Havana Reserva (1996)
by Aramis

Incredible - it takes a traditional set of notes, makes it completely unique, and gives it a fabulous development. You'll be discovering new notes for hours as each pops out and shows itself.

Opening with the highly refined tone of the original scent, HAVANA RESERVA remains true to it's heritage as it develops, but suffers from the same sweaty/gourmand dry down as the original.

Imagine: crushing finest cigars between ur palm, lightly..now bring your palm close to your nose and thats the intensity Havana Reserva has in it's opening. mix this with a steely note of metal over a floral and boozy accords; masterfully blended with spicy notes of pepper and cumin(+tons more) over a base of woody notes, patch and incense....pure bliss...

With Reserva I get a more concentrated version of Havana. The notes that end up being most dominant in the opening to me are the spice notes—they come on very strong. This stronger blast of spices pushes the opening a bit over the line for me. Where I found Havana wonderfully aggressive and edgy, Havana Reserva has gone too far. It takes over a half hour for the spices to settle down to an enjoyable level for me, and when it does, what I get is pretty much the same great accords that I got from Havana, except that spices predominate a bit more to my nose. With the spices dominating, I lose some of the woods and animal notes that I enjoyed so much in Havana. No, Havana Reserva is a very good scent and certainly deserves a thumbs up, but I prefer the original Havana. (Edit of 17 September 2006 review.)

Very hard to tell from the original, save in its greater longevity and sillage. The tobacco notes aren't quite so harsh, either.

Still, don't spend the moolah unless you just really want a discontinued original. For all intents and purposes, you're going to get the same thing minus a little "rumminess" with the equally sexy Montana Parfum d'Homme. (And for a helluva lot less.)

Thumbs up? Yes, absolutely -- but do take my advice above so long as Aramis keeps Havana and Havana Reserva among its discontinued fragrances.

Smoke and musky earthyness on me. Like both frags but this one is stronger.