Spirito Fiorentino

Tiziana Terenzi Spirito Fiorentino opens with a strong projection of pleasant citrus and floral accords. The saffron in this fragrance is the most prominent note and it brings a rich floral, vanilla, honey-like accord that blends very well with the orange. The lily and jasmine add their notes to the opening, but let the saffron and orange lead the way. In just a moment the ylang-ylang joins the blend adding its sweet, slightly woody banana-like accord, giving to the fragrance a more fruity character; the magnolia and lily-of-the-valley are shy but contributes with their soft floral and slightly green accords. The ambergris makes a noticeable entrance to the fragrance, it brings a musky, earthy, slightly animalic, and mineral accord that enhances, sharpens, and boost the fragrance. As the fragrance enters its dry-down, the woody accords join the blend, soft, clean, and fresh wood; the birch comes across as slightly sweet woody and ambery. The leather is just a touch compared to the most prominent accords. The most noticeable change from the opening to the dry-down is the almost entirely dissipation of the initial orange accord. Once Tiziana Terenzi Spirito Fiorentino has reached its full dry-down, it can be summarized as sweet saffron, and ambergris fragrance with woody, floral, earthy, musky, and soft leather accords. The fragrance feels comforting, complex, delectable, diurnal, earthy, exotic, floral, slightly fruity, modern, earthy musky, playful, resinous, refined, rich, romantic, sparkly, sweet, unisex, versatile, woody, and very pleasant. BATCH REVIEWED: 2020. WOW RATING: 10/10. The combination of saffron, musk, and woods is fantastic. DISLIKE RATING: 1/10. Unlikely but the musk accords could be offensive to some people. The mix of ambergris and musk in this fragrance comes across as earthy, mineral, slightly animalic. UNIQUENESS: 10/10. A unique and easy to recognize fragrance. MASS APPEAL: 7/10. Above-average but not the most mass-appeal fragrance. PROJECTION: 4/10. Very good, around 4 feet around the wearer and intense. SILLAGE: 5/10. Very good, about 5 feet behind the wearer. APPLICATION: Two to four atomizations will suffice. More will increase projection but will not make the fragrance offensive. LONGEVITY: 4/10. Good, about 4 hours with consistent good projection. SEASONS: Any, the fragrance is strong enough to be worn in winter and fresh enough to be worn in summer. OCCASIONS: Formal events, outdoor gatherings, office, casual, holidays, romantic, dating, clubbing. This is an office-friendly fragrance. VERSATILITY: 9/10. Excellent, this fragrance can be worn at any time of the year, almost for any occasion. GENDER: Unisex. The notes are neutral. AGES: 30 and above. RECOMMENDATION: Tiziana Terenzi Spirito Fiorentino is an exquisite fragrance, unique, versatile, high quality and it feels niche. This is a great buy. BLIND-BUY: No, sample it first. This is a complex fragrance. SIMILAR: These are fragrances that feature saffron and musk. Maison Francis Kurkdjian Baccarat Rouge 540 EDP and Extrait feature saffron, ambergris, and woods, both great fragrances; Mancera Gold Intensitive Aoud brings woody, saffron, musky and floral notes, but leans to the feminine side; Mancera Instant Crush features saffron, amber, powdery and woody accords and it is fantastic. SUMMARY: A sweet saffron, and ambergris fragrance with woody, floral, earthy, musky, and soft leather accords. The fragrance feels comforting, complex, delectable, diurnal, earthy, exotic, floral, slightly fruity, modern, earthy musky, playful, resinous, refined, rich, romantic, sparkly, sweet, unisex, versatile, woody, and very pleasant.

