Gold (Commodity)

Donna Ramanauskas, the creative force behind Gold and several other Commodity fragrances, has a style that's unmistakably her own. It’s light and energetic, fresh yet palpable, with an edge that flirts with challenging notes like inedible vanilla and sharp cypress. These two elements dominate Gold, resulting in a fragrance that, while not particularly daring, carries an air of sophistication. The interplay of crisp woods and soapy vanilla feels polished, even if it doesn’t venture far from the designer amber path.

Oriental and amber fragrances rarely hold my attention. They often grow monotonous and lean into a cloying femininity that I tire of quickly. Gold, however, sidesteps these pitfalls by weaving in nuanced layers. Its vanillic amber is softened with a touch of benzoin and an almost otherworldly synthetic sandalwood. This sandalwood doesn’t aim for authenticity but instead provides just enough weight to prevent the composition from floating into oblivion. Iso E Super hums in the background, its woody vibration threading through the drydown, where transparent wisps of vanilla and white musk add a cool, breezy texture. If you’re torn between smelling clean or cozy, Gold offers a compromise, though one that leaves me wishing for a fragrance that's a bit more natural-smelling and daring.

Vanilla reigns supreme in Gold, but this is a hyper-modern interpretation, stripped of imperfections. It’s a flawlessly smooth, almost digital note, devoid of spice, warmth, or romance. Some might find solace in its unerring refinement, but I long for a richer balance, something earthy, like the clove-heavy nostalgia of Old Spice, something alive. Gold is a masterclass in technical precision but lacks the soul to make it truly memorable. I expect a perfume to move me on an emotional and intellectual level, especially if it's named after what I must fork over to own a bottle. Gold leaves me cold. 

Sandflowers (Montale)

Here’s the thing about Sandflowers: I wanted a "true" aquatic, something that evokes the cold, briny wave of the ocean crashing on icy boulders and the gritty, coarse texture of New England sand, ground fine by centuries of waves and worn shells. Frigid, salty, with spray drifting in the air, it should carry heady notes of iodine and seaweed, but nothing of the typical funk of low tide, except perhaps the most delicate hint. And that is exactly how Sandflowers smells. No sweetness. No flowers. Salt water. Period. End of story.

What accounts for this fragrance's precision? How did Pierre Montale, known for his dense rose/oud blends and heavy, sweet musks, manage to craft something so seemingly out of character? By what act of grace did an anonymous perfumer in a Parisian lab offer up this peculiar tribute to a Connecticut beach in December? For me, it’s a hauntingly beautiful composition, the ideal aquatic for trips to Maine, where even miles inland, the air carries the cool, clean scent of the Atlantic, filtered through pine needles and campfire smoke. Sandflowers is as ethereal as that, a light, salty draft on crisp, winter air. And contrary to the consensus of many reviewers, I don’t detect anything sandy in it. For sand, one would be better off with Mario Valentino’s Ocean Rain.

Sandflowers smells salty, like skin after a day on the open ocean. But it needn’t be the frigid Atlantic of Maine. In 2004, I rented a speedboat with friends to explore the grottos of Capri, where we glided over gentle green waves in ninety-five-degree heat. The water was oddly salty, even by oceanic standards, its spray drying on my skin in a layer of salt that flaked off in the sun. By the end of that day, I smelled exactly like Sandflowers. Montale has put great care into this fragrance; aside from a fleeting, almost antiseptic alcoholic top note (mated to cinnamyl alcohol) that evokes the smell of a razor sterilizer, the composition is a resounding success, and a dream for aquatic lovers. Excellent work.

The Trump Anomaly: How Olivier Creed Accidentally Harnessed the Unfortunate Power of "Orange Man Bad"

"Donald, this smells familiar."

This weekend I was on Reddit. I know, I know. What was I thinking? There was a thread on Creed titled "Creed company's origin? How are they getting away with a fake story" -- and I had to pitch in my two cents. I know, I know, I know. What was I thinking? It's not bad enough that Reddit is populated with ignorant trolls that ceaselessly babble about stuff they know nothing about; they occasionally venture into interesting territory, and turf up just enough nonsense to lure the likes of me right on in. And boy, was I in. 

