Nuit de Bakélite

Bakelite is an interesting material, the world's first fully synthetic plastic made out of a phenol-formaldehyde resin, which makes it fully moldable into whatever shape is desired before curing. This how we got the famous Bakelite telephone (which, if land lines were still a thing, I would totally have one - and maybe a rotary too!). As someone who has been in medical laboratories for nearly the majority of my life I find the formaldehyde component particularly interesting. Formaldehyde is a nasty chemical, and I am acutely familiar with it. Its aroma has been programmed to ring an alarm bell in my head; a spill or a strong gaseous presence means that I and the entirety of my team need to evacuate the area. It will preserve the structures in tissues so that they are able to be used for diagnostic purposes. This function has advanced medical sciences in incalculable ways. Yet in order for the structures and tissues to live they need to be able to change (i.e. cellular replication, respiration, protein synthesis, and transportation); this means that formaldehyde kills by way of preservation, which is a fun thing to wax philosophic on. Let's use it to make a cheap, long lasting and convenient material for the home! Let's capture it in a perfume! Neat! We humans are adventurous and baffling creatures sometimes. I get the alarm bells in the opening of the perfume. They ring loudly like a klaxon. The gaseous and white heat of fuel-like chemicals from a violet leaf note pairs with an ice cold and chalky green pea type galbanum and a bitter green herbal angelica. If I mute the alarm bell to attempt an alternate identification, my mind goes next to a strong menthol cigarette type note - an equally challenging aroma for me. Yet something lurks underneath, a floral semi-sweetness that says "be on guard but not afraid" and I continue to be lured in by this highly unique, compelling and challenging character. I’m not evacuating despite the instinct to do so. Once the noxious gases dispense, the florals rejuvenate... sort of. Continuing the theme of evaporative cooling, or TRPM8 receptor binding - or just simply danger - are orris, tuberose, and davana in a truly remarkable floral heart. The orris is cold, starchy, silvery and metallic; the tuberose connects to the opening via a hardened, pale green edge like a dull knife, rounded out by a waxy indole and almond muskiness; the davana is its natural boozy self, not letting you forget the herbal and noxious gas from the opening, but lessening the danger with its raisin-blackcurrant-like balsam bass note. Nuit de Bakelite continues to warm up and reveal itself to you, its claws and poisons coyly turning to open arms and a gentle smile. A slightly smokey and animalic styrax presents a supple and rich suede like note, while the floral theme is carried into the dry down with a cistus labdanum note that is not cold, metallic, and green as it was in the preceding layers but now plush, pink, and a bit sweet and fruity. They rest on a strident dark wood base of earthy guaiac. In the beginning Nuit was frigid, brittle, poisonous, gaseous and unforgiving, but now that character has shifted to a stiff but more pliable and curious warmth where you can still clearly smell that earlier personality lurking around inside. Simply hit its hair trigger to see the transition between Jekyll and Hyde. I am completely taken with Nuit de Bakelite. It crosses so many boundary lines between the unnatural and deleterious, the human and warm but complicated, sharp and lethal neon green fumes and natural Mother earth browns, yet it never loses cohesion, legibility, or purpose. It is rare for a perfume to have such an expansive breadth of character but still feel focused and whole. Excellent work.

