Dark Leather Eau de Toilette

This is truly beautiful. Very smoky opening, but somehow fresh and cold too. Smoke that's dark and edgy, but without being acrid or reminiscent of barbecue. Truly the sweet spot for an edgier smoky note. Stays smoky for the dry down, but loses some of the freshness. Slowly overtime it goes from all smoky to all leathery. That stage in the middle where it's both is divine, but contains a little bit of that stereotypical sagey-savoury note that's so common in darker fragrances. I'm sure this isn't a downside at all to most people, but to me it's just one I've smelled many times before and I'd rather have something different. The leather is gorgeous. Too many times I've been disappointed with a leather note that's either non-existent or synthetic car seat-esque, but this is beautiful, grungy, animalistic leather, bold and true. None of this riding the line thing some perfumes do, where they want a rebellious edge but try and reign it in to still be mass marketable by totally masking the leather in sweetness or talk about "designer handbags" and "luxury cars." (nothing wrong with those, they're nice too, I just ran into way too many of them on my search when all I wanted was a simple grungy leather scent) You can really clearly feel the inspiration for this. This is the leather-clad metalhead by a forest campfire bottled. I can't recommend it enough if you're looking for smoky, leathery, grungy, deep and dark. Longevity and silage can't exactly compete with the high end perfumes, but they're still really good for the reasonable price. It'll last mostly all day, and projects well while it does last.

I owned the original Russian Leather at some point, but sold it years ago while reducing my collection. Compared to the EdP, the Eau de Toilette is much smoother, lighter, and has a woodsier profile. It shares a similar philosophy to Royal Vintage and could even be considered a distant relative, while the scent itself reminds me of Buveur De Vent, with a bit of Sellier thrown into the mix. To me its, the perfect blend of birch, pine, tea leaves, and dry leather wrapped in very fine smoke all of which make for a masculine and sophiscated composition. The only draw back is its performance as it leaves a lot more to be desired. The EdP performs much better, but it looses its transparency which is not necessary a bad thing.

Love the fresh scent mixed with smoky leather on this. Not sure I get the tea smell, but do get a very subtle pine outdoorsy smell. But the leather certainly is the dominant part. I absolutely love this after using the shower gel for a while. Smells exactly the same.

I really like this. It's a classic, masculine, leather chypre, far from your typical contemporary colognes, but not dated either. It's like Polo green for the non-smoking era: It doesn't have to out-stink tobacco smoke like the green beast. I initially tried this as the shower gel and the woodsy stuffiness mixed with green freshness is a great combo. By the way, the sales assistant stated this is just Russian Leather with a new name.