Melancholia

Based on other people's reviews, it is one of the most controversial perfumes I own, and I am a Moth and Rabbit fan, so that's saying something. I was told that it smelled like Vogue cigarette smoke on a teenage girl's puffer coat (meaning the mix of tobacco and sickly sweet perfumes we used to wear in the 2000s), a public bathroom (hard disagree), salted fudge, and entropy. To me, it opens as slightly rotting fruit and autumn leaves, sweet thanks to the dates and the green apple, the violet leaf and blackcurrant here add a plant overtone, putting the rot into the garden, metaphorically speaking. Once this intensity dies down a bit, it gets very tobacco-y, not the cheap cigarette tobacco of my lovely reviewers, but a rich deep smoke that makes it somehow more adult and melancholic, as the name suggests. The dry-down is lovely and vetiver-forward, very smooth and wearable, and sadly it doesn't last as much on me as I had hoped. I wear it most of all in the autumn, where the scent can blend with the overall mulchiness and death of the nature, but it is absolutely beautiful in winter in the Middle East and just starts to sing when placed in a cool desert with some qahwa being heated over fire. I will buy it again.

The name describes it well. Cold, beautiful, and sad. It smells like wet cigarettes, dry apple cider, wilted flowers, cold air, rainy clouds, and old wooden furniture covered in dust. Dark, smoky, woody, slightly leathery, yet clean and refined. Despite the seemingly heavy and suffocating notes, they actually feel airy and hollow rather than dense. It creates a strange sense of emptiness and quiet anxiety. You sense something dark is there, but you can’t see it. The opening is intense and layered, starting with cigarette smoke, wilted flowers, and sour apple. The middle is green and watery, slightly bitter - like the first herbs breaking through melting snow in spring, while the air is still cold. It eventually settles into a woody, slightly earthy base with a hint of soapy cleanliness. Overall vibe is indeed deeply melancholic. My imagination draws a funeral on a cold, rainy spring day. This is my current signature fragrance and my absolute favorite. Unique, weird, and atmospheric. Performance 8/10 Scent 10/10 Associations 10/10

In the opening it really does have a "wet" cigarette smell to it, and the smell of cigarettes isn't my favorite. However, I like how they did it in this fragrance because it's balanced nicely with the other notes, and I actually enjoy it very much now

Just bought the sample and tried it. It turns into perfection as it settle down on your skin. Give it some time, don’t rush it. Nostalgia kicks in. Listen to it. It has a story to tell.

It smells like the most stunning girl in a smoking room.

Subtly salty strong leather, hazelnuts and smoke. But is it apt for the end of the world? I admire the work of perfumer Mark Buxton very much, both in and outside the brand Moth & Rabbit, but the brand always had a soft spot in my heart. Usually their scents are inspired by great cinematic works and I have always found them true to the theme, just think about the fragile beauty of The Virgins/ Dreamers (refering to Sofia Coppola The Virgin Suicides, also a book from Eugenides), or the caotic, cold blade on the neck of La Haine (inspired by the same titled movie from Kassovitz); the cultural reference of the brand are always clear to me since they are part of my formative years, it is no wonder that I am enamored with the brand. This time the scent is inspired by another great cinematic piece very dear to me, Melancholia from genious Lars von Trier. To synthesize a bit, it is a story of two worlds that just in a few hours gets upside down: the internal world of the protagonist which just hours after her marriage decides to not hide anymore her depressive and confuse state, and the actual world, planet earth, which is about to be destroyed by a collision with the planet Melancholia. Apocalypse seems near but it is avoided at last, what remains is a strange calm after the thoughts of destruction. So, does the fragrance reflect a general feel of doom and depression? Or the sense of serenity and calm that one may find in the midst of chaos? In this case I am not sure, unfortunatelly the floral part seems to be entirely lost on my skin. The opening is so fresh, watery and juicy! Violet leaf and green apple stand out most of all and the combination of others notes creates a smell similar to that of melon/cantaloupe but without sugary elements. This may very well be the calm before the storm, or the subtle veil of pleasantness one covers himself with even in the midst of depressive mood. But then a salty sensation gives way to the leather. And to the smoky dimension. Somewhat there is a smell similar to that of fresh hazelnuts (only their interior part), then it gets seriously leathery. Hard and strong. There is a very light floral aura, just like the light coming from planet Melancholia, but the threats of leather surpass the light. You want to focus on it, capture it all the same but strong, earthy vetiver steals the spot, and unfortunately on my skin the floral mid is completely lost. The cade juniper and frankincense mix togheter for an earthy smokiness and through the vetiver you can feel the smell of petrichore, the acquatic feel is still present with the saltiness... this asphalt is wet, just like it happens in the movie when in the midst of summer it starts to snow. The movie ends with a glimmer of hope, the collision is avoided and the protagonist remains sitting and watching the light from Melancholia fade away. But there is no light in the end of this fragrance, actually it closes with the smell of almost burnt rubber (similar to that encountered in Moth & Rabbit La Haine). It may be a conceptual fragrance or maybe just not my style of fragrances, but if I must think of when wearing this fragrance then I would choose it in a fall night, maybe just after an evening of rain, I wonder if the floral could shine through. Great lasting power, moderate projection.

