Tommy New York

#135 of My Fragrance Journey - Tommy Hilfiger: Tommy New York: The mountain village hiding inside a city fragrance Tommy markets this thing as Manhattan - the grid, the skyscrapers, the hustle. First spray, and I'm just not buying it. Doesn't smell like a city at all. Smells more like something feral wandered into someone's garden and, for about five minutes, decided to behave itself. It opens sharp - bergamot cutting straight into this raw, almost bruised lavender. Not the smooth barbershop stuff that's meant to calm you down. This one's green, a little angry, as it bit you before you even got close. Coriander and cardamom show up right after, hot and jagged, moving fast, and underneath it all, there's dry cedar holding the whole thing on a leash. It's wild for about ten seconds, then immediately disciplined. Teeth, but controlled teeth. Give it an hour, though, and that tension just... leaves. The alpine edge pulls in tight to the skin and turns into something quiet - almost too quiet. Like an Oxford shirt. Clean, reliable, doesn't ask anything of you. Doesn't really give much either, if I'm honest. Projection was never loud to begin with, and by the time you're past hour two, you're reaching for the bottle again if you want that opening back. What's funny is where it actually takes me. Not New York. A mountain village in early summer - cool mornings, grass warming up by afternoon, herbs growing wild along some stone path nobody maintains. That lavender feels like brushing past a living plant, not a note someone engineered. Bergamot keeps it bright without pushing. It's the smell of cracking a window open, not spraying a bottle. As it settles, coriander, cardamom, and pink pepper add a bit of texture without any real heat behind them, and cedar keeps it from drifting off into nothing. But that "bold woody trail" on the box? Never shows up. Instead, it just gets smaller and closer to skin - intimate, sure, but understated to the point of almost disappearing. If you want a fragrance that makes a statement, this isn't it, and it'll probably annoy you. But that restraint is also the whole appeal - office, gym, a weekend that doesn't need explaining, hot days when anything heavier feels like a lot. It's not trying to be mysterious or niche. Just lavender, citrus, a little spice, some wood. Easy to wear and easy to forget you're wearing it, which, depending on your mood, is either the point or the problem. Less a statement, more a companion - quiet, dependable, just sharp enough at the start to keep you interested before it settles down. Maybe it's supposed to smell like New York. Maybe it does, to someone. But every time I put it on, I end up somewhere higher up and cooler, where the day moves more slowly. I'm not in a rush to leave. Vibe: mountain garden at 7 am, not Manhattan at rush hour Performance: sharp for the first hour, then a polite skin-scent whisper after that Fit: office, gym, weekends - anywhere you don't need to announce yourself Does it read as New York to you, or somewhere completely different? Because I can't get there no matter how many times I spray it. More scent stories and visuals on Instagram - @lavendercloudsjd

Great and youthful scent for a younger men

The bottle excited me thinking this could be a nice quiet surprise to have a remix of the original, but again left disappointed. Generic woody-blue men's fragrance without harsh woody ambers dominating, that certain bubblegummy fruity note that is nowadays hard to escape in men's fragrances is again lurking underneath, opens up with with orange-elemi-pink pepper type of freshness a la Sauvage, mixed into a core body of YsL Y blue fougere type. Overall it's just another Tommy release that will hit discounters in no time.

I am definitely looking forward to sampling this! This summer, I've been using a brand-new bottle of the original Tommy (which people say is reformulated and doesn't perform well), and the strength/longevity/etc. to me is absolutely incredible! The small Tommy Hilfiger crest on the front of this new release looks fantastic! Let's hope the fragrance turns out to be just as nice.

Smells virtually the same as impact spark with the orange note toned down and replaced with one that smells like yup you've guessed it Dior sauvage. Tommy has turned into a coty Calvin Klein cash grab merchant of a company frag wise now.

Nice smell, going to be interesting when he hits discounters. Not a very unique smell though, between Tygar and Sauvage, with so-so performances.