Red Vetiver

Montale Red Vetiver EDP opens with a moderate projection of green and woody notes. The opening is sharp, elegant, refined, fresh, and pleasant. The vetiver and cedar are the opening most prominent notes. The vetiver in this fragrance is an earthy, grassy, woody, and green that feels very refined; a small step behind is the cedar, a bright, fresh, and woody note. The patchouli, Peru balsam, pepper and grapefruit are support notes. The patchouli blends behind the vetiver enhancing its green accords with a mild, earthy, and herbaceous note. The Peru balsam and pepper are noticeable with a light sweetness and spicy touch respectively. The grapefruit is a faint opening note, shadowed by the prominent green and woody accords. The fragrance is linear, all featured notes come up as soon as the fragrance is applied and continue into the dry down. Once Montale Red Vetiver EDP has reached its full dry down, it can be summarized as a green, vetiver, woody, cedar, patchouli, and spicy fragrance with mild sweet balsamic accords. The fragrance feels bold, classy, dense, dry, earthy, elegant, expensive, formal, fresh, grassy, green, harsh, herbaceous, high-quality, masculine, mature, natural, nicely-blended, refined, rich, slightly sweet, versatile, woody, and very pleasant. BATCH REVIEWED: 2020 (#E0307). WOW RATING: 9/10. The pure and intense vetiver and cedar are impressive. DISLIKE RATING: 2/10. The vetiver gives the fragrance a classy and mature character. UNIQUENESS: 6/10. Vetiver fragrances are relatively common. MASS APPEAL: 4/10. Vetiver is note found in fragrances for mature men. PROJECTION: 4/10. Moderate, about 4 feet around the wearer. SILLAGE: 5/10. Very good, about 5 feet behind the wearer. APPLICATION: 2-4 atomizations. LONGEVITY: 6/10. Very good, about 6 hours, it projects well for over 4 hours. SEASONS: Winter, spring, summer, fall, colder days, daytime, nighttime, and climate-controlled environments. OCCASIONS: Formal events, outdoor gatherings, gym, sports, office, business, casual, clubbing. This is an office-friendly fragrance. VERSATILITY: 9/10. A highly versatile fragrance ideal for professional and work wear. GENDER: Masculine. The vetiver is a masculine note. AGES: 30 and above. RECOMMENDATION: Montale Red Vetiver EDP can be purchased for about $90. It is an intense, very elegant fragrance ideal for business and office wear. This is a great buy. BLIND-BUY: Yes, but only if you are familiar with its main notes. SIMILAR: These are examples of fragrances in the same genre. Bentley Infinity Rush is a great sweet orange, vetiver, spicy, woody, and soft musky fragrance; Cartier Declaration Essence is a great, vetiver, woody, citrus, floral, and spicy fragrance; Chanel Egoiste Platinum EDT is a great cedar, vetiver, and oakmoss fragrance; Chanel Pour Monsieur EDP is a good, classy, musky, vetiver, and citrus fragrance; Escentric Molecules 05 EDT is a good, woody green cashmeran, juniper, cypress, ISO E-Super, and musky citrusy ambroxan fragrance; Montale Vetiver Patchouli is a fantastic, cedar-like, vetiver, patchouli, and spicy fragrance; Nishane Sultan Vetiver is a great, bold, intense, anise, vetiver, and spicy pepper fragrance; Terre D’Hermes Eau Intense Vetiver is a great, classy, vetiver, and spicy fragrance; Tom Ford Grey Vetiver EDP is a very good, elegant, intense, vetiver, woody, mossy, and spicy fragrance; Montale Red Vetiver EDP is a very good, elegant, green, vetiver, woody, cedar, patchouli, and spicy fragrance. SUMMARY: A moderate projecting, vetiver, and cedar fragrance with some spicy and a soft citrus accord. The fragrance feels classy, clean, dry, earthy, elegant, formal, fresh, herbaceous, high-quality, masculine, mature, natural, sharp, versatile, zesty, and pleasant.

First off I want to say for those who want a fragrance that is VERY season appropriate, this one might be the one for you, depending if this review appeals to you. I really enjoy a few fragrances from Montale. Blue Amber is lobbying for that number one spot. Let's see why Red Vetyver is a solid contender for that number one. Smell: Red Vetyver will instantly remind you of another fragrance provided you have smelled it. The fragrance I am referring to is Terre D'Hermes. The two are very similar with what they are trying to accomplish in my opinion, yet Red Vetyver just does it so much better. The vetiver note in here is just so earthy. Don't get me wrong it is in Terre D'Hermes as well, but the orange in TdH almost wants to "clean up" the vetiver. In RV, however, the vetiver is so dirty and I love that. Some vetiver fragrances have the tendency to go green that I have smelled. Red Vetyver does not follow that path. The pepper and the patchouli keep it very earthy. When I first sampled this, I didn't like the opening, but the drydown won me over. Now that I have owned it for a while and tested it extensively, I can honestly say now that the opening and drydown are equal now in my book. Wonderful smell. Rating: 9/10 Longevity: Montale is no slouch when it comes to making quality fragrances which last a long time. This scent is no different. Red Vetyver lasts about 10-12 hours on my skin any given wearing. No complaints here. Rating: 10/10 Projection: Montale is ALSO no slouch at creating scents that can melt your face off. Their oud scents being the ones that I hear most about which accomplish this feat. Red Vetyver is not quite as loud as their oud scents, but still packs a good punch. I have tested Original Vetiver and Red Vetyver side by side. 3 sprays of OV and 3 sprays of RV. Red Vetyver outperformed OV in all departments. I am not biased toward either house for the record. Both houses are great in their own right. I digress. Red Vetyver projected for a solid 6 hours on me before slowly dying down, but never becoming a skin scent. Rating: 10/10 Versatility: This one is pretty versatile. I wore it in the winter and it just wouldn't quit. I believe this fragrance is meant for the spring. No doubt. I do think, however, that it should not be limited to the spring. You can wear this basically whenever you please. It can hold its own in any scenario in my humble opinion. Rating: 10/10 Final rating: 9.7/10