To my taste, the opening is a little chaotic - delicate florals and fruits juxtaposed with dry woods and incense smoke similar to Bois d'Ascese. When Melancholia settles on the skin, it becomes quite calm: watery, clean, slightly floral, delicate, like a cool stream in an awakening forest on a sunny spring day, but with a woody-incensy backbone. I kept smelling green apple from the top notes to the base. This green apple note is similar to the one in Zazen, but it is more obvious and bitter in the latter. At times, I even catch hints of wet soil. A quite wearable fragrance.

The opening hits me with cigarettes and bright green apple, a little jarring. The cigarette note gets stronger, smokier, with a floral layer underneath—mostly lily-of-the-valley. Once it dries down, it settles into something more balanced: florals, green apple, and incense all mingling together, a little strange but it works. Named after one of my favorite movies, this fits perfectly - dedicated to a modern Ophelia among water lilies. It also stands very well on its own as a creative and well-crafted scent, though the florals are just a bit too much for my taste.

this is not my usual type of fragrance, but surprisingly i really like it. its perfectly unisex, green, tart, incense. i will update at drydown. ive not yet seen the iconic movie this fragrance is inspired by, but i imagine it captures the essence of the movie pretty well.

initially i was repulsed by it because it smells like a cigarette butt someone threw into a glass of cider, but there is something about it that captivates me that keeps me coming back to smell it.

I strongly agree with the review below mine. I shall study this more, maybe in different weather and edit my review if I do experience something different.

A blackhole of achingly beautiful and unsettling memories. This is the vibe.

Take DKNY's apple note: true to its image. An omnipresent fruit, the symbol of New York, a cult attribute in dozens of fairy tales, proverbs and logos, the cause of the original sin. Liked by everyone. As simple as this. And then, there's Melancholia. Let's simplify it. It's fresh apple slices and ash. That cade oil note makes you alert, but at the same time, it is familiar. Just last week, I smelled three different substances with the same charred smoke profile. A jar of sea salt from Greece, smoked in beechwood for 140 hours; a bottle of 16 year old smoky Scotch; a pack of strong yerba mate ahumada from Paraguay. It is this kind of a smoke note - the false alarm of something burning, while we know perfectly well it's safe. A special gourmet game we play with our primal instincts. It might also be the welcoming smell of a wooden stove or, , depending on where have you lived, the smell of of polluted air. Sure, there's also something like violet leaf in play, the type serving as a potential melancholy trigger. I remember it placed over a gloomy mossy texture in the original Narciso Rodriguez for Him, radiating wet concrete vibes; or petrichored into the earthy alien cashmeran-scape of Dans Tes Bras. Here though, violet leaf completes the juicy freshness of apple along with a bleached floral layer. There is a stark contrast between that bright, nuanced part of the fragrance and the one-dimensional burned sensation of cade oil, incense, juniper, vetiver. Like living and not living; before and after the fire. That place was burned to the ground but there's still a whiff of hope and grace floating all over it. I'm not a Lars von Trier fan at all. I wouldn't want to wear a movie about destruction on my neck for the whole day. Which season would it be? Winter, when depression is closer anyway? Autumn? Spring? End of winter I guess. But when you don't think so much about it, when you just catch a whiff from a distance, Melancholia could be read as just a modern smoky rubbery-leathery thing, synthetic woodiness with a fruit gum molecular top, something perfectly fit for a Berlin underground venue. The ash and the uncanny eventually settle down into a more clinical, dark, minimalist fragrance easily placed between Rick Owens and Boris Bidjan Saberi pieces in a conceptual store.

It smells like cigarettes and orange juice or like someone smoked a pack and tried to hide the smell by peeling an orange and using bar soap. It’s just kind of offensive to the olfactory palette. I do love the concept of it. I love how it captures this sort of pathetic mess and looming darkness. But I certainly wouldn’t wear this tbh

It opens as leathery/smoky and salty scent. Slightly reminds me of Russian tea in the opening but more - again- salty. This combination of sea notes and suede is not to my liking; soon it becomes more tamed and flowery and reminds me of White Whale a lot.

The green apple is strong but, unfortunately, so is the incense and juniper. I'm not a huge fan of this one.