium but see absolutely no resemblance to Mitzah except for the fact that they're all Orientals. Sillage here is modest to soft. Mitzah doesn't shout, she whispers in a soft sexy seductive way. For me longevity is all day. I feel like a woman wearing this, but I can easily imagine it on a man too. I'm happy to have discovered that the discontinuation rumours were not correct - Mitzah is and has been (with periodic stock outages) available from Dior France.

I was lucky enough to get a bottle from Harrods via Paris a couple of years ago. It’s such a beautiful scent. Very evocative. Hence why it’s called a masterpiece. Some people call it a beast. Other say it’s most a skin scent. I’d have to agree with the later. Such as shame it doesn’t last more or project. For those pining after this scent, check out Dior ambre nuit espirit. It’s literally Mitzah minus the rose. But much stronger and long lasting. Having said that you could probably recreate this using the esprit, mfk absolute pour le Soir, ambre sultan and maybe tobacco honey from Guerlain. A spray of each.

In retrospect, I probably didn't need to buy this given that I already have Ambre Sultan, but the Dior salesman really rocked, and I love frankincense. It kind of reminded me of my beloved Aveda pure-fumes from the 90's. This has a very nice longevity and is probably a little less weird than Ambre Sultan. The Dior salesman said something about how they were having trouble sourcing the frankincense, whether true or not, it totally worked on me in that it made me want to buy immediately. I just love the way this note is rendered in this particular perfume.

Oh, how I love thee... Sampled from a tiny vial, this scent is bound to become my signature once I receive the full bottle! This is amber, this is incense, this is beauty and comfort, sophistication and understatement. Very similar to Ambre Sultan indeed, it is more feminine, elegant and classy. Great lasting power, too. Incredible, simply incredible. Oh, and yes, a great deal, too! 8.4 oz=250 ml for $250 - that's less than $30 per 1 oz (30 ml) I got my stash now that it's discontinued! :) Update: this perfume is a DRUG. I am officially addicted.

I am lucky enough to have1/2 a liter of this juice both in the rotation and sitting in my makeshift storage. I need to wear it more to get an accurate assessment bc it is quite complex, will update later when it cools down outside. I did layer 2 sprays with 5 of Bois D'Argent one time and it was a pleasant mix. This is the most complex fragrance that I own. The dry down is very different from what you just during the initial spray. I can see what this is a holy grail for frag heads.

FWIW, as of this last week of May 2017 Mitzah is still available from Dior in France. Over the last 2 years it's been available there though occasionally out of stock while waiting for materials (according to Dior) while the discontinued story grows here. Many 'exclusive' fragrances are following the trend of selling all or most of the line in France/Europe so it's worth looking at their French website rather than selecting U.S. which will probably direct you to a retail partner.

Mitzah is a very seamlessly blended amber perfume. Incense, rose, cardamom, cinnamon & honey. It’s great stuff for the colder months. Yet light & transparent enough to be enjoyed in spring or fall. I’m guessing it would be a bit heavy in warmer weather. It has a luminous quality. I get about 8 hours of close to the skin wear. One of the better fragrances I’ve tried from Dior. Highly recommend for lovers of a sweeter amber fragrance profile. 10/10