Nuit de Bakelite from Naomi Goodsir, created by Isabelle Doyen. After unearthing my sample again, I could not help but wonder why I didn't own this perfume yet. It's not just that I love the fragrance, but I see it as a real olfactory piece of art that you hardly encounter in perfumery nowadays. NEZ magazine had it on their 111 pieces to smell before you die, and I couldn't agree more. I'd go as far as to say that even if you don't like the perfume but you have enough experience in this hobby and have smelled plenty, you should be able to appreciate the genius behind it and make it part of your collection if not to wear at least to marvel at it now and then and think: "Ah, this is what perfumery used to be." I can't think of too many fragrances like that. Off the top of my head, and without reiterating the old vintage perfumes everybody knows, I'd say the same about compositions like Iris Silver Mist or Une Fleur De Cassie. What is this perfume all about? Can I classify it? It would be difficult as it shifts constantly throughout the wear and never stays in the same place. I'd say it is a green-floral composition if I was hard-pressed to describe it in a nutshell. And then, it feels like explaining or talking about things like religion or the universe and giving your best description attempt in two words. I also noticed that different people experience it differently, so this short elaboration is based on how I experienced it over the years on my skin. I don't like tuberose for the most part, and I'm not huge on green scents, yet I adore this perfume. The way these two motifs are portrayed helps create something larger than the sum of their parts. The result is a cryogenic tuberose stomped on the hard pavement, showered by rain, only to be later dried up with a worn leather cloth and laid on a bed of slowly burning resins to further decompose. It unfolds on my skin in a clear four-stage progression that stays consistent most of the time. The opening is venomous! Bitter, green, chalky, and somehow dusty. I can see how most listed notes and accords play together to create this breathtaking introduction. Angelica, wormwood, galbanum, tomato and violet leaf feel like a tour-de-force into "poisonous green" and bitter territory. It comes across as smelling the roots that spread too much, reaching the pavement where unaware passer-byes crushed them by accident. A combination of dried green vegetation and wet rocks that have frozen over the cold winter night. The mid-phase can be divided into two smaller parts, but as a whole, it feels like a green-floral-chypre. Here, you get the tuberose that stays on the green aspects of the flower and never goes into the milky-creamy territory. I get a nice verdant mossiness and a bit of ylang, as well as the galbanum. The tuberose is not overly assertive, as it likes to be most of the time. The other elements keep it in check while the overall feel is walking into a green field at sunset during late summer nights when the air starts getting crisper. The last stage is where you'll get the slight warmth and smokiness from the resins, which makes the composition feel somewhat more inviting, almost warm. And still, the overall feel of "dried-up lifeforms" never goes away. Like a mummy's crypt, or in this case, a tuberose mummy's crypt. The air is hot, yet the atmosphere feels dry and dead. I can understand how this perfume might feel polarizing for many, and still, I urge any aficionado to at least sample it. It is a worthy addition to your olfactory cortex. It is a prime example of what perfumery should aspire to be and offer, and I'm delighted to have finally added a proper bottle to my collection. IG:@memory.of.scents

The Convergence of Nature in Perfumery NAOMI GOODSIR NUIT DE BAKELITE MY TAKE Initiation: It opens up with a huge blast of bright, non-citrusy yet uplifting tuberose, where a vintage ozonic nuance(accord from various long-chain aldehydes) exists as the backbone, which acts as the basic building block of the scent structure. An estery, almost acetic, starchy fruity aroma(banana) exists that gives the tuberose a very unique character in the best possible way. There is quite a bit of hydroxycitronellal, which smoothens the tuberose and aids in the binding of everything with its airy muget-like profile, increasing the diffusive property while keeping the entire composition "just" smooth enough to keep it non-abrasive. Fundamentally complex while remaining minimalist. Mid: As time goes by, the tuberose shows more of its natural beauty; the flower and the stem unite to create a fragrant symphony. This stem adds a stimulating spicy, cucumber-like nuance to the pre-existing starchy, banana-like profile, which represents an infinitely vast tuberose field over wet soil. This stage almost feels as if the epitome of nature engulfed me in its peace amidst anthropomorphic pollutants. Base: The ozonic breeze fades, and the tuberose reveals its sensual side with its indolic nature, pushing a creamy, musky, yet earthy tone of galbanum until the very end of the fragrance, accurately representing delicate, clean-oily human skin, inducing a pheromonic effect. The drydown, i.e. the animalic end of the composition, is not overly skanky, but rather warm, entirely orthogonal to how the fragrance began. The above accord feels like a blend of various odorous musk compounds tinkered to perfection. The indolic nature stamps an imprint of musk, connecting with the accord which reminds me of a cross between castoreum and ambrette seed tincture, leaving a base of the vintage "Golden" era of perfumery. The far drydown may be repulsive to some, but given the taste I share for vintage perfumery, I embrace it. Similarities: There aren’t many fragrances that revolve around a similar structured fragrances as this, but if you like fragrances like Jungle Jezebel, Annick Goutal Grand Amour, Vintage Chamade or even Chanel No.19; then you might like this. They're not similar, however certain aspects within the scent transformation reminds me of compositions as such. Scores: Uniqueness in profile- 9/10 Quality-8.5/10 Blending-9/10 Pricing-8/10 (8.625) Longevity-10/10 Projection- 9/10 ΣPerformance: 9.5/10 (9.5) Rounded Σscore = 9/10