The gist of the thread was that Olivier and Erwin Creed are liars who have conned the world, ala Gabe Oppenheim's The Ghost Perfumer. Nothing new there, folks. I've already hashed and rehashed my opinion on that. But just to choke it up again, and I'll be as succinct as possible here, it's not all that bizarre for Creed to do that. Did they stretch the truth on multiple occasions? Did they exaggerate their pedigree to make their brand more appealing? Did they "con" the world with dubious claims about royal appointments and a three hundred year legacy? Maybe. Sure, maybe they did. 

But let's be honest here, people. We know what the Creeds were doing. It all made sense. They have an old family that does date back several generations, and their forefathers were in the fashion biz. They were in the "riding habits" biz. Eighteenth century leather makers like the Creeds were in a sophisticated business, one which entailed the production of leather goods, but which also required such goods to be palatable to the public, and in the 1700s, that meant making the leather smell like something other than disgusting raw animal hide. Gee, I wonder what would make dead skin smell good?

Aside from that, James Henry Creed and all the Creed tailors of that bygone era were busy making saddles and boots and gloves and jackets, and probably also made saddle soap, powders to condition and scent the gloves, little olfactory trinkets to scent the boots and jackets and get rid of the nasty. Every high-end leather maker since the dawn of time has done that. Every tailor dealing in "sports" equipment dating back to Caesar has done it. Can we stop pretending we don't know this?

This gets me back to the Reddit thread. On this thread were numerous young men who were all about pretending they don't know everything I've just said. It was all about how the Creeds are liars, con men, they have "no evidence" of perfuming anything prior to 1970, how do they get away with the lies, the lying liars that lie? 

One guy commented: 

"If you want a company with REAL history just go with Guerlain."

Another guy said,

"They claim to have made fragrances for the likes of Winston Churchill and such, but there is no proof. Compare that to Guerlain who has an extremely well documented history. Creed = lies lol." 

 And yet another said:

"My take is Creed is probably 50 or so years old and the rest is marketing to convince you that bottle of perfume that cost $10 to produce is worth $500."

This was followed by a response from another user:

"Not true. There are actual receipts etc from the 1800s for tailored goods and royal warrants. The original store in Paris has the actual warrant from Napoleon framed in the store. There is history to the Creed brand but not just for making perfumes. Doesn't matter if they embellish things a little, every company does for marketing reasons."

This prompted a response from the other guy:

"Can you provide a link to a verifiable document? Up until as recently as 2 years ago no documents could be verified anywhere. There seems to be a long history of no documentation, including a total absence of warrants. If they have proof in their shop it seems reasonable the rumor would have ended."

This led to me saying:

"My friend, you clearly don't know what you're talking about. You want to see Creed's royal warrant? Just look at any one of their Private Collection boxes. Their warrant with royal signature is printed on the back of every one of them. I get it's fun to criticize Creed. But you've just embarrassed yourself.

This got a windy response that ended with the sentence:

"If you have something objective to add, let's see it." 

I posted this photo: 

 

It has the royal warrant clearly displayed. The guy had claimed that he owns Private Collection fragrances and that none of his boxes have the warrant on them, but when I posted this picture he shut up right quick and I haven't heard from him again. Conversation over, as it should be. (Pretty clear the only lie on the line was the one about owning Private Collection Creeds, as evidenced by how easy it was to shut this guy down.)

This got me thinking about how people grapple with what I call the Creed Conundrum. I’ve written about this before: there’s something about Creed that seems to cloud rational thought. Call it Creed Derangement Syndrome: an obsessive need to heckle the brand, accusing it of fabricating its entire history. The prevailing narrative? Olivier Creed conjured the whole legacy out of thin air, hired modern perfumers to craft the scents, and let the truth be collateral damage. And if I don’t buy into that outrage, well, then clearly, I must be a gullible fool, a perfect mark for this suave charlatan and his so-called phony empire. How could I be so naive? What’s wrong with me?

This is the same dynamic I see with Donald Trump. For example, he steps up to a microphone in front of a crowd and says something like, "I love Mexicans and Mexico, they’re wonderful people. But they’re not sending us their best. The people crossing the border are drug dealers and rapists." Okay, it’s a bit uncomfortable, I’ll admit. The phrase "I love Mexicans" is meant to soften the impact, but I have to carefully unpack what Trump is actually saying: he believes that many illegal border crossers are young men with bad intentions, no viable way to earn a living in the U.S., and likely to engage in more criminal behavior while here. Laken Riley’s family would probably agree with him on the issues of drug dealers, killers, and rapists.

