cK be (1996)
by Calvin Klein

Simple musk with poor longevity and sillage and nothing more. Super close to the skin and sickeningly sweet.

Fresh yet musky. Affordable but smells slightly more expensive. Unique yet comes from a house which I sort of feel is the king of mediocrity and generic scents.

The only CK scent I'd still buy and wear.

Its very linear and has poor longevity and projection, but its one of the best soapy scents i've had. Very clean and subtle.

If it was Comme De Garcons they would have named it "Artificial Leather", "Pink Plastic", "Matchstick", "Condom", whatever... And it would receive quite a different bundle of reviews with a different set of associations. But Since it's CK, and since the bottle is the same as the mainstream CK One, there's always a bit of confusion involved... What's that smell anyway?
When I first smelled, I thought there was too little to smell at all, like some kind of very light chemical. Some days later I already knew this perfume has a certain statement... Peach, lavender, mint, whatever is in the list, they're mixed in a way that creates something that barely connects to the human world... maybe just some kind of musk plays its usual role . Yet my overall impression is that it's not made for humans at all. At times it reminds me of a frigid Bulgari Black, without the passion and warmness. Rubber, face tonic, shaving foam, plastic, medicine and a lot of similar references.
Strange enough, on my skin the smell disappears very quickly but then after an hour or so, returns stronger than in the beginning.
For me this is quite an interesting experiment and I respect it, but it's sometimes emotionally disturbing, Can't figure out the appropriate situation to wear this... reminds me of rainy and wind day in Dresden, when I was waiting in a laundromat. Maybe they should have made a grey bottle instead of black.

Very "meek".
I was really looking forward to this one, based on it being described as soapy and fresh like laundry. I was surprised when I tried it that I could hardly smell anything at all when applied. It took several attempts before I picked up the peach behind the extremely weak white musk.
I still like it better than ck One, though.

Oddly enough, this scent seemed mediocre to me until I accidentally layered it with Organza Indecence... wow!