This is not your usual pretty tuberose. What makes me love this fragrance isn’t simply that it’s green, or even that it features tuberose; it’s the unmistakable witchy vein running through it. A dark-green, unsettling scent that refuses to please everyone. Judging by the reactions I’ve received (which never influence my choices anyway), people either find it astonishingly beautiful or say I smell like a walking vegetable stand. It’s very much a love-it-or-hate-it kind of fragrance; and I’m firmly in the love camp. Rather than opening with a bright, lively greenness, it begins with a cynical blend of damp stone and incense. Vegetal, herbal, and indolic; yet never bubblegummy; this is a a tuberose, devoid of sweetness; cleansed and austere. Angelica and bitter, sharp green galbanum hit hard and unapologetically; and to me, this pairing is one of the key elements that gives the fragrance its unmistakably witchy character. Deep in the base, I detect immortelle; not extinguished, but restrained; dry, hay-like and a resinous, smoky leather. It feels as though this green, vegetal tuberose has been locked away in a dark, damp cellar, left to struggle and grow without light, fighting for survival; and succeeding. There’s also a very clear presence of orris root, though unlisted: cold, austere, and unmistakably chalk-dry. Perhaps the most beautiful aspect of this perfume is the complete absence of warmth and sweetness. It evokes shades of deep green, muted green, and icy white. Stunning. Lately, I wear it with just a single spray; anything more overwhelms and dilutes the very sensations I love, as it’s intensely potent and concentrated. This fragrance deserves a small story: A Necromantic Witch with pale green skin, thick emerald waves of hair, translucent flesh beneath which dark green veins are visible, large grey eyes, and an arrestingly elegant presence. She has no friends, nor does she need any; except for the familiars she resurrected from the realm of the dead: Bell Ghostlet (tuberose), Nightshade Hare (immortale), Thimble Crow (galbanum), and Black Stitch (styrax). Her life is devoted entirely to the forest, harvesting rare and deadly herbs. From these, she brews toxic essences to nourish corpse-blooms that grow in grave-soil. With each flower, she replaces one of her organs, slowly shedding her humanity; her ultimate goal being to transform into a garden entity.... Tag(s): witchy, gothic, green, bitter, herbal, green tuberose, leathery, dark, flower stem, vegetable root

Nuit de Bakélite makes me smile. Not because it's a particularly cheerful fragrance, but because it's so darn brilliant. Bakelite was an early form of plastic (the first, I think) that peaked in popularity in the first half of the twentieth century. If you've ever encountered it—and you probably have, knowingly or not—you know it has a characteristic look and feel (smooth and brittle), as well as a unique smell: something synthetic and warm, almost sweet; certainly a far cry from the more sophisticated, impersonal plastics we know today. It is this note that makes NdB such a clever fragrance, both vintage and postmodern. Honestly, I'm a bit stumped by the composition: I definitely detect angelica and wisps of tuberose, green notes and leather too, and the carrot seeds mentioned in the note pyramid. What I don't understand is how they come together to produce what others have insightfully identified as an "artificial flower" accord. The name is perfect: I spray this on and am transported to postwar America. I'm Julianne Moore's character in The Hours, or perhaps Betty Draper from Mad Men. With the children in bed and the husband passed out in a drunk stupor on the couch, I'm savoring the one quiet moment of the day. I relax, letting the stiff kitchen chair support me. All the lights, save the one above the nook where I'm sitting, are out, and I only have the humming refrigerator to keep me company. There's an ashtray full of cigarette butts an arm's length away, and a bouquet of dying white flowers that seem to be looking at me in an accusatory manner. I sigh, and it all comes to me at once: the flowers, the earthy ash, the spice cabinet a few feet away, but most of all, the bakelite. It's everywhere. In many ways it's me: glossy yet translucent, new but timeless, scratch-resistant but imminently breakable. I don't know what occasion Nuit de Bakélite is best suited for, but I do know that it's one of the most artful fragrances I've had the privilege of owning. All-season, all-gender, and good for day or night. Take with a grain of salt and the drink of your choice. EDIT 27 DEC 2020: It just occurred to me that this is also an homage to, or riff on, Serge Lutens's Nuit de Cellophane, a fragrance I only recently discovered and sampled. Like Nuit de Bakélite, it uses clever floral and herbal accords to integrate a sweet plastic note into the composition. I found NdC more subtle, but also much less interesting and evocative, than NdB.

