Smudge

I selected this as a part of a Heretic discovery set, recommended by Hayden Anhedonia (Ethel Cain). She had described it as "coming home to the person you love most" and it "stinks so good". This perfume is an experience and is absolutely my favorite right now. My first impressions when sprayed, is the crackle of a campfire. As it sets, emits wood and dried flowers are intermixed with the flames. The evolution over time I can only describe this campfire of wood and flowers dying down as you are laying close to someone you deeply cherish. The scent just evokes a vision of my myself sitting closely to my partner sitting with our close friends around a campfire in the fall with the crunch of leaves and laughter. I absolutely love it and I wear it daily. I really can't wait until its cold and I am wearing it. If you enjoy incense/burning wood/dried flowers kind of smells, you will enjoy this a lot.

I’m originally from the Southwestern United States, and this instantly reminds me of home. The sage is photorealistic; first spray is sage and cedar, and strong smoke. It does smell exactly like a burning smudge stick. It reminds me of the desert at night, of dusty, dry air and campfire smoke. On me, it’s peppery, smokey sage for 3-4 hours, drying down a little sweeter with the patchouli. I love woody scents, and this is a super unique smokey addition to my collection. It’s not a safe blind buy and not for everyone. I consider it more masculine with the lack of sweetness, but honestly, I don’t think it has a gender. I feel like an ancient druid wearing this. I love it.

You walk past the magical herbs and wander to the back of the metaphysical store, almost in a trance as the oddity-filled shelves slowly begin to warp... My first time wearing this it smelled very strongly like liquid smoke and I didn't like it, but I gave it another go and was very glad I did. As it dries the smoke gives way to the patchouli and sage for a smell remniscent of incense. It lasts a very long time- I could still make it out on my wrists after 12 hours! I wouldn't wear this to work for fear of smelling like a dirty hippie but it has made its way into my regular rotation.

Sensational. Unique. Primal. Five stars. Smoky, resinous, ambery, bit of incense. Smells ancient, powerful, mysterious, and darkly sensual. Lasts for hours. To my nose it also smells 100% masculine. I bought it instantly after smelling it at a fragrance shop last week in Japan. Been wearing it ever since. I was over the moon about this fragrance before I even knew Heretic fragrance house only uses natural (non-synthetic) ingredients. My new signature scent. Awesome and daringly creative.

Nice custardy Labdanum forward scent with smoke, patch, and vanilla in key support roles. Thankfully I don't get any sage here as sage tends to come off a little b.o.-ish on my skin. Maaybe in the first millisecond of spraying there's something green there, but it isn't detectable at all after. I love Labdanum and sometimes wear the e.o. solo, so this was an easy purchase. Lasts forever, which is saying something considering this line is synthetic free!

I definitely get the witchy vibes intended, but to me it’s in the form of a strong desert atmosphere. It’s bone dry and bold, it smells like the ghosts of cigars outside an abandoned saloon, a hot desert wind at night around a fire. It’s praying for rain. It’s masculine to me, and it takes me to places I can almost remember visiting. Dries down to smell like incense; much subtler. Would be a delicious summer night fragrance.

Remember that scene in The Craft when the teenage girls, led by the angry goth Nancy, first explore the witchcraft store? This perfume smells like that. Incense, sage, patchouli, vanilla, and, though it's not listed in the description, I SWEAR I catch a hint of clove. I absolutely love it. The next thing will be to experiment with layering it with other scents.

i love this one, it really is unique. I've been looking for an incense-y, orthodox church perfume and this is the closest i've gotten. it's palo santo at first and then the dry down is more complex and beautiful, the myrrh really pops out and starts giving me church memories. this one and dirty violet are my top fave scents rn, bless u heretic

does smell like smudging sage. extremely nostalgic for me. love the minor floral of labdanum, and the creaminess of the vanilla and benzoin, both of which I'm always a sucker for. with the patchouli, cedar and myrrh, it reminds me of all the cool moms growing up in the pacific northwest. adore this scent!!!

Super aptly named because the moment the scent hit my senses i was brought back to my Iroquois grandpa smudging when I was a child. Super smoky, like if you bottled burning sage. The staying power of heretic always amazes me. I could still smell this on myself after 8 hours.

I enjoy this, but I also completely understand what one would not. To me, it smells like that first sip of lapsang souchang tea: bitter smokey yet enticing. Probably the sexiest of all my scents (I wear it on nights out).

As an old "goth" bat this is my signature scent for fall, winter. Smells like ren-fair incense stall combined with dark smoky goth club. I can see only minority of people who like this type of scent.

Alone, I find it extremely intense, but I've started to wear it along with Nest's Madagascar Vanilla oil, and it's beautifully warm, sweet and smoky

i LOVE this fragrance....i have been mourning the loss of norma kamali's incense for many moons; i've found my new love <3

A staple scent for me. Smells exactly like palo santo smudge sticks with some vanilla caviar. Perfection. They nailed it.

