L'Eau du Navigateur

Upon first experiencing L'Eau du Navigateur, I immediately understood why many adherents to contemporary niche don't necessarily warm up to it. This is a niche from the 1980s, and the composition, which was daring and forward-thinking for its time period, does remind you that it is of its time. There is an epicene base, which I absolutely adore. It is showcased to full effect in seminal men's classics such as Hermes Equipage and Cacharel Pour L'Homme. It imparts a melange of spices: nutmeg, mace, cloves, bay leaf, even allspice (pimento). This is due to the presence of myrcene, a warm, balsamic, ethereal and somewhat sweet terpene. From an aromatherapy perspective, it is actually considered quite warming and calming. Here, it is in full effect through the epicene base almost overdosed to what would be I suppose considered a "niche" level today. This, with the musks and leather, really makes this more of a "yesteryear" scent, but with a twist. It is argued that L'Artisan had the earliest "niche", pre-dating the category by decades. So, we have this opening that has a coffee note, but this is no strident Intense Cafe or sweet cappuccino, creamy latte, coffee in your face note, and for that, it seems many folks are let down. This is a coffee note, not a coffee fragrance, and let's remember that coffee as a scent is quite a charger for the olfactory receptors, so having such a nuanced coffee note is actually an impressive feat by Jean-Claude Ellena. Watercolor, minimalist coffee in the atmosphere, with a splash of rum, while one wears their lounge jacket and reads the morning papers. That is the coffee note, and yes, it doesn't stay for hours, but it makes for a fantastic first hour. This sits perfectly well for me. The dry down is vaguely floral, maybe some dianthus and a tiny bit of muguet murmuring, and while the coffee and rum has run dry and the funnies are through, a fine soap layer surfaces (uh oh, too 70s-80s for contempos) and I am a sucker for soapy and spicy together. Hours in, a discernible caraway note mingles with the woods and it makes for a snuggle-worthy second skin. L'Eau du Navigateur is quite arid and pleasantly aloof, it has no time for the frivolity of youth, it has seen and experienced a lot, knows what it wants and where it wants to be. It lights some incense to ruminate, smokes a pipe now and then to relax, takes long naps, enjoys comfortable slippers and revels in the languorous. Navigateur has an acerbic wit but a soft heart. Navigateur could be you or me, at least while we are wearing it.

Lately I've been searching for softer scents since my wardrobe is full of powerhouses and some days I feel like having something good without being loud. L'Eau du Navigateur fits the bill perfectly since it is very smooth and understated without being bland or forgettable. I see here some other reviewers saying this is a powerhouse and I'm intrigued, Is it that there's been a significant reformulation? My bottle is in the new shape and it is definitely not a strong scent. I wonder: if l'Artisan stopped selling this... what did they make the new bottles for? Is the old juice transferred? It sounds strange... On the first 3 minutes there's a defined edge with some leather, spices and bitter coffee which still is not something I'd call strong. I love the smell! It goes on for a long time but softens considerably, even becoming hard to perceive unless you put your nose close to the skin. The general effect is that of very bitter and tart coffee beans. Dusty and deeply erotic, I agree with those previous reviewers. It is not dated at all to my nose even if the smell recalls some 80s scents. The good thing is the softness makes this wearable whereas its cousin Eau des iles, which shares many many facets with this, feels more suitable for the older crowd and might appear a bit dated and harsh (even if it is gorgeous too). Here the smell is unique and modern... or better: timeless. Jean Laporte was a genius to have conceived both. It is wonderful for men but women should give it a try, I think it might surprise you positively. Still, do I recommend to blind buy as I did? not really. I think a sampling is wise in this case in order to see if you like the low sillage and the scent itself. As for me, I'm in love with it (but to be honest, I would surely have dismissed it in my first months of sampling scents...). Last but not least: warmer weather (like spring or early autumn, not summer) is the perfect season for this since in winter it gets too lost unless you're inside a small room.

