Patchouli

The perfect Patchouli fragrance for my soul. It has a bit of everything - nature-like smell, dank, earthy, dusty, liquor-like, spicy, medicinal, only slightly sweet, and with a brilliantly poetic addition of rose. It is a soul-stirring, unfiltered, and brutal depiction of this note. I love many approaches to patchouli, from the dusty cocoa to the ambery ones. The variety that leaves me indifferent is the "modern" and "clean" patchouli scents a la Coromandel and Co. I like them as musty, dusty, earthy, and close-to-nature as possible. The Santa Maria Novella is that and more. I think it might be too literal for many, specifically if one is used to having their patchouli pampered by balsamic, woody, and floral notes. This one is as close to nature as it can get, further made challenging by the cold, almost metallic, and medicinal blast from the opening (very clove-forward), the raw earthiness (practically can nearly chew it), and the minimal sweetness and fillers. As with other perfumes from this house, it smells very high quality, quite butch, and medieval. With this one, I picture a dank cellar in a castle. The cold and wet opening, coupled with the boozy, liquor-like facet (like a liquor made from the earth) and the earthiness, all make me think of a cellar. There is, however, one aspect that helps bring out a lyrical and romantic face of the fragrance, and that is a vivid rose accord. It comes across as such and may be the suggested imagery of the combination of eugenol, geranium, and rosewood listed among the notes. Still, it's a rose nonetheless. Crimson petals of a withered flower dangling on the cold and wet earth. It allows a sensitive side of the perfume to show and prevents it from being too simple-minded and brute. This duality of darkness with speckles of diaphanous light makes me reminisce of the way Lestat dreamed of Claudia: "The smell of crushed rose petals wafting from her curly hair." I can see a character like Lestat de Lioncourt as an embodiment of this scent. The perfect balance of malevolence, starkness, timeless beauty, with a hint of romance. CAVEAT: Review based on the frosted bottle version, which differs from the current, clear-glass, and paper-label one. IG:@memory.of.scents

In the beginning it's chocolate patchouli, the chocolate smell only lasts for a few minutes (fortunately), otherwise it's earthy patchouli, the spicey character of it tickles my nose, it has also a little licorice character. It maybe just turned on my skin little to chocolately side, when i sprayed it on shirt its from the beginning earthy/rooty smell. After an hour, I stop registering it, over time it changes to the earthy smell. In our language we use the same word for spice and root, this smell smells like spicey root, when someone said i smelled like spices im not sure if he mean spicy or smell of roots, for me is mainly earthy smell. Patchouli is the same as in Marescialla. I use Marescialla on my neck and I put 2x Patchouli spritzs on my chest under my shirt, after a few hours when I stop registering Marescialla I start to smell the earthy scent of roots from under my shirt, these 2 scents complement each other. I started to be huge fan o SNM. I get chance to get original formulation, dark brown almost red juice in milky bottle. Its much different than current version. Velvety dark mysterious aroma, almost fruity red berries with vanilla tones, its not so spicey and earthy like current version, but more ambery and somehow powdery if you can said it like that. So old formulation is using absolutelly different patchouli with different qualities than the current one. Despite the fact they are still the “same” perfume, you need to look on them like 2 different perfumes. Both of them are nice, the mistake is they keep the same name. I will say main difference between them, that the current one is more sharp and earthy/rooty, the old one is more smooth and fruity with nice herbal black tea drydown. If you are interested in old formulation, let me know, the guy have more bottles of this old juice. Oh men, if you combine patchouli after shave from them with patchouli (old formulation) perfume, georgous combo. The other things i found these days that it have this glue quality in the opening, it smells like glue, will not say it’s synthetic smell and its somehow pleasant, but never noticed it before.