I then sit back in my chair, and think, "Well, he didn't say that very well. And he's not as clear as he could be. He's trying to say that Mexico and Mexicans are generally likable -- lovable, even. He likes them. But the border problem is the worst of Mexico mixed in with some of the others, and it's those baddies that we need to focus on, because if we're just letting them into the country, no questions asked, we've got trouble."

Then I turn on the news. 

The chyron: . . . TRUMP SAYS MEXICANS ARE DRUG DEALERS AND RAPISTS . . . 

And I sigh. That's not what Trump said. It's on tape. I know what he said. Why are you gaslighting me on what he said? It's the border. We've been having issues down there for decades. They've been getting much worse in the last twenty years. He's addressing that. He's making his case. I don't particularly like how clumsily he's making it, but he's making it, and I get it. Why are you pretending you don't get it, mainstream news people? 

Trump addresses the Charlottesville fiasco with the Confederate statues, and says that in the debate about whether the historical aspect of those statues should be preserved, there are "Very fine people on both sides." The mainstream media and the Democrat party interpret that as, "Donald Trump says white supremacists are very fine people." 

Again, not what he said. 

In 2024, much of these gaslighting messaging tactics have been debunked on X, Elon Musk's platform after his Twitter buyout, and the majority of Americans now have a revised opinion on exactly what Donald Trump stands for, which explains how a majority of voters put him back in office, including about 50% of hispanic voters (mostly men). Now, whether or not that was a good thing is up for very deep debate, and there is a strong case to be made that Trump should not serve another term, and should perhaps serve jail time instead. That case is convoluted, hard to understand, impossible to identify with. I don't get it. Neither do 75 million Americans. But, there is another 75 million who do get it, and to them it's very real. I can live with that. I can work with that. I can respect it.

I bring this up because the same thing happens with Olivier Creed. Olivier does an interview and says to Le Figaro in 2013, "When I entered with my creations exclusively in a provincial perfume store like Le Soleil d'Or, in Lille, in 1963, it was a real challenge against the big brands." Gabe Oppenheim translates this to: "Perfumery was a brand new business for us, so I chose to soft-launch it in the sticks." 

That's not what Olivier said.

He clearly said that he positioned himself in a provincial commercial setting because he was up against the likes of Chanel and Dior. He's stating that when you take your perfumes from the land of bespoke and into the designer market, you have an uphill battle on your hands. What Olivier is implicitly saying is that when your perfumes have to speak for themselves because you don't have a rich financial backer to foot the bill, and your own money is at stake, wealthy as you may already be, it's still a major uphill battle. For comparison, look at how Pierre Montale made out. He was also a "perfumer to the royals" in the Middle East. Despite that, he still needed a rich financier to fund his launch of the Montale brand. Without that, and despite all of his private clientele, he wouldn't have gotten his own perfume business off the ground. 

Olivier has honesty on his side there, the same sort of honesty that Donald Trump kinda-sorta has when he kinda-sorta just is himself and says exactly what he thinks, at least in the moment he thinks it. But here's the thing about Olivier Creed, the thing that Trump doesn't have: he's got mystery on his side. Yes, there are things about Olivier and the Creed dynasty that are not known to the public. He has kept it that way for a reason. Mystery about him and his family gives him cover. 

This cover creates a vacuum of information and knowledge, which gets filled with speculation. But like with Trump, the speculation is touted as fact. "Creed's perfume business only dates back to the seventies." "Creed lies about the perfume part, but the tailoring business was real." "There is no verifiable proof that Creed created perfumes prior to 1970." All of these ideas swirl around in the bleakness that Creed's mystery has cast on the yearning public, those fragrance-obsessed guys who spend all of their time seeking out and buying the most obscure niche crap they can find. 

The claim that the perfumery end of the Creed family business started with Olivier is tempting to believe. There are a slew of factual arrows that point in that direction, and many are mentioned in Oppenheim's book. Indeed, Creed did show up at Le Soleil d'Or in nineteen sixty-something with a couple of perfumes that had no clear provenance, and he was, by his own account, looking to sell. He claimed to be a perfumer. He continued to offer perfumes to the shop, and as Oppenheim's book elucidates, those perfumes actually moved units. Oppenheim acted like the number of perfumes that sold was meager, but I was impressed by it. Twelve-hundred bottles sold in 1970? That's a hundred sold every month. That's about three bottles per day. For a small family brand with no designer clout, that's amazing. 