Batch number on bottle: Unreadable Reviewed from sample: No Nuit de Bakélite opens like a scorched greenhouse. Unrelentingly green, bitter, and surreal. From the first spray, it smells like someone crushed fresh angelica and galbanum stems under a leather boot, set fire to it, and called it art. There’s tuberose too, but not the usual creamy version - this one is sharp, waxy, and vegetal, like stem pulp or cut flower sap. What really sets this apart is how proudly unnatural it feels. It doesn’t try to hide its synthetic side. It knows that it’s not natural, and it spits right in your mouth for expecting anything else. There’s a plasticky, rubberized harshness layered into the green bitterness and leathery tar that turns the whole thing into a kind of olfactory provocation. People always yap about Followed by Kerosene. And no - you’re wrong! Nuit de Bakélite roundhouse kicks Kerosene right in the nuts! It’s the strongest perfume I’ve ever encountered. And I say that without any exaggeration. Longevity is absurd. It clings for days and days. Sillage is completely nuclear. This scent doesn’t walk into a room, it melts the door away. The mass appeal is near zero. Yet, most people won’t even know how to react. It’s too much for work, too much for events and probably too much for most social situations unless you're prepared flip anyone off who makes comments about it. And there will be, trust me on that. You need an unhealthy amount of arrogance to pull this off. But if truly don't give a f***, this is juice as good as it gets! Creatively, this is just a total masterpiece. If Annihilation (2018) were a perfume, this would be it. It’s eerie, otherworldly and very confident in its vision. The quality is excellent and while the value is decent for what you get, the presentation plays it coy: a slim, minimalist bottle that feel quiet and polite. Just until you open it. The pale yellowish juice is already screaming before it hits your skin. SCORE BLOCK Scent: 10 Longevity: 10 Sillage: 10 Mass Appeal: 6 Creativity: 10 Quality: 10 Value: 8 Presentation: 8 Final score: 9.4 / 10

If neon green had a scent, it would be the opening of Nuit de Bakelite. The first few moments are pure galbanum. You smell freshly cut stems: vegetal, wet, sharp, almost acidic. But the green’s so strong and bright, it goes past smelling natural. It pulses and glows with the otherworldly hue of radium. This stage of the perfume is so weird and beautiful, I wish it lasted forever. But it doesn’t. A few beats in, the neon retreats to the edges, and a more natural shade of green begins to bloom thanks to the tomato leaf. The perfume still has a serrated sharpness, but in comparison to the opening, it now registers as sweeter. As it dries down, the floral elements get stronger. It's like a slow olfactory camera tilt up the length of a bouquet — from the stems of the flowers, to its petals. Finally, the tuberose and ylang-ylang enter the frame. But, just when you think the perfume's settled into its true character, there’s another trick. A haze creeps into the frame -- almost like someone off-screen has set down an ashtray next to the bouquet, and set it down a little too heavily, so a puff of ash swirls into the air. The metaphorical camera zooms out until we see the room all this is taking place in, complete with ashtray, some leather chairs, and half-drawn curtains. The weird, vibrant plant life at the center of Nuit de Bakelite has now been subsumed by human life. The leather chairs look supple and lived-in. The tobacco dust smells slightly stale, but in a way that suggests worldliness — a touch of vintage mystery and fading glamor. It’s like the perfume’s connecting the surrealism of its opening to the elegant strangeness of old galbanum-greats like Chanel No19. This isn't meant to smell natural, but it is meant to smell like a continuation of perfume history. By the end of its run, it's a touchingly domesticated masterpiece. TLDR; Nuit de Bakelite starts off otherworldly, and ends up being very worldly. For anyone who enjoys perfume as art, it's a journey worth taking.

