Peloponnesian

One is literally transported on the coast of Greece when inhaling this scent! I was baffled by the 'marine' element of it, given the strict 'all natural' policy of this perfume house: how does Miss Balahoutis bring the sea into this bottle? Having been to Greece several times the impression it left me with was even more bewitching. The cypress (resinous, sappy and green), orange blossom, citruses and sage dominate until the heart notes, then the honey and musk come out, a faint scent of sea water always in the background. It's a charm from a distant land...

This opens bracingly with blended citrus notes tempered with some herbaceous quality, probably the sage, that transforms the initial blast to something very interesting -- you just have to keep sniffing! The scent moves quickly away from the citrus-sage-cypress, to a captivatingly clean element -- think I detect a hint of eucalyptus in the "sea scent" -- laced with a rich honey and musk. It moves fast between transitions, I'm not sure how long this will last, but I'm loving it.

Amazing, just amazing for a 100% natural perfume. This smells like a classic men's cologne on my skin. It opens with a totally real, zesty, green lime, and soon I can smell the fragrant cypress. It's a little too masculine for me personally, but still a wonderful, aromatic men's cologne for every day. It reminds me of the fresh air on my favorite hiking trail, a 4-mile hike through the woods to the ocean.

Absolutely stunning and my favorite fragrance from Strange Invisible. This style of fragrance making is a nod to historical beauty in the ancients of the Mediterranean.

I rarely write negative reviews. Usually I just figure that the perfume is not to my taste or doesn't work with my chemistry, give the perfumer the benefit of the doubt and move on. This may be the first time a perfume has actually made me angry. Happily, I'm only out the five or six bucks I spent on the sample. But this stuff is so dreadful it feels like I've been cheated out of my sample money for something that doesn't even qualify as fragrance. All I got was the smell of menthol stinging my nose and eyes for a half hour and then nothing. If I stick my nose to my wrist I can faintly smell something vaguely aquatic, as in seaweed, mixed with menthol. Literally that is it. Its lack of longevity is the only thing it has going for it. And don't get me started on what this has to do with the name. In fairness, this is clearly a masculine and not my thing and it is beastly hot so that may be affecting it as well but I am done with this line.

This smells like an herbal bug spray. Just horrible. What more could I add, the review below is dead on, wish I had read it before I bought the sample kit!

Opens with a blast of cypress, this is almost so herbal that it stings. Huge masculine feel to this. Huge notes of Cypress and Sage. Almost smells a bit lavender like. It takes a while for the more aquatic tones & citruses to come out and when they do? I kinda like it. A dance of herbs and citrus is always going to be pleasant to my nose. A jolt of aquatic and it just adds that extra bit of something special. I respect this company for making all natural perfumes as that's what I'm studying so, this kinda stuff is what I'm aiming for. How DO you make a perfume smell aquatic? As this is an aromatic aquatic, there's not much weight to it. It stays light and airy, and masculine as I said. Zero sweetness from the honey and...it's quite fleeting. I also get zero orange blossom. I noticed while doing my sniff tests while studying, that when natural oils are dry? They all tend to have this similar smell. It's like very weak, watered down versions of themselves and I've come to really dislike it. This fragrance turns into that when it's dry. Watery, weak and it happens way too fast for my liking. At $250 a bottle? No siree! I still have 8 other samples to try out but for a first impression? Not over the moon with this one.

I did not spend as much time with this, but in brief, it’s got a strong musk akin to what’s in Musc Botanique—sour, stale, ambrette/marine-like, but here it’s paired up with coniferous notes rather than frankincense. The coniferous notes seem fine, but lean more toward teal than dark greens—a cypress and sage combination. I didn’t try this on my skin, so I really couldn’t speak to the performance in the way that I can with some of the others, but I will say that there are other coniferous scents that I’d rather wear. If you’re looking for a sage-y coniferous thing with some sour musk notes, then this could be worth seeking out. Aside from that, it’s more of a show piece that’s highlighting expensive materials and creating a fairly effective headspace of a forest hike.

Try a sample before buying; I read about the perfumer, read reviews, loved the notes as described and blind bought a bottle and ........ it's not for me. I don't want to be unkind so we will leave it at 'not for me.'