My problem with all of this is that it doesn't track. Just as the slings and arrows fired at Donald Trump fail to land, the same degree of skepticism thrown at Olivier Creed misses the mark and hits something else entirely. Oppenheim fails to deliver the goods on my questions about where Olivier got the "Creed Water" formula of real ambergris and musk from, or how he came up with his impressive list of briefs for the Grey Cap lineup. You can say a guy pulled briefs out of his butt, conned a few perfumers into making them, and touted them as heirlooms . . . but he pulled this off with Fleurissimo, Orange Spice, Épicea, Baie de Genièvre, Bois de Cèdrat, Citrus Bigarade, Sélection Verte, Bayrhum Vétiver, Herbe Marine, Ambre Cannelle, Angélique Encens, Aubépine Acacia, Bois de Santal, Santal Impérial, Chèvrefeuille, Animalis Pimenta, Bois de Rhodes, Cyprès-Musc, Ylang Jonquilles, Royal Scottish Lavender, Cuir Imperial, Verveine Narcisse, Vétiver, Fleur de Thé Rose Bulgare, Irisia, "Vintage" Tabaróme, Royal English Leather, and Zeste Mandarine Pamplemousse?

Sorry, Gabe, but no. 

There is a huge chunk of information missing here. Most of these perfumes aren't color-by-numbers pieces; they are weirdly sophisticated and speak to the sort of Old Money wealth that only aristocratic Europeans enjoy. You can't fake that. You, Mister Oppenheim, have failed to shed light on most of this.

The skeptics sling everything they can at this, and miss every time. The word they like to use that gives away their bad aim? 

"Proof."

They want "proof" that Creed is responsible for creating perfumes prior to 1963. What they ought to be asking for is "proof" of who is responsible for the lion's share of perfumes that predate Green Irish Tweed, and fundamentally question whether the perfumers who have laid claim to some of them, like Pierre Bourdon did with Fleurs de Bulgarie, were acting on brand-new from-thin-air briefs, or adapting archaic, time-worn formulas that needed overhauls to be brought to commercial market. Almost nobody is asking about that.

The narrative that Olivier Creed simply waltzed into labs and stole formulas is more entertaining, even though it doesn't really make sense when you consider the scope of the lineup mentioned above.

If I had a leather riding goods and tailoring firm in the 1700s, my focus would be on the functional accoutrements to leather. This was a time when perfume barely existed. I would create products like saddle soap and homespun perfumes designed to make the hide smell tolerable. The formulas I developed would be proprietary to my leather goods firm. If they proved successful in their duties over the course of a century, I might parlay one or two of them into actual fine fragrance at some point in the nineteenth century. 

These perfumes would be little stocking stuffers offered to faithful clients in tiny bottles of an ounce or less. They might even gain some steam in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, when the leather goods end of things has closed shop, and the tailoring has picked up. By the middle of the twentieth century, I might have some period-specific pieces on offer like Orange Spice and Fleurissimo. These might migrate from the 1950s to the 1960s, into the hands of a young Olivier Creed, who might eventually decide to "amp up" the perfume piece and make it everything. 

None of this is hard to believe. None of it requires proof.

Orange Spice, by the way, is an example of a perfume that I think adds to the Creed mystery. Pierre Bourdon is not the nose behind it, despite its resemblance to Kouros. If he were, the formula would have been mentioned in Oppenheim's book, and it wasn't. (Varanis Ridari has the scoop there.) I smelled the comparison to Kouros in my bottle, but I also smelled a strong comparison to another fragrance from the 1950s called Max Factor Signature for Men. Same musky orange and wood notes. Slight hint of ambergris and nitromusk in the base. The two fragrances clearly hail, at least in spirit, from the same era. That goes a ways in backing up Creed's claim that Orange Spice is from 1950. 

That might sound trite, but the truth is less glamorous than the narrative we've been spoonfed by the skepticcs. Again, anything is possible, but if Creed faked the provenance of Orange Spice, well then, man, did he nail it. Total bullseye. He managed to get a perfumer to make up something that smells quite literally like some obscure fragrance from the 1950s, which happens to also be in my collection. 

The Reddit user is right to say that Guerlain has real history to prove they made perfumes. Creed isn't Guerlain. Guerlain is a behemoth of nineteenth and early twentieth century perfume; Creed is a footnote. When Pierre-François Pascal Guerlain was gunning for a spot in the Eau de Cologne Hall of Fame, Creed was merely doing private little ditties for wealthy clientele. Privately-commissioned fragrance. This is what Olivier Creed and his son, Erwin, have claimed their family dealt in for hundreds of years.