Having damned L'Artisan Parfumer's Dzongkha as an absolute Stzingkha, I am pleased to be able to endorse L'Eau du Navigateur as an absolute pleasure. From the first to the end, pure delight. I love this! I don't get a lot of transition, the opening stays until the end. But it is not a 'linear scent'. Every note is on stage and can be smelt (or heard as Japanese say about incense) as an ensemble but each one remains as distinct as in a solo. It reminds me of the end of Mozart's La Nozze di Figaro when everyone sings 'Ah Tutti Contenti Saremo Cosi'. The great voices of the Divi have to blend as a choir - very difficult for voices trained for solo singing. When it works it is breath taking. This fragrance achieves the same amazing balance which brings solo notes together not to form a shapeless mush but to form a glorious ensemble. I get rum, leather, coffee, spices, incense, soap, rose. I get, from Bass to Soprano, Bartolo, Figaro, the Count, Cherubino, Marcellina, Susanna, the Countess - singing their hearts out! Beautiful! Bravissimo! This fragrance is so life-affirming I want to stand up and cheer! Not much projection, a private indulgence. I like this even more than Timbuktu which is drier and less sweet. Will wear this often, day or evening. I think you could recommend this to men or women, in fact anyone who could sing along with Mozart.

first impressions: curry, coffee, spice incense. Oh these reviews below me...This is not "just for men", gimme a break. What makes this solely masculine?? Stop deterring women from giving these type of scents a chance on their skin! It's sexist and ridiculous. A century ago, there were no classifications...men and women wore perfumes based on what they liked, not what they were told was for men or women. There is nothing cloyingly thick heavy or suffocating that would not work on a female's skin with this perfume. Ok rant over. It's very nice and middle-eastern-y. It's different, and this smells lovely on me. On top of everything I already listed that I smelled, also add sort of a rum & coke hint, and just a little little bit of sweet smoky pipe tobacco. These are buried tho, they are not strong components. The stars are still the curry/spice/incense/coffee notes. Since I'm not a world traveler, I will have to compare this perfume to something I do know about...this smells like when you're walking down Curry Hill in Nyc on Lexington Ave & the 20's...all the spices coming from the many Indian restaurants, very warm and exotic. This is just beautiful and I would love to add this to my collection someday. lasts a long time as well !

Perhaps someone could think that this is not the right fragrance for summer, perhaps someone is right. For me a fragrance can be right if it doesn't spoil itself whenever it's used, no matter what the thermometer says, it is basic that the chemistry of the essence and that of the 'holder' can match. Liking paradoxes, I do like also trying 'summer' scents during the winter and 'warm' ones during the summer, being a gardenist I like making programs and projects as well, perfume is not only memory, but sometimes it makes you skip the calendar and let you spy a glimpse of future possibilities as well......A frag like a 'dress' or a colour must suit you, and l'Eau de Navigateur does it its job very well on my skin. Although I could love and wear totally different kind of frags, I'm not ashamed about something -probably - controversial but really above any genre, style, trend and so on. Quite inimaginable that it comes from the expert hands of Olivia Giacobetti! Rich and a bit excentric but always in the right 'measure'! Long lasting. A big mistake by l'Artisan putting this wonderful perfume (perhaps one of their most original creations) outside its 'menu', I personally, would have suggested to do the same with something else! : (

I just got a little sample and a bit of it had spilled in the envelope, so when I opened my mail this morning and sniffed it I wondered :"what's this beauty!" (there were various samples in the envelope). So, I put it on my skin, knowing I would like it. At the beginning it's delicately sweet. It doesn't really seem to be a fragrance for men, as I always expect men fragrances to be a bit stronger, harsher. L'eau du navigateur on my skin starts sweet, with a mild mix of vanilla and rum, which makes it round and mouthwatering. As it develops I can also detect a mild smokiness, very pleasant, and some incense which balances the sweetness giving it a sort of dryness. It is a very pleasant fragrance and it doesn't scream loud. I think you could apply wildly this beauty on your skin and it would never be too much, it would never be annoying to the others. About an hour after applying, I can now detect a hint of leather. Nice leather. The sweetness has toned down. It is now drier. I can now smell a clear note of incense. I really like it.

