Chene

Serious, SERIOUS business. How did it take me so long to write about Chene? A true masterpiece: tracked through a forest of expertise, riddled with the rot and stink of nature, and ending up as an amazingly complex enigma. The wild and the civilised, the rich and the austere, the indoor and outdoor woven together into some crazed kind of perfection. Chene is kind of "peak Lutens". It smells like nothing else on the market. It's radiant with completely solid, hardwood-to-the-core inner confidence, just doing its thing while you reel back in astonishment. It's dark and smoky and almost dirty. It's archaic and spicy and venerable. HISTORIC. It smells like old - like centuries-old - timber relics imbued with years of human effort, burnished to a mellow, dark-brown glow: barrels and airing chests and well-polished tables and the keys of some rattly old spinet. The scent of heirloom furniture and old, old money; grand families with deep roots and heavy dignity. It also brings the outside of an imaginary 18th-century-aristocrat's parkland right inside your memory palace with the unmistakeable reek of moss and mud and freshly stripped birch bark and dirty boots kicked through the forest floor in autumn. Its almost-sour, almost-acrid notes keep popping scent-memories of all facets of oak - slightly bruised acorns, moulding leaves, moss on damp bark, the tannic bite of fresh-splintered raw wood, the spicier undertow of that wood aged and tended and loved. It conjures not just a person or even a place - but a whole antique world, somehow. Scent of a roistering hereditary landowner with great taste and a love of the outdoors - though probably mostly for the chance to shoot things. Now that is not my world at all - and yet this was passionate love from the first moment. I drooled like a gundog or a truffle pig, not even from the first drop, but from the first waft of a tiny .25ml sample I'd tracked all over the internet for months. And it absolutely transported me. Chene is no easy ride, though: it's so determinedly ITSELF that it's not aiming to please, and definitely not even trying to put lesser beings at their ease. Some people tell me it positively revolts them: 'mouldy', 'stinky', 'sour', 'dirty' - well yes, kinda, of course, I feel like insisting... but still magically so? So much about it puzzles me: you can tell this is grown-ups' stuff because it's shot through with paradoxes. There's a very serious bang of poky-sharp alcoholic notes, which if you're caught on the wrong day, can go pretty strange, verging on acetone or pear drops or something more synthetic. And the immortelle is unmistakeably there: I LOATHE immortelle, yet here it is (as in another great love, Papillon Anubis), defiantly present but without ruining everything. It's not 'wearable' or 'adaptable' in any sense: it's the outermost, classiest, most stubbornly individual wood-centred scent I can imagine. The very first time I smelled this my nose went BOINGGG and it detonated a love and taste for niche, and a lust for Serge in particular, which would run for years. How do they DO that? A prince among scents and priced to match. Needs patience to let it unfold and despite its uncompromising presence it's not a huge, overbearing performer (for that would be vulgar, and this is far too weird and too classy to cheapen itself that way.) Very much on the masculine side of unisex but ladies like me, who love to hug trees or tree scents, will be able to deal. Take a walk on the properly wild - the countryside in autumn - side with it and you might well never want to leave. Chene. OMG. Oak Made Gorgeous. Please try to smell it once, even if you know you'll hate it. For truly this is what art perfumery can be at its finest.