This scent is not for the faint-hearted, like once I was. If the Xenomorph Queen wore a scent before biting off heads of poor space travelers, she'd wear this one, no doubt. At some point, everyone within the community started talking about Nuit De Bakelite, so I've set on a mission to find it and dare to sniff. What can I say, after what it has done to my nose it has to marry me! Firstly, I was mortified. Evil, absolutely mad greens, in an old leather rucksack. Don't expect classic tuberose - what you'll find here is the most concentrated medicinal tuberose absolute. Notes of angelica and artemisia are loud, to say the least. Something about it is so scary and captivating at the same time. When I first tried it I was relieved that "it is not my scent", but I placed the blotter in my bag and went home. The blotter made my bag smell of it, and in fact, my whole room was smelling of Bakelite for a week. My wardrobe smelt of Bakelite after I had put my bag in it. Call it Stockholm syndrome, but the next day, I could not stop thinking about it. I started craving it, I started dreaming about it. Eventually, I got hold of a sample just to understand if I need a full bottle, which now I have. Towards the end, it becomes soft, almost velour like. My drunk friend told me "you smell like honey". Not sure if I'd agree, but you get the picture of the full journey this scent will send you on. It is an absolute wacko scent, not a blind buy even if you think that you love greens and tuberoses. It is an experience, and it became a revelation for me that perfumes are more scented water that is there to please your nostrils. I wear it when I need to channel my inner dominatrix on those days when I choose violence.

One spray is more than sufficient to demonstrate why Nuit de Bakelite (my, what a strange name) is an award-winning scent. Though vaguely following in the vein established by Cellier's Bandit for Piguet, NdB establishes itself as a neo-green leather from the very first moment on the skin. Opening barefoot on a note of sliced green bell-pepper, such confidence in its own weirdness immediately takes my attention. Lying beneath this green-vegetal gossamer is a gargantuan floral iris, powdery and rooty and, to my nose, evocative of the totality of Olfactive Studios' Iris Shot. And just before the bitter-powdery greenness can become too much, soft carroty and biscuity leather rises up from the base like a whale taking a breath of fresh air. It's so strange, so enormous, and yet also so beautiful that I really struggle to find the words to describe it. Despite its marvellousness though, when I examine (again and again and again) NdB I realise that, on an emotional level, I think it's merely trying to be conventionally beautiful and not much else (or this is all it gives to me, on the inside). I find, in its weirdness, it evokes nothing in terms of places, times, emotions in me, it smells purely like a perfume demonstrating how incredible perfume can be for its own sake, and nothing more. Thus, despite its deserved renown as one of the most ground-breaking contributions this century, I have a subtle suspicion that few will take to actually wearing it habitually, myself included. No, when I wrest myself from the arms of this green incubus I do immediately realise that its experimental character is simply who it is - too weird to not love, too weird to wear. A perfume not of this Earth.

A nyitó robbanás frissen éteresen csillogó ásványi aromákat lövell szanaszét bőrünkről, nem is fogjuk fel rögtön, mi is történik velünk, bizarr módon bár, de ez az illat sikoltozik! Téli, zselésen megdermedt menta-jégkristályok hullanak szerteszét szegfűszeges, vodkás hópelyhek formájában, gyönyörűséges citrusok, különösen a zöld lime leve freccsen szét, rozmaringgal, bazsalikommal és rengeteg szegfűszeggel fűszerezve. A rengeteg csapadék eredményeképpen egy kifejezetten zöld, vizes élőhelyen vagyunk, érezzük a zöld nád illatát, fásan lédús naturalista a helyszín, mellyel a rengeteg szegfűszeg szinte összeegyeztethetetlennek tűnik, de csak egy pillanatra, mert az összkép egységes egésszé áll össze, bizarr, kóros, de lenyűgözően stimuláló az eredmény. Ahogy elcsitul a támadás, olyan érzésem támad, mintha egy hűsítő mentolos almakompóttal teli kádban feredőznék. A mentolos zöld leveles közegben a szegfűszeg jelenléte kiemelkedő ebben a kezdeti intenzív szakaszban. Miután a fejillatok, a lime, a menta, az ánizs és a szegfűszeg, illetve a zöld jegyzetek csitulva leülepednek, nos, ekkor kezdődik az igazi élmény, de micsudi élmény! Ebben a nyugvó fázisban az illat finoman átalakul egy fa-velúr-fűszernövény kombinációvá, egy káprázatos kopaiba balzsamos tiszta vászonágyon elterülve, tűlevelekkel megbolondítva, melyek segítik az orris (írisz gyöktörzse -enyhén púderes ibolya illat) beszivárgását a kompozícióba. A finom füves árnyalatok ismét érezhetők egy enyhe fűszeres ködben, amit a cédrus, a nyír fenomenálisan éteres jegye és a szantálfa foglal gyönyörűséges fás keretbe. Pazar, ragyogó csodában lehet részünk, ha túléltük a kezdeti jégkorszaki robbanást...

