Chant De Bois

Incredible. I spray this on and it has the effect of Vicks Vapo-rub - instantly calming and medicinal in the best way possible. Forget cough syrup or inhalers, THIS stuff will cure a cold, or at least blast out whatever congestion you have! Lots and lots of aromatic cedar, like pencil shavings, or a cedar chest, or walking through a redwood forest. Very drying but not dusty. The citrus is barely detectable at all, and the patchouli and pink pepper are only slightly stronger than the citrus. Above all, this is CEDAR. A fantastic fragrance that I'd wear all the time by myself at home, but would probably have to layer it with something else before leaving the house to make it less one-note to others smelling it around me (oh, but WHAT a one note it is, though!). Dang it, I really want to find the candle now! Tip: layer this with Poudre d'Orient to get a heavenly and strongly aromatic violet-cedar accord that's less sweet and has more sillage and character than either perfume by itself.

FEMININE WOODSY THIS IS NOT! Smelled the set of 5 at Anthropologie while looking for a gift for my friend and this one was my favorite of the bunch. But not for her, for me :) because this was very masculine to me. I saw the notes and they were masculine not feminine. I went back and they were sold out. I figured it was the best seller. I looked for it on the site and saw it was no longer available. I freaked and asked the stores if they had any left or were expecting and they said they werent sure. Only to later let me know it has been discontinued. WHYYYYYY? And of course to the best one out of the 5. Why? Cause Anthropologie is a womens store and this was the least feminine fragrance from the 5 making it the less one likely to sell? Sucks because this was the best and most luxury and expensive from the bunch. It even reminded me of Terre d'Hermes. Le Labo, bring it back!

UPDATE: Ok heres an update lol. I contacted Le Labo and told them what happened and Le Labo informed me that this scent has not been discontinued and they sent a message to Anthropologie to restock immediately. They let me know in a very nice email that they were sorry for the inconvenience and they are saddened I thought it was dicontinued and it was true that the Anthopologie stores were strangely out of stock and did not inform Le Labo about this. They also had the employees at Anthro misinformed thinking this was no longer being made. Very kindly, Le Labo had Anthropologie Send me the fragrance half off! Im so happy, got it today in the mail and yes it still is amazing as it was when I first smelled it at Anthropologie :) Anthropologie needs to Anthropologize!

CHANT DE BOIS appears to be the sole survivor of the Le Labo-Anthropologie special limited edition series comprising five perfumes. Three of these perfumes, including CHANT DE BOIS, push the boundaries of feminine fragrances past what some would consider the breaking point. This is a very woody scent, and perhaps because of its spicy quality, initially it reminded me of my memory of Lalique PERLES DE LALIQUE. In a side-by-side test, however, I find that the rose of PERLES comes through much more clearly juxtaposed with a super woody, nearly flowerless composition. CHANT DE BOIS lists hedione among its notes, but there do not appear to be any natural floral extracts or essences. Well, at least no flowers are listed as notes! Instead, the composition smells quite woody, as I imagine a wood-processing plant might smell, with large tree trunks being split and sawed into usable planks. The scent of ambroxan is patent in this composition, and it is listed explicitly among the notes, but there is quite a bit of real wood as well. It smells to me like red wood. Or perhaps it is white wood made pink by the baies roses! It's nice to be able to directly compare a perfume evoked by another perfume because I often find that my memory is not the same as my direct perception of the scent. Here I find that PERLES is not nearly so woody as CHANT DE BOIS and in fact PERLES is now evoking memories of Bond no 9 WEST SIDE, a very spicy rose! Our memories of scents, as our memories of events, seem to be very selective and dependent upon all sorts of variable factors. I've noticed that CHANT DE BOIS itself smells quite different under different circumstances. Today, on a frigid day, I noticed the ambroxan very much. During other wearings, I felt that the wood was more marked. I would recommend this unisex creation for testing by anyone who loves wood and can tolerate fairly hefty doses of ambroxan. I expect that once the bottles of this limited edition perfume have been depleted, the same formula will be reincarnated in another (far more expensive...) bottle available directly chez Le Labo. If you are a Le Labo fan, do yourself a favor and grab a bottle of this modestly priced juice while it still can be had!

Chant de Bois is a great perfume for women (like me) who lean towards masculine scents but have a hard time finding a really good wearable one. I love the smell of men's cologne, but when I attempt to wear it, it's so clearly masculine on me that I want to scrub it off, so I pretty much have to stick with unisex scents that mimic men's cologne. This perfume is wonderful. It smells masculine, but not overly so. It's definitely a beautiful and very realistic woody scent, as expected of Le Labo. The grapefruit is clean and slightly sweet, and the wood smells very natural. For masculine fragrances of this sort, I prefer Belle du Soir, but Chant de Bois is probably my second favorite.