Black Pepper & Vanilla

I think this leans feminine due to the sweet waxy orange blossom and heliotrope and the vanilla-rose blend, but it's unisex. The heliotrope-rose aren't too powdery. The scent has an oriental vibe from the rose and resins and I'm here for it. I was scared at first that it's masculine, but once I sprayed it, I was pleasantly surprised. I LOVE black pepper while I dislike pink pepper and I wanted a perfume like 007 James bond for women which also has intense black pepper, rose, musk, vanilla and cedar so it's very woody like a wood working shop and dark, but it is also fruity and milky from the gardenia, so I wanted more emphasis on the black pepper and vanilla without fruity notes. This is ideal and the resin warmth is an added bonus. At first the black pepper smelled kinda dry and dusty-woody to me near the mid phase - it does that sometimes esp with sandalwood, but I let it sit and now it is creamy and dreamy while some dusty woody effect after the opening, is subdued by the vanilla and musk. Now it smells more rich, smoother, sweeter, as if the resins released some syrup into the scent. This becomes a syrupy sweet dark spicy scent on me that is not cloying, old-lady or manly. It opens wonderfully balsamic, kinda oriental, very boozy and sweet from the resins-vanilla and then these notes release more sweetness. The rose provides its own balsamic jammy element in the mid and drydown that is subtle, not a stand-alone-rose, and it intensifies at the drydown and later on, blending with the rest of the notes. It also opens with a crude aromatic fresh and bold black pepper along with the smooth boozy balsamic element, and the pepper is dark and very woody by the cedar which I LOVE. It becomes sweeter progressively, while at first the black pepper is more crude and dry-peppery for a minute which I also love, but the resins join in and they provide the oriental boozy balsamic sweetness. So it becomes more oriental and sweeter at the later drydown. The heliotrope lends a waxy feel to the scent and so does the orange blossom without being solar, they are a feminine touch. I love cedar as it accentuates a peppery effect in scents and it does so here but the Vanilla maintains the smooth feel of the scent in the mid and drydown. Nothing smoky or harshly dry and obnoxiously peppery other than the refreshing more peppery opening, but the scent throughout is soft sweet dark woody spicy with the James bond type of balsamic rose-vanilla and the warm syrupy resins at the base - delicious. This is less woody than that perfume, and more vanilla-pepper infused. There is some herbal vibe to the scent from the rosebay willowherb accompanying the balsamic boozy resins-vanilla - black pepper in the opening, embracing the fresh realistic black pepper. Overall it's a masterpiece and one of my new favs. I'm a girl that's into natural, herbal, woody scents that are unisex. I collect Corral boots and I spend a lot on my 3 dogs and on other things so DUA allows me to explore new scents that I wouldn't discover myself.

Let me be the first to say this fragrance is really nice. I love a spiced vanilla and this one is close but really it’s own play on bohoboco. Way affordable and I think lasts a lot longer! I see chopard casmir in the you might like section, but this vanilla tone is really similar!