Damasq

Damasq is the very best of Dawn's new rose offerings, and maybe the best of any perfumer's new rose offerings. I'd ordered a sample, and within 5 minutes of smelling it I ordered a 30ml bottle. The short description off the site lures you in: "A glorious deep red Damask rose, with gilded edges of pure gold. Luxurious, resinous, and velvety in every respect." It's every bit of that, heavy on the resinous and velvety. It's a Middle-Eastern inspired fragrance, a strong rose scent, smelling like multi-petaled once blooming antique damask roses, and heavy on the incense and patchouli. Nothing sweet or cloying or gooey or frothy here. You won't be feeling like a giggly teenager wearing this; Damasq is an adult woman's scent. Two minutes later: I just realized there is another review of this, and golly, I don't smell raspberry at all. And thank heavens, I'm not a fan on raspberry in perfumes. I think there's more geranium in Damasq than there is raspberry, if raspberry is there at all.

I'm not the biggest rose fan in the world so I wouldn't have selected it myself, but Damasq is great. So natural, and almost edible; what I like to call gently complex. It's obviously multilayered, but not in a way that makes your head hurt trying to figure out what's going on. "Well-blended" is an overused term, but this really is. A rich, luxurious rose that evokes afternoon tea in a lush garden. It's obviously rose, but you know there are more flowers behind the scenes than just rose. I'm not much of a fan of patch either, but I don't even notice it, it's just contributing to the sturdy yet feminine base. I think it's the vanilla and raspberry which are really making this work for me. There's something here that reminds me of 100Bon Amaretto & Framboise Poudree, but like if it was still stuck on you from yesterday, and today you put on a high-end rose perfume. Honey takes a while to reveal itself but once it does, it pulls the scent together nicely. That may make Damasq sound sweet, but I promise it is only slightly so. The longevity and throw leave a little to be desired, though it's not really surprising with how natural it is. There's nothing headache-y here at all.

I am not a rose perfume fan, not because I don't like the scent but because it just doesn't quite fit my style. Usually there's a familiar "rose perfume" or "rose scented soap" scent that is comforting and pleasant and reminds me of older female relatives but which I wouldn't personally wear. Damasq isn't like those exactly. Instead of smelling like "rose scent" it smells exactly like putting your nose up to a beautiful red rose. There is no perfumey texture, just the sensation of breathing through fresh garden air with a rose held up to your face. The raspberry is very much present but it doesn't stand out as itself - it's part of the rose, in the way that roses can often have fruity notes. I don't pick up any of the other listed notes on their own but perhaps they are there as scaffolding.

120 I love a rose and raspberry combo. This one does a descent job with the raspberry note blending with the rose, yet I can pick out the sweet raspberry. I am not a big fan of musky (the patchouli note could be left out, since it only adds to giving this rose a musky feel), but this grew on me and is very natural smelling. The raspberry part won me over. 8/10 warm, lightly tart and sweet, berry rose.

A beautiful and lush amber rose, with the complex elements of natural perfumery—tobacco, spicy green notes, and fresh roses—all enveloped in an amber that carries a waxy, beeswax-like sensuality. However, the sillage of this fragrance can only be described as painfully weak...