Chene is one of the few perfumes that leaves me speechless. I really have to force myself to articulate thoughts and feelings when I smell it. As many of you know that have been following my reviews, being speechless is an extreme rarity for me that I sure some of you would like to be a lot more frequent. I'm not sure I can do my usual thing of blending technical description with artistic and emotional descriptions, now that I've finally decided to try to put something to paper, so instead, let me tell you a story. Within walking distance of my home here in Northern California is a forest preserve park full of old oaks, birch trees, evergreens, and much more besides. A spring storm exploded through a couple of days prior to me taking a walk in this park, drenching us with rain and pummeling us with wind. Walking through a park after an early spring storm is one of life's little pleasures, where you'll get to witness the plant life seeming to have been shaken awake from their winter slumber and relieved of old growths to make room for new growths. I stopped at a little rest area deep in the park along a walking trail where the storm seemed to have really shaken things up. A large, old oak, some several decades old, was uprooted; birch and evergreen branches were everywhere; the ground was still wet, rainwater sitting in some spots while other spots with robust shrubbery seemed to have drank as much of the rainwater as they could. The smell was intoxicating. Pine and fir sap gave the thick air a sour and sweet resinous quality as the evergreens were bursting at their seams from pulling in as much water as they could muster to free their roots to air. The fallen birch branches and exposed trunk unions kept to themselves, but if I got close enough they smelled crisp and fresh yet mildly deep and robust with a distinct earthy leatheriness. Then there was the mighty fallen oak. It looked as though it was mostly dead by the time the storm hit, which it would be for a storm to have this much impact on it, but a significant part of it was hanging on for dear life until the storm hit, evidenced by several large roots bigger than elephant trunks still reaching into the earth from the tree's fallen base. But the storm made up the oak's mind for it, it was time. The oak was splintered and separating. The smell of it was captivating. The wet, rich soil that symbiotically lived around the root base of the oak was sweet, loamy, and fragrant. The oak tree smelled woody and stiff, slightly vanillic, and had a curious sweet-fruity-earthy facet very similar to beet root. Seeing this beautiful and stately giant laying prostrate on the ground in surrender didn't elicit any feelings of sadness or despondence; something about the clean, invigorated, and rich smells affected by the rain made me think the oak was happy to be there - if it had a mind and could express itself, it would say something like "I'm becoming more at one with the soil that supported me for decades. I'm still alive, just in a different form." I didn't share the happiness even though I stayed there for what felt like a long time, taking in the smells, colors, and the life forms, but what I did feel was a sense of equanimity and totality. Emotions, thoughts, and time were distractions from what is. Around me wasn't destruction or progress, it was what it should be. That moment for me is perfectly captured by Chene. There is something very evocative and tender-hearted about it, but it is also unflinchingly austere. It's a truly gorgeous perfume, and one of the best by Lutens and Sheldrake.

*Chene - Majestic Oak Forest* I recently had a trip to Paris to visit the headquarters of Serge Lutens at Palais Royal. I tested many of the exclusive bell jars, amongst them Chene and Santal de Mysore. I loved them both but for different reasons and after a day of testing, decided on Chene. Back at home, I was very intimidated to open the bottle. I was scared I did a hasty decision and that it would’t be the same as my first impression, even a completely different thing. (the normal perfume paranoia...) Indeed, there where many notes I missed that probably got burned away quickly in the Paris heat. The opening blast is a stressful explosion of sawdust, wood varnishes, acetone and boozy alcohols. Given a few minutes to settle you get Oakwood: fresh logs split in two, sap and slightly bitter bark, with soft immortelle and a whisper of thyme both just supporting and contributing to this smelling specifically like oak, not like cedar or sandalwood or any of the more conventional woody notes we see everywhere else. There is a strange fruitiness that brings some sweetness and notes of medium dark rum, or rum barrels which of course would be made of oakwood. The rum keeps the overall oakwood fresh and sappy as in newly chopped wood and moist sawdust, nothing stale or dusty. As nice as these aromas are, this is not what I love about this scent. The real beauty is revealed in the dry-down, when the sweetness of the rum subsides and the scene transitions from a peaceful sawmill against a green summer forest clearing, to an autumnal and dark fairytale forest. The Immortelle is still soft and restrained, now smelling of brown, fallen leaves. The fresh sawdust notes are gone and a soft, but dark Oakmoss rises to dominate for the hours to come. I’m very surprised not to see oakmoss listed here or mentioned that much, but of course an oak-centric perfume needs to have a proper dose of oakmoss to finish everything off! Chene actually manages to smell realisticly of pieces of dried oakmoss, rather than a concentrated oakmoss absolute - foresty, dry, tannic, fuzzy, gorgeous, peculiar- quite striking I must say. The experience of wearing Chene is like a dissection of the oak tree in reverse, or inside-out. It starts in the moist heartwood in the core of the tree, moves outwards through its growth rings, pierces the tannic bark and reaches its branches and stems covered in mosses and lichen, eventually depicting the whole majestic oak forest. I love how it ends so autumnal, I feel immersed in all kinds of murky and swampy colors, all goblin greens and browns, mist, mud and moss. Chene is unusual-woody, mischievous, ultimately dark and forest-like, a gloomy fantasy. It reminds me of why I in the end always prefer my unruly forest woods over sophisticated and polished sandalwoods.

