Brut Splash-On Lotion (Unilever)

Closing out May, let's take a look at European Brut Splash-On. Here in America, we rubes are given tacky plastic bottles that look and feel junky and are in an unnecessarily deep shade of green. It's as if HRB thinks the darker color will help buyers overlook the fact that they're splurging on a great big bottle of cheap. But not in Europe -- oh god no. You fancy-pants Euros get the expensive plastic that looks and feels like glass and is finished in a tastefully subdued translucent green. 

How does your supermarket Brut smell? Well, after the initial alcohol bite, which is unexpectedly more pronounced than the American version, the Euro Splash-On settles into a delicate and very sweet sugared lavender fougère with wispy woody underpinnings, reminiscent of the Unilever EDT in glass (squat bottle). My war-torn nose sometimes struggles to get the full picture, but what I glean is that this is an "aura" fragrance, something any bloke with a few quid can grab in a pinch to send olfactorily subliminal signals of very civilized masculinity out to the world. An eau de cologne version of the Unilever formula, if you will. The irony here is that Europe and Asia, where this formula is primarily marketed and sold, is loaded with sophisticated and eye-wateringly expensive haute parfumerie, most of which fails to capture the ethereal beauty of this understated classic. You can find it across from the condoms at Tesco. 

This formula of Brut is sweet, gentle, yet nuanced enough to smell like a real composition. It "feels," more than smells, as if I'm relaxing in a grassy meadow full of wild pink catchfly, their dulcet aroma whirling past my senses on a warm breeze, along with a hint of English lavender from further afield. There's also a warmer hay-like essence, powdery and woody, just underneath. Truly beautiful for a drugstore pong, possibly better than HRB's here in the States. Now for a prawn salad and a bowl of Heinz beans. 

Brut Aftershave (Unilever)

I've used Brut aftershave for many years, but always the American formula, which comes in the usual green plastic. The Helen of Troy formula (Idelle Labs) was formidable enough and got it done until about 2016, at which point they lost the plot and pinched a penny too many, leaving little more than a sweet vanilla powder behind. Then High Ridge Brands snatched it up and did the best thing any company has done for a fragrance in the past thirty years -- reformulated it back to its pre-HoT days, circa 1995. 

But, as always, there is more than just one Brut, which at least partially explains my obsession with this stuff. The Europeans have their own formula, courtesy of Unilever, and it comes in the squat bottle, which also happens to be solid glass. Everyone knows perfume fares better in glass (and best in metal). Of further interest is how Unilever couldn't quite bring themselves to make it green glass, and instead opted for the cheaper route of coloring the liquid, which I find to be a little, what's the Euro word? Naff. But hey, at least they didn't do it to the EDT, I can't complain too much.

How does it work, and how does it smell? Beautifully, though not for nearly as long as the American version. The European EDT scales back the aromatics and amps up the woody vanilla, which really sings in the aftershave -- for all of thirty seconds -- before fading into the musky hum of a polite gentleman’s splash. Europeans pride themselves on being more sophisticated than their colonial counterparts, and this formula says, "I wear it for me, not for you." Very nice, and well worth owning if you're a Brut fanatic like I am. If not, stick with the American stuff. It's stronger and, thanks to fortune, smells just as good.

Brut Classic (Fabergé/Unilever)

My bottle of Brut Classic by "Fabergé" is the 1990s formula that was only sold from circa 1989 to circa 2000, after which point Unilever sold the North American license exclusively to Helen of Troy/Idelle Labs. I had never smelled this formula of Brut Classic until recently, having only owned several bottles of the 2000s stuff, which I was always a bit wary of. I'd spent years hearing older guys reminisce about how the current Classic smells like the original stuff from the 1960s, but I always questioned it. The fragrance smelled much better than the plastic bottle version sold in drugstores, but I felt it lacked something and seemed suspiciously thin in the drydown, a wispy white musk and powder vibe. 

The first five minutes of Fabergé's Classic smells very similar to the Idelle Labs reformulation, but the main difference that jumps out at you (if you have experience with the newer stuff) is that the vintage version has way more depth in its lavender and geranium accord, with brighter, mintier aromatics, and a sort of sparkling quality to the citrus and greens. The stearyl acetate accord really glows in Unilever's older version of Classic, and as it dries down the lavender remains lucid, guiding me through an array of powdery white florals and into a musky sandalwood and patchouli base that smells classy and overwhelmingly "adult" and sophisticated. Wearing it, it's hard to believe Brut was once the "cheap cologne" that anyone could grab at a Woolworths or K-Mart. Its projection exceeds the safety zone of three feet by at least another three, and its longevity is nuclear at 15 hours plus. Classic indeed, especially when you consider my bottle is the cologne and not the eau de toilette spray that was also available at the time. The Idelle Labs formula doesn't come close to touching this one in quality or strength. (The Parfums Prestige formula, also Unilever, is a different story.) 

