Fort Royal

I know the notes in Fort Royal are perfect for the colder seasons, but I'm wearing it right now in the heat of summer, and I love it! Warm, resinous, mysterious woods and vanilla, sensual, beautiful, it puts me in the mood of reflection, perfect for writing, or even meditation. This scent seems to have something of a spiritual, inspiring, dreamy quality to me. I decided I had to smell it again today and decide whether or not to buy a back-up now when it's on sale. The answer is yes, I cannot be without this beauty! It seems to get more and more difficult to buy fragrances from Le Couvent in Scandinavia where I live, as the main perfumeries have stopped selling them, and there are no testers anymore. So I order from the webshops while it's available. I tried two fragrances by Initio recently, Psychedelic Love and Rehab. While I certainly enjoyed both of them, I have to say that quality wise, Fort Royal is just as fabulous, IMHO. The scents are very different, of course, but they give me a similar vibe. Fort Royal has equally good projection and longevity. It's a wonderful treasure for this price. I would even have paid the double, no doubt. The opening is spicy and may lean a little "masculine", but ten minutes later the scent is beautifully unisex. I love it both on myself and on my fiancé. Would highly recommend giving it a sniff, should you get the chance!

Fort Royale is a delight to wear! I think most of Le Couvents perfumes need to be worn to know their true beauty. A test on the wrist will not suffice here, what you smell up close is very different from what whafts around you while wearing. It starts out woody and spicy, but this is fully dominated by the benzoin and it is a mature vanilla that knocks the socks off the vanilla that made this brand famous: Cologne of the Missions. It has the same natural vibe, but is much more interesting without being complicated. There is rock rose and patchouli in the base notes. Not very noticable, but I think it helps add depth. I do pick up the patch though, so if you are sensitive to that note you might want to reconsider this one. This, along with Porto Bello, are my favorites from this line. I will wear the heck out of this in the cold! Love, love, love it! Edit: doesn't project much, even after heavy application. Wears close to skin.

Hate to be "that guy" but this has no "wild berries" in it. The confusion is caused by the manufacturer, in my opinion. The boxes of this line have the 2 main impressions/ingredients listed, in English and (sort-of) Latin. This one says: Schinus granas & Resina / Wild berries & Benzoin absolute. Schinus is actually a tree, from a family known as pepper trees. It makes what is known as pink peppercorns. So no wild berries, hopefully people won't expect a berry/fruity fragrance.The English bit is kind of misleading. This is woody, peppery, rounded off with sweetness from the benzoin-vanilla combo, kind of like the effect that chocolate accord has in Coromandel, slightly boozy. I could swear there is some patchouli in here too...anyway NOT a berry fragrance. The line is great overall, each of them is a very good representative of its respective category.

On me this smells like strawberries, balsamic glaze and vanilla ice cream. I absolutely adore it and it’s my go to for when i want a more feminine scent (I am female but wear almost exclusively unisex perfumes). However it’s worth to note that almost all perfumes turn sweeter on me, so if you’re the opposite i would definitely not blind buy. As someone else mentioned it does definitely have things in common with Porto Bello, and i had the same experience with that scent as well. Fort royal is much fruitier in my opinion, and Porto Bello has much more of a warm spicy quality. But i think if you like one you’ll also like the other in most cases edit: also worth noting is that i often layer this with porto bello, and get complimented every single time!

This is the fourth in the Le Couvent des Minimes-series I've sampled so far (Valparaiso, Santa Cruz and Smyrna being the others) and boy, this is definitely a beast/the best! Pure class, indeed a feeling of 'royal' comes to mind. The pepper lingers throughout, along with the vanilla as the solid backbone, neither becoming synthetic or nauseous. Could definitely be a signature scent. Only a shame I discovered it now, in April, as this is more of a fall/winter-type of fragrance (warm and cozy, yet mature and sophisticated) Can't wait to bring this high class-scent back in the front line come fall.