As an SL junkie I have several house perfumes--but my FIRST bell jar was not Chergui (though that was the one that led me to SL--& the one I thought I'd originally purchase as a Bell). After careful thought, THIS was the big one, and for me, just perfect; it's home" to me--the Sierras and the California valley; Lutens captures pines and cedars, imortelle and other "memory scents" beautifully, but this really is OAK--Oak and birch softened by a boozy sweetness, a bit of fall crushed fruit and the leaves, even the tannin smell of leaves fresh and fallen, oak and others, crushed. It evolves at various times from an astringent bracing wood (fresh cut), "bitter-tannin" into a warmth with the beeswax/imortelle and then even later into a more macerated fruit sweetness with less booze. The silage is moderate, but the longevity is quite good; I'm into my 10th hour now, and the scent is sweet but not gourmand at all--sharp tannins, balsamic resins and very honeyed fruit though not cloying. It is a multi-faceted perfume--I do not find it linear though it may be when compared to something like Borneo. Compared to his other woods and fruits, this one has the leather/tannin wood that braces but also soothes. It is somewhat less sultry,less "winey" and "port-like" than other SL woods, and I do wear it to work (and to play and in the evening!). I suppose because of the notes listed, someone might believe this is "better suited" for a man; however, I find that his more recent perfumes appeal to "my idea" of what I like a man to smell like, whereas his former woods, spices are quite unisex and more exotic, sexy, sophisticated and appealing on a woman (especially after a day walking through the college halls where I work where I'm suffocating from berry-fruit-bubble-liciousness drizzled on the young 20 somethings). There are other more dramatic SL creations, and some more "wearable," but this is just very enjoyable all around to me. Sometimes I just crave it--and right now, it's a warm complex pulsing wood emanating around me.

i love this perfume...love love LOVE this perfume. i got onto a 'rum kick' about a year ago, and ordered all manner of rum scent samples online. of the 30+ i got, only about 4 or 5 really hit me (this, opus v, etc), and this one is a pure PURE refined aristocratic scent. i can't describe it ANY other way. i can imagine the privileged few who have mansions and private libraries with butlers who dust the shelves SMELL like this; it's pure sophistication. it starts off with a dry, almost creamy woods smell. almost sandalwood creamy (without smelling like sandalwood, but displaying the creaminess of it) and some high, bitter white woods. almost bleached woods. this 'high' smell is joined shortly after the opening by boozy rum which melds seamlessly in to create an amazing accord. a few woods, rum and an irresistible creaminess that makes it amazing. i wanted to get a full bottle of this, and the options online were unbelievably steep. so i waited a few months until i was in paris and plotted a route to the paris palais royale branch to acquire my exclusive non-export. on the day i was supposed to get it, i had a MASSIVE fight with my wife which meant that i had to cancel my plans, and concentrate on making it up to her! the next day was our last day, and we had a big day ahead of us, so i had to get up early and go to the palais royale, which is an AMAZING peaceful and serene complex. i got there too early, and just took in the beautiful architecture and the perfectly-manicured hedges opposite the boutique. once the shop opened, i got in, smelt EVERY single exclusive (kinda liked the 'santal de mysore save for the cumin punch), bought my bell jar of 'chene', and hightailed it back home (we were staying in marais -- a 25 minute brisk walk), where i set about getting ready to go to champs elysees where i mended bridges with my wife, experienced the sephora flagship store (perfume mecca, in paris at least), and enjoyed my last day in paris, content in the fact that i had a FULL BOTTLE of chene in my clutches...