There would be zero proof of any privately-commissioned perfumes. They would not come in mass-produced bottles. They would probably be delivered in little apothecary bottles. And they would not have advertising or a paper trail of any kind, beyond whatever perishable receipts of the tax year might require. 

None of this is hard to believe. None of it requires proof.

These formulas, probably a bit hackneyed and unscientific, unsophisticated even, would eventually need to be made in earnest by trained perfumers, if they were to survive at all. Cue the 1970s. Cue Olivier's quest to hire professionals on the low-down and make things properly. Suddenly Fleurissimo exists in a mass-produced flacon with a label and anyone with money can buy it.

None of this is hard to believe. And the proof is in the perfumes.

Why must we go all Trump Derangement Syndrome on Creed every single time the subject of their historical bonafides comes up? Must we keep pretending that Creed's claims about making perfume are preposterous? The part about making the perfumes, I mean. If you want to poke holes in all the claims about serving perfume to royals, have at it. But making the perfumes. Really? We can't believe that some Creed sometime before 1963 came up with a few perfumes? Even if they were purely functional perfumes used to soak leather hides and give them a signature smell? Scented gloves for ladies? Scented habits for riding? The stuff that people actually used back then, as opposed to the luxury stuff of today that people don't need to use? 

Is it the fake tan thing? If Olivier's tan was real, and not orange, would he be more credible? Or still in the doghouse like Trump? Has Olivier, in being a successful businessman with a knack for exaggerating his accomplishments, harnessed the unfortunate power of "Orange Man Bad?" 

The moral of this article is the following: Stop expecting proof of things that never required proof prior to you coming along and demanding it. If a family made bespoke perfumes for wealthy Europeans dating back hundreds of years, those Europeans would have had titles and nobility. That's how Europeans with money rolled back then. If you had money, it was likely inherited. And it was disposable, and even then, it was used for frivolities like fancy riding habits with citrus and floral scents. Such personal bespoke projects would not survive in any way to yield "proof" of their existence centuries later. They would simply melt into the annals of time. If this is what the Creed family did, then the only proof they need is the warrant printed on the box. Read it, and shut up already. 

Replica Sailing Day (Maison Margiela)

Briny aquatics thrive when they embrace their salt-soaked nature without being softened by fruit or generic crowd-pleasing notes. Maison Margiela’s Sailing Day, launched in 2017, attempts an intriguing balance but falls oddly short. It’s loaded with the essentials: sea salt, seaweed, minerals, aldehydes, and Amboxide, yet lurking beneath the surface is an unexpected sweetness, a soapiness verging on dish detergent. Ajax in my high-end fragrance? Who authorized this?

The scent opens with a sharp burst of frosty aldehydes, anchored by an intense saline note reminiscent of opening a jar of Himalayan pink salt and inhaling deeply. Yet somehow, this bracing saltiness is layered with a bubble bath-like sweetness, as if Sailing Day were more suited to a toy yacht in a soapy tub. A faint trail of white florals and a timid hint of pineapple-citrus runs through it all, but nothing takes center stage. Ultimately, Sailing Day is a steady, linear composition, smelling good but landing somewhere between commonplace and, well, “meh.”

I view aquatics like this one as the go-to for people who are still unaware of their options. Having sniffed my way through a hundred or more variants in the aquatic genre, I know what truly shines in this category. Yet for many, Sailing Day may simply register as an inoffensive “luxury” spin on a “fresh” and “sexy” locker room scent. And perhaps that’s all Maison Margiela aimed to achieve. For the less discerning, it does the job well enough, and in that spirit, I give it a reluctant nod of approval. (Get Sel Marin instead.)

Obsession for Men -- Oops! I Mean, Musk Deer (Zoologist)

This 2020 creation from Zoologist, crafted by Pascal Gaurin, senior perfumer at IFF, immediately transported me back to the 1990s. Now, for those of you who’ve been following my writing for some time, I’m aware that my frequent nostalgic musings about this era might be a bit much. But I stand by it: the 1980s and 1990s were a golden age of cultural innovation, and I often find myself yearning for the heady days when fashion, music, and fragrance had a particular magic. One standout from that time was Calvin Klein's Obsession for Men, a balsamic oriental fragrance rich with resins and spices that exuded a "grown-up" sophistication without veering into stuffy territory. Though the fragrance has been reworked over the years, its essence remains intact, albeit a few notes lighter than I remember. (For this reason, I haven't purchased a new bottle.) 

