Baklava Musk

This is an odd one for me. The first time I wore it, it reminded me of asphalt. It had an extremely harsh opening. But after a few times of wearing it I get it now. It’s a smoky, nutty, and musky. It’s certainly a unique smell. I get the inspiration of the baklava, but it’s purely a gourmand perfume, it’s stays as an inspiration, it doesn’t smell like baklava. The coffee, musk, smoke, and pistachio are in the forefront for me. It’s pretty nice, a little challenging to be sure, but nice! Edit: after 4 or so wears, I’m in love with this. I left my original thoughts above since there was some trials and tribulations prior to me “getting it”. But boy is it wonderful. I finally get the baklava, I swear I can smell the baked phyllo, honey, and pistachio which is married beautifully with the musk and smoke. I’m not sure if what made this finally fully click for me. Maybe an extra year of maturation for either my nose or my sample, but it has definitely become full bottle worthy for me. However, 100% not a safe blind buy, especially if you judge the perfume by your first sniff. The opening is the most challenging for certain, but I’ve come to love it as much as the dry down.

Baklava Musk is one of my favourites. It took me a while to get used to it at first as the opening is a little intense and smoky but in dry down it’s divine. I started with a sample and noticed I kept going back to smell my wrists. I get roasted nuts and coffee, super cozy.

It took me a few attempts to 'get' it, but now I do and I like it. It's such an unusual scent it made me unsure but after wearing it a few times it grew on me. It's not a safe blind but, especially at the price. It's not a gourmand fragrance as the name suggests, the smoke and anise notes are the dominant ones for me.

This is...OK? I've only worn it a few times, and I'm liking it more with each wear. It doesn't smell like baklava to me, though--not much cinnamon. It's coffee, anise, cardamom...and then a sweet nuttiness. Definitely not a typical gourmand.

I was super excited about this scent since I really like baklava and knew it wouldn't be too sweet, but I was still disappointed. The opening was way too smoky it gave me headaches the first time I wore it and I just barely got any of the spicey scents as it dried down. Second time I tried it, I layered a very tame vanilla under to see if it'd make it any better and it did but only the tiniest bit. Would definitely not get a full bottle.

This sounded like a delicious gourmand! but alas, it is not. Far from it. I actually had to scrub it off. :/ it smell like the nuts, coffee, and an cardamon got burned. There is something so heavy and inedible smelling in this. Sad to say but one of the worst things I've smelled. Thankfully I got a sample before purchasing a full bottle!

I noticed that the marketing for this scent began as though it was a gourmand, and then they changed the site's description of the scent entirely, noting that it wasn't meant to smell like baklava so much as evoke a market where baklava is being made. Combined with the near impossibility of finding reviews for the fragrance and the fact that Rook turns off comments for all of their ads, I can't help but think that this fragrance has been very poorly received overall and they are really floundering to figure out how to sell this scent. The thing is, I just do not know who this is for. It doesn't smell spicy. I don't smell cardamom or coffee. The smoke that people are describing doesn't really even smell like smoke to me. Or at least not the smoke of a burnt pastry, which I could imagine being pleasant. It smells plasticky and fumey, that scent of something synthetic burning that you can tell is extremely bad for your lungs. This intense fume smell dies down after an hour or so leaving pistachio and powdered sugar with a sandalwood base. It's...fine at this point. But again, who is this for? There are successful smoky, spicy scents. There are successful gourmands. This is neither, and it fails to be a pleasing blend of the two.

This one is awful. It smells like a kitchen disaster with lots of vile smoke, no hint of musk or baklava at all. It was really hard to scrub off, making it even worse.

This quite literally attacked my nostrils, what’s in this thing?! Spiky, velcro weapon

Oh no... I was very excited for this scent. The smell of smoke overtakes it. There isn’t even a hint of sweetness/gourmand. It’s very bad, very heavy. I guess sure it smells like a baklava bakery... if it burnt all the pastries that day.