Venom Incarnat

This perfume. I am just... blown. Away. This is one of the most incredible perfumes i have smelled in my life! Absolute work of art, intoxicating, unique, just stunning. A dream come true for the niche fanatic i am. And let me tell you after collecting perfumes for years, it takes something special and different to wow me like this one did. This is a very unique take on the fruity patchouli genre. My rule of thumb for scents, is that they have to be likeable and pleasant. Appealing. Enough w the weird unwearable sht. I do not feel the need to be a niche head wanna be that need something weird an off putting to call this art and masterpiece. To me this is a masterpiece on the fruity genre, a sexy iteration of feminity, gourmand, fall, sexy atmosphere. This is also right up the alley of gourmand niche lovers like myself. The scent: the most gorgeous, sweet, juicy and powdery wild strawberry you’ll ever smell. I think ppl are calling this synthetic because wild strawberry is a rather unusual scent, with a very particular dna and because its really likeable. This pretty feminine too eh. And youthful. To me its a hyper real wild strawberry. Nothing about this scent points to simple or cheap scent whatsoever. If signature scents were still a thing, this would be it for me. This a very patchouli forward scent. Yep a fruity patchouli. The patchouli here truly stands out in the best possible way. Its a minty, foresty and fresh camphoric and herbal type of patchouli, green and natural smelling. Think of a fresh, green botanical garden while you are eating a wild sweet strawberry bowl. Or a dark, green forest with wild strawberry bushes all around you. Sooo aromatic, sweet, powdery, rich, herbaceous... juicy. The leather is very much in the background to ground this scent, barely perceptible and blended to perfection. You can not pick it out almost. It mostly gives to the scent an animalic, sexy af nuance. It does ever so slightly remind me too of a strawberry vanilla hookah scent, in the best possible way. This is a dream fall scent, i see it more for a cooler weather, on a sexy outfit, something casual but not extremely casual. For a party, cocktails, dinner. Movies maybe if on a date. The dna is super unique, i have not smelled a gourmand like this. Has the slightest similar category as la capitale, but very different scents. This is sooo yummy, likeable, sweet, juicy, powdery, sexy, unique. Intoxicating and super attractive with All the complexity and intrigue i want from a Niche house. A true fruity genre masterpiece that has gotten me totally addicted to this and in love w this house and i want all bottles now. Stephan Humbert... well done. 10/10 scent. Follow me at splendid.scents on insta.

Female leaning I like to wear this scent during the summertime and I fell in love with two years ago while testing it in hot Italy weather. How is this beauty? It opens up with a juicy Strawberry and Wild Strawberry notes and I love it. It’s quite sweet since there is a caramel note as well but woody and leather notes push the sweetness down after the dry down. I think this is so special for me since wild strawberry brings me back to my childhood memories when picking up those and when stringing them into the hay. I don’t get any Raspberries but I think it blends into Strawberries. This is not typical light girly Strawberry scent, it’s unique like all SHL:s creations. There is all the time certain kind of depth in the background. Juice vibe turns into soft Vanilla and Tonka but I can smell the hint of the Strawberry until the end. During the cold days this is not so beautiful but it’s just my opinion. Anyway this is really different in cold than in really hot so I recommend to test how it differs in your skin. All that synthetic feeling disappears in hot and all the notes are blending better. The hotter the better. Strawberry and caramel melt on my skin into very intoxicating sweet aroma. In wintertime I'm wondering why I even have this perfume and when the summer arrives I remember why I fell in love with this scent. I have noticed that some people compare this to La Capitale by Xerjoff and even think that’s this is redundant if you already have La Capitale but imo there is nothing same how these two perform. There is many same notes in those two and it looks like a same but especially Strawberry note is very different in those. La Capitale is really delicate compared to this. This has more character and a deeper woody touch. I think there is different occasions to wear those. Thank you for reading, I hope my review was helpful. I would appreciate a lot if you want to follow me on IG and/or YouTube (English subtitles): @ninamariahperfumes It gives me a lot of motivation to write more. 🤗

You can really tell the difference on this fragrance between reviewers that tested on skin over a long period of time and those that just wrote a review based on the opening. It is true that this one opens very sweet with a strawberry note. My first thought was wow this smells quite cheap, kind of like a $20 body mist from some teen clothing store. I didn’t like it and said in my mind, well that’s that. I came back and put my nose on it a bit later ... this can’t be the same fragrance ... I must have sleep walked over and sprayed something else on my wrist. I’ve never experienced a perfume change to a larger degree than this one. One of the major differences to me of a good niche fragrance and designer is niche perfumery going through 2-3 transitions and new notes emerging. Most accomplish that by the opening being very short lived followed by a middle that comprises most of the performance and then a skin scent of base notes. Here, the sweet strawberry opening stays around longer, 1-2 hours, but by hours 2-4 you get this smoked leather that’s coming from the combination of patchouli, tonka bean, and leather but smoothed by the vanilla with hints of woods. On my skin, the strawberry is completely gone. The fragrance has done a complete 180. It’s not a mixing of notes, there is no thread of DNA recognizable from the opening to the end ... it’s an entirely different scent. It’s remarkably well blended master perfumery to accomplish this and also to have it be consistent between wears. I still don’t like the opening, I do enjoy the dry down although it’s not that unique. I love the overall scent though because it’s like a magic trick in a bottle that very few others have managed to pull off.

This was a blind buy for me - SHL fragrances are an absolute nightmare to get samples of in the UK and thankfully I really like this one. I've tried quite a few other Strawberry dominant fragrances even the hyped up Mula Mula / La Capitale which I was expecting this to smell similar to with them sharing a lot of notes, I can confirm they go in totally different directions. This one has just a hint of sourness to balance the sweetness, making it Unisex appropriate. The strawberry smells the most natural out of any strawberry fragrances i've ever tried and doesn't have that cloying effect that usually happens when this note is dominant. Anyways there is a lot more to this fragrance than just strawberry, its ever morphing.. some of the other notes shine in the back and add a lot of depth and a touch of smokiness. Truly a unique fragrance which I've come to expect from SHL. After wearing this for a few days everybody comments how 'different' this one is to my other fragrances and how they love it. Would I Buy: Successful blind buy that I received today, may become an all-time favourite in time. Recommended: Absolutely. I always recommend sampling (hypocrite in this case lol) but this is fairly safe.

This fragrance is the definition of duality. An opening of berry fruityness versus a black leather and wood background, almost a masquerade between sugary strawberry lies and the bitter venomy truth enveloped in dark woods; every sniff a different facet, sweet but not cloying or screechy and the more i smell the more i yearn for for it. Truly a dance between sentiments; it's alluring, it's seductive, it's sexy, dark and addictive... poison-like. The name venom incarnat suits it soo much Beautiful blend between light and dark, the sticky caramel and slight tinge of vanilla brings out the best of this fragrance, it's extremely unique too; i can easily see this being worn by any gender, a true unisex fragrance. Criminally underrated (IMO way better and frutier than God of Fire) Such a gem of a fragrance, although a bit on the pricier side, in my opinion it's well worth it. easily brings out 8h+ performance with REALLY good sillage (at least on me) On the wearability side of things, this perfume is best suited for the freezing winter; as the warmth of the tonka, caramel and leather clashes beautifully with the cold, although it can slip into spring/autumn in honour of the cedar and berry accords