Anything I have tried from Naomi Goodsir has been excellent. I love the artistry of this brand - avant-garde yet wearable; original compositions yet rooted in classical French perfumery. Nuit de Bakélite is a creative, avant-garde take on tuberose, one of my favourite notes. The tuberose is mounted on a leather backdrop and the herbal notes add a green-tinged, aromatic edge. It feels 1970s in style - a bold green floral with some bitterness from the herbs, not a million miles from Cellier's legendary style. Fitting, considering the witchy poison theme of this scent. NdB is green from initial spray - galbanum leads the way, adding a nice vintage-style green haze. Bitter angelica is quite prominent initially, keeping things herbal from the get-go. There is a hint of peppery spice too. The tuberose is bright and clean, slightly fruity - not its typically heady, waxy white floral self. There is a camphorous quality to the green notes as it progresses, providing a bright, fresh counterpoint to the tuberose. Ylang ylang adds a creamy sweetness, muted and pleasant. This creates a slightly tropical effect alongside the camphorous notes and fruity phase of the tuberose. The camphor dissipates, and the green accord becomes dewy and sap-like, evocative of the stem of the flower. The leather develops in the background as it progresses, soft, suede-like and slightly musky. It enhances the green tuberose, until it dries down to a musky floral skin scent. Sillage is strong and longevity is long-lasting. A transeasonal scent, NdB is surprisingly easy to wear despite its artiness. Unisex, and utterly cool. 4.5/5.

Reviewing a bottle from 2024. Nuit de Bakélite was launched in 2017. What strange magic is this? Nuit de Bakélite is an intriguing green bitter floral post-apocalyptic fragrance which has the potential to rock your world ( just read all the idolatrous reviews). It opens with a disturbing burst of bitter green herbal accord (green galbanum, tomato & violet leaf and angelica). Some have described this as green pepper which is too simplistic. It is more like a cloud of smoldering green plastic. This is followed by soft smoky leather with powdery spices. When the tuberose enters it is not what you would expect, rather it has mutated into a green vinyl version with lovely Karo Karounde thrown into the mix. This addition of tuberose is a brilliant foil to the potent green opening. The dry down brings out more of the florals supported by tobacco, guaiac wood and resins. This fragrance is difficult to describe accurately and must be experienced individually. It is unusual but also very addictive; gorgeous and wearable despite/because of it's challenging unique opening. Masterfully blended by Isabelle Doyon who won the Prix d'Honneur in 2022. Quality- excellent Unisex Performance- very good (although I don't find it as beast as described previously) Overall, this is not just a fragrance, it is an experience. Nuit de Bakelite deftly contrasts synthetic plastic with natural floral/herbal notes. The green opening may be difficult but overall this is expectionally beautiful. One of my favourites. 10/10 ** Won best Indie Perfume at Art and Olfaction in 2019**