Chêne is the first perfume that comes to mind when I think about Autumn. To me, this is Autumn in a bottle. It is one of my favorites from the house of Lutens. I remember how perplexed I was trying it for the first time, in the shop. It was an eye-opening moment for me. I never thought that perfumery could be like this, more than an accessory to complement your outfit or to get attention. This is a perfect perfume for a Lumberjack. One with fine tastes. Because, although it smells unusual, and true to nature, it is handled with a gentle touch and much refinement. There is a strong Oak Wood accord that Birch Wood and some nutty qualities complement very well. Additionally, you get a honeyed sweetness as well as some faint rum. While spices, immortelle, and soft leather round up the composition. What makes me think of Autumn is the usage of warm, sweet notes such as honey, rum, and nuts, blended with the scent of oak logs and smoke. Like a cabin in the woods, sitting next to a warm fireplace and sipping your favorite hot beverage. Likewise, the composition has a strong outdoorsy character and will satisfy people who enjoy foresty scents. And even though it sounds like a rougher around-edge perfume, it is surprisingly elegant and sophisticated. It behaves gently and never feels cloying or overpowering. When I tried Chêne for the first time I was in total awe because I love the smell of Oak and I could have never imagined it captured so well in a perfume, but also because it smelled so unique. Since then, a few indie and artisanal houses attempted this theme but none managed to pull the balance Christopher had struck here. Much like all the other perfumes in the line, or at least the very best, it is a unique piece of olfaction that will always rank among the best Lutens-Sheldrake creations ever, for me. IG:@memory.of.scents

Chêne opens thick and furrowed much like the bark of a stately, enduring oak, furrowed, with deep fissures. It is ever so slightly honeyed, but nothing like Miel de Bois, and something reminiscent of smoked plum. Most notably, I am captivated by what reminds me of the scent of acorns, nut shells, dry, somewhat bitter, herbal, tannin-like, yet unmistakably woody and nutty. Perfumer nerd alert: I would venture to guess that Christopher Sheldrake may have used Herbacet (acorn acetate) and Tabanon, the latter of which is toasty, nutty, with dry tobacco facets. Further on, freshly cut oak wood, weeping sap, a distant fire (a tiny bit of birch tar?), dusty caraway seeds, and autumn leaves. Over time, Chêne loosens into a mellow beeswax and fenugreek, cedar chips and soft, sweet undergrowth. It retains its enchanting woody character throughout, and I am struck by the memories it conjures for me, especially from my childhood. I recall playing in the discarded woodshed behind my home, the stacked planks with their ends stamped with red ink from the lumberyard. I get flashbacks of the oak bookshelf at my grandparent's house, where I would examine the spines of all the books even before I could really read, all the different text, the colors, and patterns. I remember studying felled trees, that distinct crumbliness of the decaying wood, playfully observing critters that have made it their dwelling. There are still other memories, other sensations, but moreover, Chêne is incredibly grounding and comforting for me. This is no fairytale, glossy woodland nymph scent, light and blond and sparkled with Iso E Super. This is a true woods lovers' fragrance, for one who yearns for something that elevates the palpable, unconventionally beautiful olfactory traits of the woods.

Serge Lutens (and his longtime collaborator Christopher Sheldrake) are at their best, in my opinion, when they just take a simple good smell and run with it, staying very canonical but amping up the intensity. Mandarine Mandarin is orange-spice done right, Un Lys is lily done right, Chergui is clove-y hay done right...and Chene is rum-and-woods done right. It’s a rollicking, intense, warming good time, intensely oaky, pleasantly boozy, and just sweet enough to be addictive, in shades of coppery brown. An hour or so in, it’s also animalic, with a lusty, salty, hot-breath effect that I find very satisfying. It’s “sweaty”, but only in the somewhat abstract perfumery sense that actually smells good, and it sits on a nice dark leathery backdrop. All the boozy sweetness is gone in this phase, leaving more of a barbaric-splendor effect. If you like the traditionally masculine “wood-paneled study” sort of perfume – warm woods, leather, sippin’ liquor, the occasional taxidermied furry animal – Chene is one of the best, if not the best. There are other animalic leathers (Djedi being the original masterpiece and Aramis a classic stalwart) and other warm ambered woods (Canfield Cedar still has my heart) and there are infinite, often tediously heavy, brown Dad’s-Study concoctions built around patchouli and/or tobacco – but Chene is special. Warm, bright, friendly, never weighed down with goo, and perfectly balanced between civilization and wildness.