This perfume and particularly the patchouli causes me to go back in time not to my own time, but to one or more unknown times.. A time when knowledge, progress whether real or not, did not yet exist. It is a time when time passes to the rhythm of boredom, daily labors and the little miracles of life: such as the days sunny with the smiles that bloom on the faces encountered, an unconditional respect for life in society in a barely submissive nature! In short, natural time. This perfume brings together a part of that, but with all that one can expect from a pure patchouli..a note of camphor almost minty even of eucalyptus or pine, the smell of mushroom, of cellar, a dusty aspect and old, and finally the smell of earth in the background.. oh my beloved! This perfume in its frosted bottle (the current one being transparent with a white label on the front side), lasts quite long on my skin.. even if the smell seems close to the skin, I'm sure it diffuses very suitably (and it is an eau de cologne). In any case, for all patchouli lovers, it's a must have.. and the only one that I will keep as a standard meter! I don't find it dark or harsh...just pure and assertive. On the other hand, with this strong camphor (or even turpentine) note, it is difficult to show himself in the first half-hour...but little by little he becomes more able to be sociable. I think it's a good perfume on which you can juxtapose after the first hour other perfumes of which you would like to emphasize the patchouli or add its particularity! I don't find it close to that of Rem who with his overly imposing cistus labdanum weighs down the note of patchouli without emphasizing it, in other words, it stifles it. Here patchouli is the key word and it breathes deeply and so do we! ⁝

[OCT. 2021] UPDATE: No doubt, this is delicious patchouli. But don't go expecting a boozy-choco here or any sort of replacement for Nasomatto Pardon here. I feel... "how sad!", since Pardon is quite expensive for a 30ml compared to SMN Patchouli's 100ml, but even to this day there is still no beating the bush that even after 3 or 4 years Pardon is STILL the best undeniably boozy dark chocolate in the market around my area today. And I've tried Xerjoff and Lubin's takes-- also deliciously boozy but more like having Xerjoff's box of Lindt or Lubin's bite of Loacker than Pardon's Ferrero Rocher Noir...! By comparison, SMN's Patchouli is a vintage wooden cabin! Also, thank you to tiberije for a comparison! In short: "SMN Patchouli is a true patchouli, dry but never grating. Jovoy's Psychedelique turns from patchouli to delicious vanilla cafe-patchouli in 30 minutes. But my favourite is still Givenchy Gentleman (Boisee)." Hi tiberije, thank you for the PM! I'd love to hear what you think about Margiela's Jazz Club. I find just as delicious as Gentleman but with a bit of smooth sweet-patchoulish depth thanks to the Margiela tobacco flower note. Enjoy! [SEPT. 2021] I'm glad I'm not the only tester here that gets the boozy dark chocolate qualities of this patchouli. I'd love for someone to compare this to Jovoy's Psychedelique because these two by their reviews both praise these patchouli bombs/soliflores as having a delicious, addictive bitter dark chocolate semi-liqueurish quality to them. I'm leaning to this one because of the much more accessible price tag and just my ability to pick this one up locally in Fortitude Valley, QLD. A side-by-side would make for an interesting review video!

My favorite patchouli so far. The strong patchouli blast in the opening is a tad harsh but give it some time and you’ll be rewarded with a clean, smooth patchouli that has a beautiful, soft, soapy, slightly rosy drydown. The patchouli is thick, warm and spicy (pink peppery) but it dries down lighter without ever being too heavy unless you overspray. Really love this gem. It’s the kind of scent that will blend nicely into your skin and create a long lasting fluffy patchouli cloud around you all day. Actual notes are rose, jasmine, rosewood, patchouli, sandalwood and oakmoss but it's blended so perfectly that you mostly just get patchouli. About 95% patchouli and 5% Rose. I also get a nice, smooth clove note in the drydown. Even those who don’t like rose will probably love this because the rose works so well and remains subtle. I own a full bottle of this and also Lorenzo Villoresi Patchouli but I prefer the Santa Maria. It’s a must have for patchouli lovers. Some say it's not as strong as it used to be but I applied two sprays last night at 9:00 and my wife smelled it from several feet away this morning. Patchouli is all about the sillage. It can't be enjoyed with your nose buried in it. It can only be enjoyed when floating in the air after drying on the skin. NOTE that this review is for the older formula with darker red/brown juice, not the newer reformulated gold juice with paper label on bottle. I hope they didn't destroy this masterpiece with a shit reformulation.