Mall flowers ★★★★☆ One of the vilest, most violent openings I've ever smelled. I gagged with the fury of a thousand suns and prayed my sins to be forgiven. The drydown is really something however. To me this is the perfume equivalent to vaporwave music and aesthetics. NdB recalls fake plants and palm trees in an 80's American mall. Fountains with neon lightning, soft jazz in the background, hair salons with ridiculous hair cut posters in the windows. There's a hint of an artifical candy flavour sweetening the green tuberose foliage, think of those candy necklaces made of tiny pastel coloured sugar rings. This makes me feel nostalgic for an era (and for a memory) that I never lived through, much like vaporwave music does. The tuberose seems to have an intentional cheap jasmine oil facet that reminds the audience that the cliches aren't to be hidden with embarrassment but to be boldly declared as part of the appeal - like a classic floral bouquet overdone with irony. Forget the joyless and indifferent Santal 33, this is the new cool! Very interesting and evocative indeed, I never thought I'd experience a perfume that would make me feel in this particular way. The opening was truly sickening, but the drydown is definitely worthwhile. A very special fragrance, highly recommended! If you're interested in the vaporwave reference check out NEON PALM MALL (Vaporwave Mix + Video) by SPLIFF RADIOショー in YouTube for a concrete idea what I mean.

I'm going to try to keep this brief but I feel I have a lot to say about nuit de Bakelite. I recall first sampling it a few years ago when these launched (I think there was only three then) and being impressed by the creativity of this line, they are for real 'eds it seems. This is the crown jewel according to most as well, has that smoky, green, Cellier-esque, vintage nod, but with peculiar modernity and the 1940's plastic reference in the name. Well the name is oddly appropriate because it does have this strange plastic quality, a guff of sharp but sweet musks in the opening and bizarre, green tuberose sweetened with carrot seed and angelica musk. Then comes a flip to a mossy, leathery scent and call me mad but an association with Creed's Green Irish tweed for a moment. It's strangely enigmatic and aloof with those gassy musks but resinous and deep, and flipping back to floral and green all the time. I suspect this is a polarising fragrance but clearly very popular and I get why, I think it's an excellent concept, and execution. Hugely powerful this one as well, had some horrendous comments from folks nearby me, which is always a treat when you like a perfume which pisses others off, oh and my car smelled of it for a about three days. I think it's a modern masterpiece and I want it in my collection from a perfume history perspective but I'm reluctant as I'm not sure how often I'd wear it?

Cold and curious. Initially I took Nuit de Bakélite to be a twist on the purple floral with an ambiguous mystery dimension. Medium white wine, cigarette ash and violets, I noted with false confidence. Maybe that impression of wine could be coming from a watery accord of hedione, galbanum and hyacinth? In part it recalled the greens of the 1970s. Now smelling it with the notelist in front of me I can see the carrot seed is dominant providing the ionones of the purple flower / orris root note I picked up on, the thin, neutral leather (isobutyl quinoline?) and galbanum bring the ashiness and the tuberose and artemisia provide the watery green. But set that aside, it's the overall impact that matters with this one. Nuit de Bakélite is a linear single accord, unique and distinctive. A smouldering greenhouse is what comes to mind, half-green / half-purple, aromatic and cold, looking to the past but standing alone. It doesn't smell like it but it makes me think of Guerlain's mysterious Vol de Nuit , it has that same chilly, unemotional "otherness". The only other connection I can make is it has some of the dry, aromatic ashiness of Hermès's Eau de Gentiane Blanche . It's completely hypnotic and I love it. A word of warning, it's very persistent — I have to store it separately and boxed up in its original packaging. Niche and vintage green lovers should investigate.

Reviews of this are really strange it makes me wonder if I got the correct sample from luckyscent. Upon immediate application it smells like a dish rag full of musty water (in a really good/interesting way) but that only lasts a second. As it dries the greenness becomes more clear and it has a sort of mentholated quality to my nose. Very much bitter green vibes. It also has that synthetic plasticy vibe to it. It reminds me of being at my great aunts house when she’d babysit me as a little one, she was always washing laundry as we were running in and out of the house. This has a sort of clean laundry vibe to me. As other reviews have said, this is a rainy day scent. It smells like a cool, overcast, misty morning in early spring. Where my experience differs from a lot of other reviews is in the longevity. This scent is pretty bold on initial application and it does seem to last a good while on skin. However in my experience this is not stronger than kerosene Followed. Followed is insane, it dominates my bowl of samples that it’s stored in. Nuit de Bakelite also stands out amongst my mix of samples but to me Followed overpowers it. I do only have a 2ml dabber but I feel like that tiny amount will last me a while because she is very strong, and for me, an occasional selection. I really enjoy this one, the dry down is heavenly.