I have been burning the Diptyque Chene candle for the month of December and I am positively addicted to it, and have fallen out of love or even like with most of my perfume collection due to a profound life change. I must say that Oakmoss is my absolute favorite perfume ingredient. I love the smell of the natural stuff, which is what I adore, so a perfume ingredient has to be pretty close for me to respond to it. The candle is amazing. In a flash I remembered Lutens Chene from when it was released maybe 15 years ago, and I was lucky enough to score a vintage bottle (with the Palais Royal logo on the label) on Vinted - she has more - and I am addicted to it as well. I can't do any better at describing the scent than anyone here, but just to say that the rich almost salty nature of the Oakmoss seems to be the structure on which Chene is built, so although it isn't the most prominent smell, it couldn't exist without it. This perfume's great achievement is to be so well blended that it alchemically changes into its own self instead of just smelling like a blend of the said ingredients. I remember loving it but not wanting to wear it when it came out, now I want to wear nothing but Chene.

Wood - as nature intended. You may like woodsy scents but so many fall short or blend into some pseudo-oriental mix. So what if you really want to smell like wood - totally, purely, naturally, wholly? Try Chene. It is beautifully uncomplicated: it is raw wood, it is all wood. Stripping birch & stunning cedar - wood turnings falling on the woodshop floor. Oak - from the green herby leaf to the acorn. Hay bales - softly sweet and grassy. The lightest, truest hint of the hive & a sniff of a saddle. Almost smokey, almost sweet. Dry. Bone dry. I hardly detect a boozy note. If there is rum, it is the one that is aged in old oak whisky barrels (not the pub-pirate kind). I do find a herbs-de-Provence dry grey-greeness running throughout the composition - I am obsessed by thyme in cooking but this is more gentle, muted, like an old, dried herb. Again, I find he caraway note to be old, dusty, like a sepia photograph of the real thing. Chene is very different from most woodsy scents. It is so centred around the wood from root to tip that it is uncompromising in its delivery. You will either get it or you won't. If you love nature - step into Chene.

I smell oak and spiced rum at first - not too sweet, but there is a tinge of sweetness that makes sense for rum. The sweetness fades and a spicier scent emerges as time goes on. Cedar also joins the complement of notes. A few hours in, a faint whiff of tobacco shows up. It's very masculine, typically speaking. I would call this an understated fragrance; it doesn't project that much, though close to the skin the scent is strong and full. It's not boring or simplistic either. It fades quickly to a skin scent, but lasts a long time in that form. Overall, this is a very wearable and pleasant fragrance that is also interesting. Wearing it feels comfortable - maybe because it matches my tastes and general style very well, or maybe just because of its warm nature. It's like sitting in front of a fire in a small wooden lodge, drinking a mug of hot spiced rum, while snow falls quietly in the darkness outside.

After many years I found this bottle in the back of my cabinet. I forgot about it, as it was difficult to come by for a reasonable price, I wanted to save it so I could smell it for an elongated time throughout my life. I bought it when it was in the export collection and thus a lot more affordable. Side note, I just realize it’s still 255 euro for 75ml, it seems to not have inflated as much as other houses. 255 euro was ridiculously expensive back in the day, but anno 2025 seems sort of normal. I sprayed it on and was reminded of how beautiful the combination of dry pencil shavings and sweet rum is. There’s something so literary and romantic to this composition. To me this is something I wear for myself, in the evenings, not for others, as I’ve noticed it’s not a crowd pleaser. But I can’t help sniffing my wrist, it’s so beautiful and cosy.

I’m going to say it again, SL s close to my heart because it was my first niche fragrances that I bought 20 years ago! Now for this scent, I love this sweet woody leather scent on me. Perfect for sweater weather and coming into the winter months. It is very sweet but NOT gourmand at all it’s like a saddle leather sweet ( I should know we have horses) anyway this is an everyone fragrance neither masculine or feminine. After about 4 hours it gets close to skin and I can smell it waifing up to my face, and I can smell it on my sweater the next day. Serge Lutens has always been in my top ten either nostalgic reasons or the creations are amazing. This will always be in my top ten. Always remember we all have different chemistries and what smells good on me may not a be a win for you. But, Highly recommended 10/10