It's interesting that Unilever kept the Fabergé marquee going for another decade after it was all but moot to associate the name of a Baltic jeweler with an inexpensive American barbershop scent, but I guess when a British multinational firm of its size buys something as iconic as Karl Mann's 1964 fougère, the incentive to maintain is there. Of note to me is how their post-'89 formula doesn't smell the least bit cheap or simplistic -- there's quite a stew of notes at work, and all of them smell sprightly, dimensional, and, for lack of a better word, solid. It stands apart from its powdery post-shave brethren, reminding me more of Trumper Wild Fern than Pinaud Clubman. If you have the cash, I say get this. 

Brut EDT, Gold Vs. Silver (Unilever)

I've always wondered why Unilever's Brut EDT comes in two shades, as shown in the image above. Are they distinct in scent, do they offer unique benefits, or is it just marketing through arbitrary packaging? I owned the silver-capped version (with a matching medallion) and bought the gold-capped one to investigate.

The truth is, there's no difference between the two beyond the metal color and one minor detail specific to my bottles. The silver bottle's clear plastic box had a manufacturing sticker lacking any company information—no Unilever "U" logo, making it hard to trace its origin. The gold bottle's box, however, bears a Unilever logo on a more detailed sticker. Otherwise, both bottles are identical in appearance and scent.

Despite the identical fragrance, I’m left wondering why Unilever offers two colors. My theory is that silver targets the Asian market, while gold is aimed at Europe—a notion I vaguely recall reading somewhere, though unverified. Like much of Brut’s branding, this choice remains a mystery, although a scam has surfaced on platforms like eBay and YouTube, where Indian resellers package genuine or fake Parfums Prestige silver bottles in Fabergé Brut Classic boxes, passing them off as vintage. At least one YouTuber fell for this, reviewing a current bottle in a vintage Fabergé box, which is unfortunate.

Buyers should beware of Brut Classic boxes with the Fabergé logo, especially from sellers omitting bottle photos. Many of these boxes are likely counterfeit, part of a petty Indian scam. It’s baffling why resellers don’t just use the clear plastic packaging typical of '70s vintage Fabergé bottles, but there you have it.

Brut Special Reserve (High Ridge Brands)

It's Back

Brut Special Reserve is no longer discontinued. Sorry, eBay scalpers. You'll have to forget about charging $125 for 89 milliliters of this stuff, because it can be had for $18 again. And, I have more bad news for you: the $18 formula, new from High Ridge Brands, is better than the old version from twelve years ago. So go fish. 

Is there a lot to say about this new Brut? No, not really. I finally understand what High Ridge Brands is doing, and it makes me feel a lot better about my life. Back about four years ago, they reissued Brut 33 (the plastic bottle drugstore version) with a beautiful formula that took Brut back to 2000. I was awestruck by it, because I never expected anyone to buy an old, over-reformulated legacy drugstore cologne and "fix" it. But that's exactly what they did, and it smelled great. I bought two backup bottles. 

Then HRB did the unthinkable, and quickly reformulated it, cheapening the top notes and messing with the warm, ambery finish by adding shrill white florals. Not terrible, and still miles better than what Helen of Troy had brought us to, but why? Well, now I know why -- they decided to take their first formula, increase the concentration by 10%, and put it in a glass bottle, to be marketed as the new Special Reserve. This new stuff smells rather similar to Brut Special Reserve 2013, but it's smoother, drier, more put together, and a bit less crude in how it impacts the nose. I like it better, let's put it that way. 

Brut remains one of the most difficult fragrances for me to pin down, given its myriad incarnations and the simple fact that it's been around for 61 years. I find myself obsessing over Brut in much the same way I obsess over Creeds, and indeed, I have a bottle of the original glass Fabergé cologne on the way, so I'll be taking my obsession to its logical endpoint. Stay tuned. In the meantime, if you're someone who has been gnashing his teeth over Special Reserve's discontinuation, and you had not, until now, heard of its re-release, well, you're very welcome.