Reviews of Angélique Encens (1933)
by Creed

This is one of the most elusive fragrances I have ever had the pleasure, privilege and frustration to wear. It is suave, soft, beautiful, masculine, feminine, angelic, spiritual and distant. Some scents are bold and "out there"; others are subtle; others are what they call "skin scents" in that they ride close to the skin; this is a soul scent. You can only smell it tangentially and by inference by looking into one's soul. Like an old church with no present incense wafting, but a lingering impression of incense that was once there but is now mostly gone. That is how I experience this most amazing fragrance. Angelique Encens Tangentiale, what is that? Is that my Angelique Encens? Maybe, maybe not; strange I thought it was, how nice it was. Too bad I really can't smell it. Best for those who fully understand Kierkegaard's "Being and Nothingess". The perfect scent for the equally elusive Greta Garbo. Unisex, but better for gals. Holy Subtle. I would get it if I could get it, but I don't really get it. My loss I guess.

Well, for me this was a disappointment. I love "churchy" incense scents; ones that are resinous, dry, and woody. They evoke a haunting, mysterious quality. The fact that this scent was revived for the occasion of Pope Benedict's visit to the USA led me to think AA might be something along the lines I've described above. But, as many have noted, this is a very sweet, musky, vanillan and floral scent. It has only a passing acquaintance with incense. Creed's Cypres-Musc is the sort of thing I had been expecting, and certainly Comme des Garcons' Incense line delivers the goods. This is another pot of incense, and not my style. Doesn't smell masculine to me at all. Thumbs down because what the promotion suggests, and what the product delivers, are two different things.

I wish Angélique Encens would stop at the beginning, when there's a perfect accord of vegetal angelica and (already) a noticeable presence of incense, with the bergamot providing a bit of freshness. However, as the drydown progresses it becomes headier and headier on my skin, reaching an almost headache-inducing intensity in the combined power of the florals and particularly the vanilla. At this point I come to agree with Caltha on the connotation of cheap perfume oil, which is a shame, knowing how fine a creation this is. But the overbearing vanilla inescapably conjures up olfactory images of $1.99 scented candles. The angelica and incense struggles to be heard in the background and they rebound somewhat, but ultimately I'll have to say that I could only wear this in deepest winter, in miniscule amounts. My 30% full apothecary bottle should thus last me well into the next century. This is a classic, "old-fashioned," perfume which needs to be tried on skin.

Rather weird... It fells "vintage", yet it has a sweet, powdery, even plasticky vanilla note that feels very contemporary to me. The combination is truly original, I haven't smelled any perfume like it. But is it any good? To my nose, it smells quite cheap, like a cheap perfume oil. It's the vanilla that does it. Loads of vanilla over a dry, woody incense base. In the drydown I get a hint of white floral and the slightest whiff of animalic notes. Worthy of Marlene Dietrich? Hardly! Perhaps in some role where she's disguised as blond angel with a heart of gold in white furs...

This fragrance should be my HG. It has all the Piscean traits I love, BUT... I don't like it. Angelica is a complex essential oil that is transporting in the pure state, but I love it so much I only seem to want it straight up. I have never run across an Angelica-blend perfume I love yet. I have also come to another realization after trying this one off and on for a year - I'm not really a fan of incense fragrances. I don't mind them as a note but when they figure prominently, I seem to lose interest.
I want to have what other people describe with this fragrance, and was prepared to fall desperately in love, so it has been a disappointing experience. I will keep trying, and hopefully, one time I'll be transported to the Angelique Encens plane. My experience thus far has kept my feet on the ground.
For now, for much less than the cost of AE, I'll indulge myself in the pure essential oil, burn a stick of sandalwood incense, lay on the couch, and play "Sunlight Through A Vaulted Window" by Peter Davison, the music that evokes the mood AE lovers are describing, and pretend....

Angelique Encens on me smells the way a big black panther would smell as it cools down from a long and sweaty chase. To me, AE is the quintessential le parfum fourrure, but not in a nice way. When I first smelled AE, my initial reaction was, “this is very mannish.” My second thought was, “this is very cattish.” My third thought was, “this is like getting an old fur coat out of mothballs.” So I was wryly amused when I was informed that Creed had developed this for Marlene Dietrich back in the ‘30s. Well, that would explain my first two reactions.!! There’s something repulsive about the way AE melds with my chemistry. It’s so repulsive I’m constantly smelling my wrists to figure out what in the world this note is that I find so off-putting. Is it ambergris? Whatever it is, it’s certainly compelling and repelling simultaneously. I will admit that at the end, hours and hours later, there is a faint trail of pure musk oil left behind. I actually like that part, but it takes too doggoned long to get there. Angelic incense, eh? Surely not the incense of heavenly seraphim or cherubim. Maybe the incense of those “other” angels, like the ones in Tartarus?