Such a heavenly scent! -sampled this in the palais royal-store on a crisp autumn day in 2009, stupidly didn't buy it then but opted for tubereuse criminelle, but this will forever bring me back to that crisp afternoon, in my favouite city, and my favourite season... Just managed to secure two bottles from 2007, according to the batch codes, -will definitely lose my mind when i run out as the current reformulation is disastrously watered down, not to mention the new design which is embarassingly cheap-looking, considering the price range, and how stylish they used to be. I sometimes pair Chêne with Guerlain's Mitsouko (My mother's signature scent, and thus the most comforting scent i know) and they marry amazingly well, i guess it's the latter's oakmoss notes.

For me Chene is woods with definite presence of human civilization. The smoke and the vapor, the elaborate dinners served, the scanty meals of poor times, the gasps and chokes between the countless relaxed breaths, the baby skin, the sweat of the loved one, the pantry whiffs, the amber liquids in the crystal flacons, the aroma of candles - now obsolete, but the scent kept alive during the holiday season, the cracked leather of armchairs and grandfathers book covers, the celebration, the mourn. All etched to the aged wooden walls, well cared to remain to these days - and the crackling fire, slowly consuming oak log - relatively fresh, but carefully dried for this particular purpose. Linear - yes. Simple - no. Yes, I do love it.

I still love this, but it is a fair chunk of fir absolute that gives it the distinctive scent profile -- before I tried FA, I thought that this was a masterpiece creation -- now, it still smells amazing, but a fair amount of this is one single note -- a rare, exclusive note, but a single note nonetheless. I still love this -- I bought up BIG -- I have that limited edition 'tall boy' bottle (I forget the name, it's French), the belljar which I got personally from Paris, and a vintage rectangular bottle, so I'm set, but this one DOES hit -- it's a mature white wood, with a warm boozy element that SCREAMS royalty, majesty and sophistication. Love it!

An expertly blended woody perfume centered around a lovely central woody base (comprised of oak, birch,and cedar). This woody note is enhanced by addition of a leathery beeswax, powdery tonka, boozy rum and a nice herbal accord comprising of caraway, immortelle, and thyme. The result is a juice unlike anything else experienced in modern perfumery that remains unique and has tremendous warmth of character. Unisex, with moderate sillage / projection and very good lasting power. This perfume is many ways is completely genre bending because it can double up both as a fresh outdoors perfume and a transportative meditative healing experience. Beautiful!

This has to be one of the freshest and more radiant woody fragrances produced by Serge Lutens. It has a wonderful herbal-balsamic accompaniment, sweetened and softened a little by some beeswax, tonka bean, and rum. It has birch tar to personify the leather note, but its rather muted because the focus is oak wood. Charming and approachable for both men and women. It's rather difficult to find these days, outside of the expensive 75ml bell jar. And if that price if off putting, it's worth trying to track down a 50ml bottle for a more sensible price. Very glad to finally own this beauty, one of Serge Lutens "unspoken" greats. Fragrance 9.3, Value: 9

I went to the Int'l Seafood Expo this month and saw a new product of smoked salmon in the display. There was also a drum of oak flake which is used for making the product. To my curiosity, I smelled it (never smelled oak bark/wood before) and somehow really reminds me of holy grail SL Chene that I recently owned. I got initial blast of a boozy rum from Chene. Then it settled down to a delicious oak/woody scent I ever dreamt of. It is somehow sweet, delicate and a bit dark. Although it is marketed as a unisex frag, but I find Chene leans to be more masculine. Chene is definitely a hidden gem in Serge Lutens collection. It has class of its own.

They reformulated it! It's distinctively worse and now I don't know whether to purchase >_< I had gotten a sample from the same store awhile back; the juice was thick and quite green, the scent was deep and lasted for TWO days on the skin, but this time around I noticed an uncomfortable sharp opening, and even the dry down wasn't as rich as I remembered; I was like "Huh!?" until I noticed the juice is now pale and yellow-y, and watery/runny; not surprisingly, it only lasted 1 day instead of 2... This was my favorite fragrance of all time, now I don't know what to do :(