After reading reviews of how powerful this stuff is, I decided to try it on in the garage instead of the bathroom. I got a perfect little hit of plasticky goodness upon opening the sample vial and managed to dab some on my forearms before spilling half of the sample onto the floor :( In the early phase, the soft quality of the first sniff was overwhelmed by an acrid artemisia/angelica note which dare I say didn't smell out of place in the garage. Hours later, the site of the accident smells distinctly of absinthe and not much else. The artemisia (wormwood) note seems to be underrepresented in the comments here. Meanwhile, this fared a lot better on my skin. Sweet indolic ylang ylang crept into the green accord, which warmed the fragrance a little but also vaguely reminded me of the sickly bittersweet odor of someone who hasn't bathed in months. However, the sterile industrial facets quickly regained the upper hand, and the fragrance eventually faded into that wonderful plastic tuberose skin scent I had been craving from the beginning. TL;DR Bizarrely captivating, leans feminine... Even if the opening makes your hair stand on end, I think you should try a VERY small amount on your skin. Maybe it's my skin chemistry or maybe I'm a tuberose freak, but I rather like this on myself and would even consider it for casual wear.

Imagine being in a shopping mall in the '70s or '80s, sitting near some big dark-green flowering plants surrounded by variegated lacquered bricks, a water fountain splashing, some muzak echoing in the distance, near the store that sold exclusively leather clothing under garish fluorescent light. Maybe there's a TV nearby with a late-morning game show on with no volume. That's what this fragrance is, that experience, that feeling, that time. It's extremely evocative, extremely expressive, extremely powerful. Do people in general want to smell like this? Probably not. But for those of us who like to be completely transported with our perfumes, to a place that is forever gone, like shaky vidcam footage of happier and more carefree times, this is just raw, unadulterated genius and joy. In more practical terms, this is basically dry tuberose and leather. Quite austere, aggressive, a little chalky and soapy. Performance is high, so beware. It's not sexy at all. It's very non-gendered. It's very indoor, all-weather. The perfume equivalent of a polyester pantsuit at a Space Invaders machine. I find it hard to believe that this fragrance is even possible. Pure art and pure nostalgia. A great and rare masterpiece.

I'm obsessed with this perfume. I'm not even sure why. This is a bomb. I've got 2 decants and only 5 drops on my skin was enough to let a fantastic smell in my (small) apartment. I came back from the boring grocery store and was amazed by the ambient smell. My first love when it comes to special perfume was Aura Mugler. I guess I like green monster perfumes after all. Nuit de Bakélite is much more shocking than Aura though. Someone mentioned Blade Runner below and that's spot on. I'm not sure if it smells like Rachel in Blade Runner or just like a clever green/tuberose/leather perfume from 1985 but it smells like something out of our ultra commercialized ages and this is remarkable. This is the kind of perfume that makes me realize how that industry is still well alive. Edit : I finally bought a FB and this is nuclear (more than my decant). I guess that what we mean when we say perfumes from the 80's were strong. The only other perfume I own that stick to everything like that is Bee by Zoologist. After a couple of hours the scent on my skin is nice and not so strong. I guess if you don't want to fill an entire room you need to spray a couple of hours in advance and let that thing calm down.

it's been over a year since i first smelled nuit de bakelite and got it, i must say it leaves an impression on you. irrelevant but i have a collection of 50ish bottles and don't ask me why, but i have at times sprayed every single one on a piece of a garment to find a winner in terms which one would overpower the others and nuit de bakelite is my winner. that aside how does it smell like? the opening is the strangest green bubblegum to me, and idk why i get this milk thing sensation that u get from unripe fruits (like fig ooze), but the dry down is insane; imagine a cigarette smoke that comes out green in colour (unrelated but i always smell cigarette smoke when there's galbanum but i didn't see it on Fragrantica though i still wouldn't be surprised if it's there). this thing is strange, not for everyone, i'm not gonna hype it up for no reason bc i realize it's not everyone's cup of tea. i don't wanna say that it smells like mugler aura, but u know how that one is so strange and u can't really categorize it? in that sense nuit de bakelite is like that. they don't smell similar at all.