Cabochard Parfum

My friend mentioned this during one of our long conversations about fragrances last week and I absolutely had to try it. I was drawn in by the asafoetida note purely because I am a long time student of Indian cuisine. I have eaten asafoetida daily since July, in fact. I found a vintage EDP on ebay and when it got here and I opened the bottle I was terrified. In the bottle it smelled like an Avon wearer's wet dream. Instead of screaming and running out the room I very gently dabbed a bit on my wrists, rubbed them together and waited. For the first 15 minutes it lit up every single circuit in my olfactory system in the most glorious way possible. It is so complex, SO beautifully designed that it is hard to form a cohesive impression of how profound it really is at first. This scent is not fucking around. It's insanely sophisticated. Totally, 100% unisex. If I smelled this on a man I would ask him to marry me. If I smelled this on a woman I'd ask her to go into business with me and we would decimate the corporate world with our razor sharp acumen. This scent if for grown ups who have their shit together ONLY. No posers, no clout chasers, no one out here shaking a little cup and wearing a sign that says "Will wear fragrance for compliments". Absolutely no one in any of those categories are allowed to get *near* a bottle of Cabochard Parfum by Grès. That's because each bottle has their own body guards with pistols wearing ear pieces and black Raybans to execute those dryer sheet, Downy fabric softener loving bitches. I have seen people say this is sexy--no. I'm sorry. This is far beyond sexy. It's slapping people across the face, taking a bucket of ice water over the head without flinching, walking away from an explosion without looking back and slow motion dodging bullets easy as pie like you're buying Cheetos at Kroger in a bottle. God damn. I could put this on and go rob a bank without saying a word or breaking a sweat. Glorious. Absolutely profoundly glorious. As it faded I felt like a little kid being driven away from an amusement park where they had the best day of their life. I knew it had to come to an end but I'm still going to pout and kick the back of the driver's seat a little. I don't want to go home.

I first put my mitts on a bottle of Cabochard EDT more than 2-1/2 years ago and immediately loved, loved, loved it...so much that I added the EDP and vintage bottles of the EDT and Parfum to my infamous Scent Armory. Anyway, I would just like to duplicate my review of Cabochard EDT (below) but add that if Carbochard Parfum were a woman, I'd marry this strong, sexy seductress. And I would gladly permit her to spend my money, walk all over me in her sexy six-inch black stiletto heels, and grope me longer and harder than Al Franken and Roy Moore at USO Show at a Mall filled with teenage girls and radio anchors. She is that fine of a fragrance. ***** I received my bottle of Gres Cabochard last week and quickly opened it and applied it to each wrist. I find this fragrance to be a really nice throwback mossy scent that is ballsy, timeless (not dated) and simply a terrific olfactory experience. Oakmoss, leather, tobacco, woods, spices and some floral notes and other things supporting this composition and giving it structure. What's not to love? Gres Cabochard performs well on my skin; it lasts a solid 8-hours and projects above-average. While this fragrance may not be a universal people-pleaser, per se, it is smooth, bold, sophisticated and a bit ballsy. When I'm wearing Cabochard it's like wearing my soulmate...someone who will have my back when I need 'em, and will give me a good spanking when I need that too. Besides...this fragrance pleases me, which is far more important than it pleasing anyone else. Testosterone-laden dudes should not fear this one - it's awesome! Conversely, girls and pathetically weak-woman should scent themselves with a dryer sheet and don't dare reach for this gem. Godking is happy!

This is for the EDP. A beautiful aldehydic leather. The notes are very similar to Aramis obviously, but with a sweeter opening. I get the fruity notes on application along with a hint of dry tarragon. I'm a bloke btw, so it may seem different on my skin, or not. But either way, I deem this to be, as all 'fumes will soon be, completely unisex. Truth be told that's why I got it (along with Tabu, Aromatics elixir etc.). Reviews here and elsewhere from experienced perfume lovers tell of how well these reacts to male chemistry and that's what I'm finding. For what it's worth, I'm in the camp that believes fragrances have no gender they're just marketed toward one or the other, and often bought so 'I' can 'be that'. So it's down to money (for the manucaturers) and identity (for the end-user). Anyhow, Cabochard smells great on me. Lasts well too. There's quite a floral mid to it, but the spicy leather/tobacco vibe is prominent throughout, as is the sparkly/soapy aldehyde buzz, even into the mossy cream drydown. A lovely perfume for us all.

Cabochard Parfum/Extrait by Grès (Vintage) Today I’m wearing this magnificent creation of slightly bitter, dry, complex, and elegant Chypre-leather, where herbaceous tarragon, green galbanum, white flowers, and a base of leather, tobacco, and oakmoss intertwine with the earthy intensity of isobutyl quinoline, a key molecule that brings an accord of tar and tanned leather. The use of castoreum in the formula, probably in its natural form as was customary at the time, adds an animalic warmth which, together with civet and ambergris, reinforces the leather-tobacco character, lending depth and an enveloping sensuality. Cabochard is an icon of French perfumery, that embodies the refined rebellion of Madame Grès

Good god, this is glorious. I was lucky to have found the original perfume and what a delicious scent. I still have to compare this with Cellier's Bandit side by side but, from memory, there are some things in common. Both with a complex formulation that you can smell almost each ingredient and nothing is superfluous. The bright opening and the floral middle. I would say that the main difference is in the sweet tobacco mixed with the moss and leather, also less animalic, more tolerable than Bandit. The balance here is so great that is hard do put this in a box. I will hunt a bottle of this.