I was in a niche boutique a few years ago and smelled this on a card. Before I left, I purchased a 3ml decant. That decant lasted me about six months. I know this is categorized for men, but I honestly don't care. It's dark, dry, heavy on the vetiver, epically woody, and liberally dusted in black pepper. The grapefruit is such a nice touch here, making for a really clean opening. Oddly enough, grapefruit is a note that is fairly consistent throughout the wearing, on my skin. It's rare that I find a citrus note last that long. As it fades, the sharp juiciness of it becomes bitter and more like a cross between bergamot and petitgrain. But all the while, dark and mysterious. I like that about this scent. On me, it's mysterious and unassuming. I honestly think that's a big part of it's charm on me. This fragrance really makes me happy. It brings on a sense of calm when I need soothing. It's like a strong masculine hug when I'm lonely. I'm the type of woman that isn't afraid of dark, dry, masculine fragrances. Among other heavy ♂️ hitters, I also have Encre Noire, but I find that one to be have such a high concentration of iso e super that it kind of gives me a headache. I'm sure iso e super is in this formula, but it thankfully doesn't have the same effect. It's definitely a dead ringer for it's predecessor, Terre d'Hermes. And while I adore TDH, there's something about this one that just does it for me. This scent isn't something I'd wear on a date, or out with friends. However, it is something that I very much enjoy when I'm alone, in a mood, feeling witchy, or wanting to be immersed in nature. Sexy, sexy, nature. It's all about the dry down with this one. I'm in love. 😘 Originality 6/10 Longevity 10/10 Versatility / Year round for me. But what do I know? 😉

Okay so I'm pretty seasoned in Montale fragrances now...I've tried a lot of them. Red Vetyver is one of the stragglers after working my way through various Aouds. Yes...I thought to myself...how much can this smell like Terre d'Hermes? Well... ALOT! is the answer. The opening is that gorgeous juicy orange tempered with dry earthy vetiver the spice of pepper and cleanness of cedar. It's a stunning fragrance done very well and it's the age old question..."who did it first?" or more ominously..."Who copied who?" (I don't believe in intentional copying in most cases BTW) well I think this was out in 2008 and Terre was 2006 if I remember correctly? But more importantly is there anything which sets this apart from TdH and the answer could well be starring me in the face. Recently I tried Terre d'Hermes EDP for the first time and pitted it against the faithful EDT. The main difference was that I prefered the 'ever so' slightly boozier, heavier and more fruity quality of the EDP in smell. However performance wise the EDT beat it hands down and the fragrance never changed from beginning to end, just straight delivers. I'd say positively Red Vetyver possesses the great qualities of both! The opening is exploding with orange fruit like the EDP, the bitterness of the EDT is there but it has the transitional drydown from the EDP. That drydown incidentally is really nice and long as I've come to expect from Montale. So Is it worth trading this for Terre d'Hermes? No. That's no offense to this fragrance but even if it lasts longer that has never been an issue for me. How about Montale make a copycat of D&G's the One that lasts 12 hours...then they'd have a winner on their hands!

As to me it's like an Ice & Fire in one vial. Terre d'Hermes? Perhpas only when to judge both very briefly. But RV - this is quite another scale, and it seems like Terre d'Hermes is loosing... People around do pay attention to this, and the Owner of this Scent will share deserved success with this Aroma. It has attracting power - nothing to say! Seems like easily would fit man & woman. After sprits it begins sparkling with all colors - Vetiver, Grapefruit, Pepper.... And after some time suddenly appear like from nowhere Cedar & Patchouli in the lucent cloud of Peruan balsam. And all this beauty shining, playing by the edges, like in kaleidoscope. And it's playing with you, giving new turn of impressions! It comes to mind some comparison with mysterious Forest after the rainfall, with wet & odorant evaporations coming up from the Trees and Earth, melting in the hot air of Sunset – that’s the feeling like. Supposed to be evenly good for every of 4 times of the year -and every time you’ll be gifted by this Aroma with new impressions! it‘s suitable for any occasion, and it is easily acceptable by most of people. The difference is in the measure of exclamations and delight you would hear around! Only once I noticed negative report from one very malicious man that is completely unfair to this Scent. It’s like some spiteful hissing at Queen of Beauty by the reason she is beautiful.... But let’s keep it aside! This is just splendid – just keep trying and get inspiration from this Scent – it’s just exactly created for that!