Myrhh is the standout in this. From the get-go anyway. I just sprayed heavily over my body and clothes. I get copper, palo santo and myrrh. It's strong. Like when I burn intense in the house, which I would have expected from the name. It's a freezing cold dry day and I'm sitting on the bus wearing a mask. All I can smell is fresh smoke. I'm loving it truly. It's been about 30 minutes, leather is opening. Very old leather. Used leather. Weird but I get a licorice undertone. No vanilla and I really hope that takes the show. Like all fragrances from heretic there is a strong booze base. I hope this one has longevity as the florals do not last on me. An hour in I'm getting vanilla. It is lovely overall bit time and time again I am left thinking heretic lacks that luxury depth. It's not a cheap perfume in AU. Perhaps in the state's it's marketed to a mid-range market. Midrange would suit it perfectly but for the price, there are others I would prefer spend my money on. Edit: a few hours in... Isn't this whiskey custard. I read custard and laughed but I can smell it. Definitely sits as one of their better scents. Lasting power seems to be a winner, is expect nothing less from the scent profile though... They're all long lasting scents usually. Edit: I had to do a second edit. Just picked up a jacket 2 days after wearing the fragrance. It's so strong and lingers all over my previously worn clothes. Impressed by longevity.

To be fair, I smelled this on my friend's arm a while ago, so it might be different if I were to smell it on myself and I'm going off of memory (which I know might not be the best lol), BUT! at first the scent completely shocked me, I was NOT expecting it to smell the way it did - it smelled SO strong, like old burning wood on a noticeably cold midsummers eve, it was super intense for me and it made me feel weirdly nostalgic but in a bad way, like, nostalgic of a bad memory I dont remember even having. But after a bit when it died down, I smelled it again and it was so sweet!? I typically wear sweet scents so that I liked, but it was shocking after the first impression. But at first I still wasn't very fond of it. Recently the same friend walked past me and I instantly commented on how good he smelled, and it was this perfume! Soo my opinion shifted again. It was sweet but also a little "dark", like a manly sweet that doesn't smell like cologne? It was sexy in a scary way kind of, I liked it. This perfume made me go through a whole rollercoaster of emotions, but that made it memorable and I love it now. Aside from the poeticness, it smells at first like sage and cedar the most to me, but after a while I think it's kind of like a "dirty" vanilla.

I ordered 4 samples of Heretic scents, and Smudge was the first. Initially I was offput by it--I'm still unfamiliar with many fragrance terms, but the first inhale felt chalky or powdery. As someone with a mother who often burns sage to "smudge" the house, I don't think this encapsulates that scent specifically, but there are merits to it regardless. When I wore it for a day, there was something about it. Not unappealing or repulsive, but something a little stale. It fits with the descriptions of an old building, dust, or a cluttered incense shop. This might become headachy to some, but the scent is subtle enough to not be so for me. I wasn't sure about it after I had trialed it. I liked it well enough, but it didn't immediately appeal to me. Smelling it now, I can appreciate the smokiness much more, and I don't detect that initial chalkiness I once did. It's warming on me. It's a little spooky, a little incense-y, and a lot smokey--the kind of scent you'd smell on someone walking past and would know that they're witchy.

I really, really, really like this scent. It is not something I would feel comfortable wearing in public, however. Where it shines is in the memories it evokes. It is only something to wear conservatively and if, literally only if, you have a similar memory or experience. It conveys, or really captures, the entire essence of meeting my now-husband and our romance; it is the story of how and why we eventually got engaged, the distances we traveled and the sights we experienced, the money we had to squander to make our dreams come true. This is not a safe blind buy. This is not for everyone. I would rate this as a "love love love" but I know, factually, this perfume would absolutely be inappropriate to wear at any other time than when I am in my home, completely alone, with my spouse--and no one else. It is so incredibly sexy and captivating but you have to have had the experience, in my very humble opinion, to appreciate it. Cannot wait to buy a full bottle. It is next on my list. I will savor it until the day I die.

I bought the 15 ml bottle. When I opened the box, I was immediately struck by the product. The color of the fragrance matched the sleek bottle perfectly—an ideal size for carrying around. The first spray reminded me of burning a large bundle of sage leaves and letting the flame burn for over ten seconds. Its pungent aroma may be off-putting to some, but I’ve grown to enjoy it—I regularly light sage in multiple spots to cleanse my space of lingering energy. As I traveled to the office, the sage haze faded almost unnoticed, giving way to a sweeter, cigar-like note infused with vanilla and wrapped in a wisp of juniper smoke. It felt as if I’d sealed myself in a safe, peaceful circle. With a cup of warm nut milk by my side—brightened by a pinch of lemon zest—I went about my daily tasks without feeling constrained. To my surprise, even six hours into a humid Hong Kong workday, that soft, milky-citrus veil still clung to my wrist, gently lifting my mood with every turn.