Foremost, I'll just say this is far more a masculine scent than anything. I would find it strange on a woman since the dry-down and base of this is all tobacco, leather, resin and incense. I do pick up on the rum, the spices and coffee, but the other notes certainly take a minor role in this. This is a warm, rich, well-executed scent that has incredible projection and a subtle and agreeable dry-down. I've just gotten home from sitting in my office with this most of the day, and just every so often the aroma would waft through. I sampled the entire line of Les Artisans, and just as @lvrocker chose this over Absinthe, I too felt the same way about the comparison from the first scent. This is a fragrance that you either understand quickly, or you'll never get it. By far, next to Dzing! (which I cannot figure out why they classify that as unisex as well), this is a brilliant scent. I can't recommend it highly enough. I find it completely intoxicating. Oh, and as for Luca Turin calling this "dated", consider the source. Rubbish!

This is just a divine fragrance. I cannot for the life of me work out how a scent with these notes smells so good to me; this is not at all the kind of fragrance I would normally wear or like. I have been intrigued by the notes and the positive reviews for this perfume and wanting to try it for some time, so I bought a sample from the Surrender To Chance website. On the first spray, I can smell, quite distinctly, cumin, coffee, incense, tobacco and rum, all perfectly blended and so in harmony with each other. Then the florals start to emerge, a sweet, deep yet fresh floral note soaring over the continuing refrain of spice and smoke. Later still, the woods, resins and leather come in, the florals soften, and the whole composition becomes warm and creamy. This is a glorious symphony of a fragrance. I cannot imagine not having this in my collection.

Ritual of Life (Jean-Claude Ellena, 1982) Bottle Design: Jean-Francois Laporte L'Eau de Navigateur is crazy and vivid olfactory image. A great 1982 offering by Jean-Francois Laporte and Jean-Claude Ellena. Ahead of the time then, and now somehow stuck in space-time continuum. Synthetic at the moments, transparent and dense at the same time. It's hard to describe. A lot's going on here... spices, coffee, leather, tobacco, a bouquet of flowers, resins, incense... The notes hard to imagine together are successfully combined. The work of a genius. I can easily imagine it on a man in a white suit on some Caribbean island, drinking his first morning coffee and smoking cigarillos while reading the newspapers about last night's coup. It perfectly describes the small, but important rituals of life. L'Artisan please bring this beauty back. Rating: 7/10

My first 'niche' fragrance and one of the few scents in my collection that blew me away instantly. After reading all I could find about it and decided for another blind buy, I couldn't believe at first wearing it is a fragrance created in 1979 !...it has so many notes I usualy appreciate in a man's fragrance: bitter roasted coffee, spices, leather, dry florals, incense, tobacco - everything packed harmoniously and delivering a stunning and intriguing oriental-spicy scent. When I wear this, I imagine myself on a chill morning in a torn leather jacket on the upper deck of an old sail, drinking coffee from a tin can and enjoying the smell of Eastern spices coming from under the deck. In this regard, for me, L'Eau du Navigateur is more than a fragrance...it's a marvelous adventure of senses. My humble ranking 9.5/10 ☣☣☣☣☣. Highly recommended.

A smooth, somewhat otherworldly, green smoky wood. The first time I tried it, it seemed very weak, so I was about to review it as a lark, but now I find it to be of average strength. It reminds me of things like Preferred Stock, Pasha, Tsar, Kyoto, or Curzon, with that slightly waxy smoke component. While others add to this either dark and dirty greens, or musty fetid leather, Navigateur stays straighter, cleaner and clearer, with something that seems a bit violetty at first, changing over to a very honest, fairy-tale wood. I almost don't know what to say about it because it doesn't conflict with any of my do's and dont's of wood scents. This could easily find its place among the vaunted Comme des Garcons incense series, but don't tell anyone that it smells like Preferred Stock. (Or vice versa!)

I think L'eau du Navigateur is a fragrance Marco Polo would have loved. It's not the scent of a modern sailor, it's the scent of the ancient explorers sailing to find new worlds, new smells and new feelings. L'eau du Navigateur speaks of warm spices, like Marco Polo arriving in India, of tobacco like Columbus discovering America. If you want to take a journey just pu it on. I'm a woman and I find it completely unisex. It's a classic, so sad it's been discontinued.