Obsession wasn’t merely a fragrance; it was an olfactory phenomenon, a marketing blitz that was impossible to ignore. From every magazine cover to every television ad, Kate Moss, scantily clad, if at all, stared provocatively back at me, stirring up all the hormonal chaos of a teenage boy. The scent, an "adult" oriental, was paired with imagery of waifish women caught between raw sensuality and a hint of rebellion. It was an audacious marketing strategy, but undeniably effective, selling a dream of dangerous allure. Still, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Obsession was just a little bit aspirational, like even those who wore it might have done better with something just a touch more refined. But there was no such version until now.

Pascal Gaurin answered the likely implicit call of creative director Victor Wong to reimagine Obsession, and the result is Musk Deer, a fragrance that takes the foundations of Klein’s iconic oriental and elevates them with the finest materials available. Gaurin, having crafted eleven fragrances for Calvin Klein, clearly knows Obsession inside and out. He has, in essence, "Creedified" it, giving us a scent that is both familiar and refreshingly new. Musk Deer is a stunning, crisp oriental that channels the rich amber and animalic-floral notes of the original, while introducing a new complexity through layers of cedar, labdanum, patchouli, and a delicate touch of natural Laos oud. At the heart of this composition is a luminous Sambac jasmine absolute, which infuses the fragrance with a velvety, almost intoxicating sensuality. It's a cheap-in-a-fun-way smell done with an unlimited budget. 

Among the entire Zoologist collection, this fragrance feels the most wearable to me. In fact, it’s the one I’m seriously considering purchasing. Obsession has always held a special place in my heart, and I’ve long hoped for something that could take its core concept and refine it. With Musk Deer, I’ve finally found that dream realized. Much like the original Obsession, this fragrance evokes a strangely alluring fantasy: a vision of youthful, ethereal women existing in a quiet, almost surreal world of sterile, colorless advertisements, where the only thing that matters is how good they smell. Spray on Musk Deer, and it’s the 1990s once again. Only this time, I’m ready for the ride.

Replica When the Rain Stops (Maison Margiela)

"When the Rain Stops is supposedly inspired by Dublin in 1967. I wasn't alive yet in 1967, but I do remember, somewhat acutely and unwillingly, what Dublin smelled like in the early 80s. It wasn't like this. There's a distinct lack of diesel fumes, smog, deep fried breakfast foods and old men in wet wool."

This Fragrantica review made me chuckle because it's so true. Dublin did smell like that back in the day. I have memories of the city in 1991, about seven years before the Celtic Tiger transformed the country and eroded much of Ireland’s old-world charm. Back then, it felt like a scene out of an indie film, full of smoky pubs, police on horseback, and the occasional attractive woman striding along cobblestone streets, braless under her knit sweater. Perhaps not the most ideal setting for a young boy, but it had its moments. And yes, the earthy stink of farmers in wool suits was everywhere.

Replica When the Rain Stops doesn’t capture any semblance of Dublin, but it does smell like a blend of one part Neutrogena's Rainbath and three parts early-90s aquatic musk, a slightly gummy freshness, but without the usual overdoses of dihydromyrcenol and Calone 1951. It’s clean and sexy in its way, though not particularly original. If I’m being blunt, it could easily pass for a fabric softener. The powdery fougère undertone of the Rainbath angle adds an unusual snowy softness, further emphasized by the surprising potency of this fragrance. Just one spray lasts a solid nine hours.

The masculine opening of pink pepper and cardamom lends WtRS a spicy, aftershave-like feel, faintly reminiscent of Hai Karate or Pinaud Clubman. But soon, pale florals—mostly lily of the valley and Hedione HC—take over, shifting the fragrance toward a watery herbal vibe, supported by the faintest hint of powder. There’s a touch of Kenzo Pour Homme in how this develops, but the resemblance doesn’t linger. In the end, I like this fragrance and would use it occasionally if I owned a bottle. But for the price they're asking? No way.

Is Brut the Ship of Theseus?

The Paradox of the Ship of Theseus is an age-old dilemma: can an object that has had every one of its parts systematically replaced over the years still be considered the same as it was in its original form? Can an object remain essentially unchanged despite efforts at preservation to remedy its decaying components, or is it preferable to simply reconstitute the object from the decaying pieces themselves?