I tried BR 540 Extrait ages ago and was slightly disappointed and very perplexed. It smelled so thin and simple on me, and seemed to fade within minutes, which I found appalling given the price. Hours later, though, my boyfriend remarked out of the blue on how good I smelled. I was baffled; it seemed I had become anosmic to the fragrance at lightning speed, which is pretty unusual for me. The following day, I donned the same jacket I'd worn the day prior and was instantly enveloped in a cloud of almond-saffron sweetness. The jacket hadn't even come into direct contact with my skin or the fragrance, yet there it was, almost as though I'd just sprayed it. Ever since, I'd been looking for a good dupe, as I still wasn't willing to drop so much on such a straightforward, synthetic fragrance (not that this smells artificial in any way; I just couldn't stomach such a huge retail markup given the ubiquity of the main aromamolecule). I tried Kosmala's Après L'Amour, Alexandria's Interplay, Ariana Grande's Cloud, and Terenzi's Spirito Fiorentino. This one was by far my favorite. Cloud was a bit weak, Après L'Amour was actually a tad too strong, Interplay was the closest to the Extrait, and this was the ideal strength for me with just enough difference that it's actually an elevated form of the original. Like BR 540, the core of Spirito Fiorentino is that delicious, utterly luminous and translucently pairing of sweet almond and airy saffron, which is given form and gentle heft through the slightest touch of musky-salty ambergris. Here, though, there's more dimension at the beginning and in the middle: a hint of creamy jasmine, something borderline leathery (almost suede-like), the brightness of juicy orange, some effervescent white and yellow florals, and some milky woods at the bottom. I personally don't detect any oakmoss or lily of the valley, and many of the florals and woods are so diaphanous and well-blended that I can't really distinguish them. And in the drydown, everything disappears but the almond, saffron, and a wisp of white musk. I've never really understood reviews that mention a burnt or caramelized sugar note in either the original BR 540 EdP, the Extrait, or their olfactory relatives, but then again, I don't really trust my nose around them, as they seem to befuddle it. All I get is a deceptively uncluttered, atmospherically nectarous (but not syrupy) fragrant veil that is imminently wearable and incredibly welcoming: a feather with the density of a neutron star, a hug from the crush that never liked you back. All of that comes through beautifully in Spirito Fiorentino. It's a just so unfussy, a total pleasure to wear, especially compared to these atrocious sticky-sugar gourmands that are all the rage right now. I honestly think it works in any season or weather, and is totally genderless. I would say that it's slightly more on the casual side, and many will find it redundant and possibly even irksome given how popular its fragrance family has grown. If you're in need of a mood boost or just want to smell good, though, I really don't see how you can go wrong here. It projects magnificently and lasts forever. The one downside is the bottle: like many of Terenzi's, it looks cheap, is unwieldy to maneuver, and the bottle-to-cap proportions are strange. On the whole, though, SP is definitely a good investment, especially if you can find it discounted (and you're still going to save a ton of money substituting this for BR).

Let me start by saying that I do own decants of BR 540 parfum and extrait, Instant Crush, Greenwich Village, Spirito Fiorentino and full bottle of Kalan. I sprayed each of these on my arms daily to compare for many times just to be very sure of what I am reviewing. My verdict is out of all these that I have mentioned, Spirito Fiorentino is seriously without doubt the closest to BR 540! I really love the smell of BR 540 when sniffing up close on my arms but I just simply could not smell it on myself. It is indeed frustrating when I am going to pay such high price just to let others appreciate! WTF! Perfume should also be smell and appreciated by the wearer isn't it? Now coming to Spirito Fiorentino, this is definitely going to let the wearer smell the scent for sure. I would say in general it is about 90% similar. It is deeper and more intense. Enough said. Just to share abit about the others that I have mentioned. Instant Crush is truly beautiful and last really really long. It has only a slight vibe to BR 540. Smooth and elegant. Kalan is sharp at first but dries down to be much smoother. Also only a slight vibe to BR 540. It last very long too. Greenwich Village is very very powdery. In fact I have the highest expectation for this. It also has that slight vibe to BR 540 but because it smells so powdery, I feel its more to feminine. However, Its truly a solid fragrance. All these are worth collecting and are not redundant if you own all of them.

So I’ve been looking at a new fragrance house to get into. Searching Neimans I came across what I would say is a great BR540 extrait substitute. There are a few Tiziana Terenzi fragrances I want to try on skin but I had to grab this from max aroma for $160 because at that price I’d never think to get BR extrait again. I have a few decants of BR extrait and this is almost a 1 of 1. Needless to say for $160 I have no problem sliding this into my daily rotation. Sprayed 1 spray in hand 4-5 hrs ago in store and it’s still going strong. Hopefully my bottle has the same performance. Update So I received my bottle a few days later. Granted my testing was in 100 degree Texas weather. The first few day’s performance was horrible. Was getting about 5 hrs longevity. After about a week or so and tinkering with the amount of sprays I’ve found that for good performance 7-9 sprays is ideal for my use also after a week or two performance did increase. Getting about 7-8 hrs of longevity now. Scent trail is that similar to baccarat rouge. A few days ago 3 hrs after application one of the office managers at my apartment walked behind me literally 20ft behind me and as I walked back to hold a door open for her all she could say is my god you smell so good. I’m letting the bottle sit for a few more weeks and we’ll test again when the weather cools down.

Wow - this is definitely similar to BR540 - around 90%! There are some notable differences though: 1) It's smokier throughout, which must be the birchwood/ leather / ambergris combo, and this gives me an incense vibe. 2) There is a medicinal quality in the opening, but you quickly get past this. 3) The longevity is even beastlier than BR540 - i could still smell this on my skin 24 hours later!! 4) There is no 'molecule' quality to this fragrance (if you are familiar with BR540 you will know what I mean), therefore the projection characteristics are different 5) Value for money is.... better than MFK, due to the longevity / bottle size / discount offers available. Obviously, it depends on whether you enjoy the smokier scent or not. I still think this fragrance is unisex (I'm female and LOVE it). I'm still getting the same woody vibes as BR540, and there is a similar sweetness, perhaps slightly less. Overall, I bought it and now I have both!! Do you need both? Probably not. I will keep the BR540 for ultra special occasions due to the price point :D