Santal Insolent

I purchased this Fragrance because I was looking for a Pleasant Sandalwood Scent... It was advertised to be inspired by the famous vibe as MYSORE sandalwood soap... I really think this fragrance ( Molinard Santal)... pulls this off!... YES it does have the vibe of Mysore Sandalwood... Now, does it smell like Santal 33... it's close... This Molinard does have a Sharp Herbal note in the top with the underlined Sandalwood Back Bone that smooths out through the dry down to a pleasant buttery wood... I do feel that Diptyque's Tam Dao is the best Mysore Buttery recreation right off the top!... I am getting a good 10 Hrs out of this scent.. it did turn into a skin scent around 7 hrs...

This is an excellent product at an excellent price and can be found for less than $80. It takes the good parts of Santal 33, and leaves cloying parts behind. Opens with the elemi and pepper, settles into a beautiful sandalwood with subtle smooth, yet still slightly animalic, leather and just a hint of the cardamom for sweetness and a touch of incense. Exceptionally blended.

I've just received it today and for me it's good. I need a full wearing to see longevity and sillage. I really don't detect the incense but, to my nose, it's really woody (it reminds me of the smell in a sawmill), spicy with some creaminess and little sweetness.

Santal 33, is that you? No. Wait. It is a better (in my opinion) version of you. The elemi makes it more bright and there is a wonderful smokey facet there, as opposed to the more powdery leanings of Santal 33.

If real Mysore sandalwood smells like this, I hope they get the supply fixed because this is simply gorgeous, gorgeous.

Not for the faint of heart! as you will need to ride out nearly an hour of dill pickle, mint and eucalyptus with barely any sandalwood. BUT after around 45 min the complete sandalwood accord begins to appear and you can perceive how that dill note is actually one building block in a very realistic Mysore scent. Eventually it smells very much like you put some Mysore essential oil right on your skin, it is intense, close-wearing, and it lasts a lot longer than the essential oil. (I have been experimenting to tone down the pickle, and so far layering on Molinard’s Ambre, or simply rubbing fast and hard over the application spot to speed up the development and get beyond the pickle work best.) I don’t feel like it’s a “perfume” per se — in the sense that it doesn’t decorate and project some beautiful stages of harmonious notes around an ultimate objective of Sandalwood. It more like — proves that Mysore *can be created out of carefully placed layers of other scents. I am constantly trying to fill the Samsara-shaped hole in my life, and this is not it — but it DOES create a pretty persuasive Mysore.

I got a sample of this at the Molinard shop. I dabbed a couple of drops on the back of my wrist. After 2 hours, this morphed into a woody resiny concoction and it reminded me a LOT of another perfume i had in my collection. Later on, it hit me how much it resembled the drydown of Tom Ford's London and Santal Insolent lasted much longer.