This question lies at the heart of the Ship of Theseus, which boasted thirty oars and was celebrated by the Greeks as worthy of preservation. After many years, every plank, every oar, every board, warp, and mast had been replaced with ostensibly identical new parts. The vessel was granted a hero's memorial, yet philosophers debated whether this act preserved the ship or merely replaced it. Was the pristine vessel purportedly used by Theseus still truly his ship after 150 years of plucking and replacing, or had it transformed into something entirely different?

This riddle invites contemplation of whether an object is defined by its material composition or if its identity transcends the materials that constitute it. Is the preserved assembly of planks and boards the true ship of Theseus, or is it the ship constructed by a bored dockworker using all the original parts, even if it appears altogether different?

I often find myself pondering this question in relation to Brut. Of all the fragrances in my collection, Brut inhabits a strange, eerie realm reminiscent of this timeless Greek paradox. Launched in 1964 as a classic fougère with a nitromusk base, Brut has undergone countless efforts at "preservation" due to changing ownership, reformulations, and evolving standards in perfumery. In 2024, sixty years after its debut, and now manufactured by High Ridge Brands, one might encounter Brut on grocery store shelves and wonder: is this really Brut?

The dilemma arises from Brut’s myriad iterations, applications, concentrations, and bottlings, surviving only by the skin of its teeth into the twenty-first century as an anachronistic homage to its era. When a young man discovers a green plastic bottle today, he might question whether this fragrance resembles the original. If he is a pessimist, he may assume it does not. Should he buy and wear it, can he genuinely feel as though he is donning Brut? What else could it be if not the product advertised on the label?

This conundrum extends to the fragrance community at large, where reformulations are ubiquitous across nearly every fragrance older than a couple of years. Even “newer” fragrances, still commercially popular, are likely to undergo minor tweaks and adjustments driven by the availability of materials and fluctuating prices. Consider Creed's Silver Mountain Water, a fragrance celebrating its thirtieth anniversary next year. Despite the passage of decades and two changes of ownership since 2020, the white bottle with a silver cap still contains something called Silver Mountain Water. However, the dense, mineralic ambergris of the original has vanished, replaced by an intensely inky version that might better serve as a flanker to its 1995 predecessor than a true representation of itself.

Fragrances evolve, yet their names and overall packaging typically remain unchanged. This invites a critical examination of older fragrances: Are you what you claim to be? After the natural oakmoss has been eliminated, after the notes that flourished in the sixties and seventies have been diminished—first slightly, then more conspicuously—are you still Brut? After the synthetics have been replaced with kinder, gentler chemicals, after the cancer-causing nitromusk molecules have been excised and substituted with other potentially harmful musk compounds, are you still Brut? The bottle bears the name "Brut," yet the scent I experience cannot possibly resemble what a man inhaled upon unscrewing the cap in 1964!

The Ship of Theseus Paradox profoundly impacts perfumery and presents a pressing question for those who cherish vintage scents and seek their analogs in the contemporary market. If we accept that constitution does not equal identity, it becomes easier to view a fragrance that claims to be a certain scent as authentically that scent, despite undergoing extensive refurbishment. 

By adopting the "Continued Identity Theory," we might consider Brut to be itself, as long as the changes it endures unfold over an extended period and do not occur all at once. Imagine if Brut had been obliterated by Fabergé shortly after its release, entirely wiped from the market with every bottle bought back and destroyed. Then, in 2024, another entity produces a powdery scent and labels it "Brut." In this case, we would recognize that this new Brut is not the old Brut but something entirely different. Conversely, the Brut that has undergone minor adjustments over six decades—enough that no original part remains—still retains its identity as Brut. It remains close enough to the original to be considered the original, still the same perfume.

My solution to the Ship of Theseus Paradox is straightforward: Brut is Brut if I accept that it is. My acceptance of the current iteration allows High Ridge Brands to successfully market it to me. Helen of Troy had so thoroughly altered Brut that the formula available between 2015 and 2021 was utterly unrecognizable to me, and thus I did not consider it a fragrance at all. I did not buy it, I did not wear it, I did not respect it. Brut was effectively discontinued, despite never leaving store shelves.

High Ridge Brands successfully restored the fragrance I recognized, delivering an impressive rendition of its original formula. Consequently, I regarded Brut as "back," even though it had technically never gone anywhere. Then HRB reformulated its reformulation, slightly diminishing the fragrance's quality, yet it still surpassed the subpar version that Helen of Troy had marketed. For now, Brut endures.