Magnificent. A never-duplicated fragrance profile I've been chasing since my last bottle ran out in 2016. 1999, when I purchased my first bottle at Aedes de Venustas original Christopher Street location as a teenager, this perfume changed my understanding of what fragrance could mean to me personally. Clean, spicy, incensed, sweet yet dry. I literally feel like a female Jack Sparrow wearing this, like a swashbuckling luxury pirate. Just a masterpiece.

I'm quoting from my fallacious review: '....Quite inimaginable that it comes from the expert hands of Olivia Giacobetti....' 1) Of course, NOT! I've been told that the Nose behind it was not Olivia Giacobetti but J.C. Ellena and J. La Porte. Sorry! : ( .........and also: 2) It seems that the same frag is on sale on the online boutique but in U.K. Thank you Andrapi for having told me about my imprecisions in your kind e-mail!!!

It's a shame both this and MPG Eau Des Iles are discontinued. I was able to find a small decant of this online and it brought back great memories of the smokey spiciness in both. I just wish there was something similar currently in production. With all the dupes being produced nowadays, it would fantastic if Alexandria or another house would be inspired to re-create them. A winner.

To me, this is one of the best from L'Artisan. A lot of cofee with a lot of woody and spices.Much liqueur too. Strong notes but not too dense (is a EDT) and better in Spring or autumn. I agree with Carestinus, maybe it's few deep for the winter. Longevity is medium-high (about 6-8 hours) and sillage is moderate. Scent 8/10 Longevity 7.5/10 Sillage 7/10

I had this gem hidden away for years , When I first acquired it;I was wearing it in the summer and was wondering why I am not liking it? I decided to try it today in this mild Canadian winter; Lord it is lovely, I smell the Rum, The incense,The resins and the Tobacco during the dry down, Scent 10/10 Long lasting 12 hours Silage 10/10 Thanks,

This one is discontinued unfortunately, but still available at the Artisan store online!! For the ones who must have this!!! :-) This is also the case for Tea for Two!

To me this scent opens with a sharp blast of incense,dark rum and spicy/woody notes this phase is so potent that it will mask the coffee note thats in there and all the others notes that are supporting the top, however i get the hints of dry ground coffee, which is very easy to miss in the opening of the scent. After the top notes calm down a bit the very luxurious sweet tobacco is easier to detect although It is one of the main notes of the fragrance Its is very much masked by the top notes which are very heavy to the nose and can confuse your senses. But once it settles down a bit you smell the amazing high quality tobacco, not burnt tobacco but the tobacco you buy loose from those expensive tobacco shops that are found in those trendy and expensive areas. The ground coffee is also coffee before it's been added to hot water and milk, so you will not get that sweet caramel quality here, rather something very dry and almost bitter and ashy. The leather in the scent is not heavy it just stays in the background all the way through and never becomes to leathery imo. There are some hints floral notes here not fresh florals but rather dry petels of about 2-3 different flower types so never becomes a pot pouri type floral, this blends so well with the scent and adds a different dimension to the sweet quality coming from the tobacco leaf. The spice in this scent never becomes anything that resembles currry in any shape or form. It is not the spice you get in Decloration from cartier, that one i will agree is an indian spice market done very well. This however is a very strong crushed spice added to make the fragrance sharp and to give it a kick. Once the scent does settle on your skin you are wraped in one of the cleanest and most unique smells you could think of, very artistic smell. To appreciate this scent you have to get past the opening which can last upto an hour. After that it just get better and better. This is the kind of scent thats quite serious and will be more suitable for the men and wommen in there late 20's and up. Sillage is very good and lasting power is 6-8 hours and close to the skin after that but never leaves. To me this scent is best for Autumn/Winter and cannot see anyone wanting to wear this scent during the hotter months. Overall an amazing scent that could possibly be getting discontinued, one of the more creative L'artisan scents in their line what a shame. Scent 9/10

the first 30 ~ 60 mins are perfect -- boozy, spicy and lively. then, the cumin/caraway takes over and it becomes unnavigatable. very disappointing...it goes from a A+ to a C in a matter of minutes. the cumin is overpowering, too...sorta like the cumin in 'al oudh', but with less to counter-balance it. disappointing...