Reviews of Opôné (2001)
by Diptyque

Diptyque Opone

Rose can sometimes be the prettiest note in the room to the exclusion of almost everything else. Most of my favorite rose scents are powerful and scream "Rose!" when I wear them. What to do when you want your scent to whisper "rose". For me I turn to the 2001 release from Diptyque Opone. Like many Diptyque scents it is almost a soliflore but for the addition in this scent of a lovely hit of saffron to go with the muted rose. The top of this is a sheer rose that doesn't barge into life and take over the room. Soon enough the saffron asserts itself and this mix of saffron and rose stays in place throughout the development. It is joined by some very light spice and wood throughout the development of this but Opone remains resolutely linear and composed around the two main notes of rose and saffron. This is such a good mix on me that this is a case where the linearity is not so boring on me, as I find with other scents. The ability to keep a lighter touch to the rose makes Opone an easier scent for me to wear when I don't want to be a sillage monster but still want to wear rose. Opone is like most of the Diptyque scents in that it has decent longevity on me but they don't project very much. Opone is the scent I use when I feel like whispering instead of screaming.

This is one of Diptyque's recently discontinued fragrances. I'm sorry to see this one go, but unlike L'Autre and L'Eau Trois, the world isn't losing something unique.

In its transparency and minimalism it's very Diptyque. I only discern three notes - saffron, rose, and light touch of patchouli in the base.The saffron dominates the top, and in the base the patchouli-rose accord brings to mind similar but more vivid fragrances, like L'Artisan's Voleur de Roses and Czech & Speake's Rose. The longevity and sillage are quite good without being obtrusive.

Simple and straight to the point, I find it very wearable, if just a touch dull. Good, but not exciting.

Huge rose scent. Not incredibly wearable and incredibly boring. I'd rather have it in a potpourri, a scented candle or a room spray. At least it smells good.

I actually was unable to wear this outside. It's just too pungent -- I'm not sure the saffron compliments the rose very well for a skin perfume. It's very pot-pourri -- a lovely smell (for the house maybe). CDG's White has similarities but is much more wearable (i.e. it won't knock you over) and superior in every aspect.

I loved it. But very hard to wear all a day long. It's better as a home scent..

Like most of the scents I know from Diptyque, Opone is based on a simple accord, in this case rose and saffron. These two principal notes are so tightly integrated that I can hardly tell where one ends and the other begins. This in itself is a remarkable feat of perfumery. The astringency of the saffron keeps the rose from becoming too sweetly cloying, and the rose prevents the saffron from turning into rice pilaf.

Again, like other Diptyque fragrances it is resolutely linear, so that once you've smelled the top notes, you've experienced the whole thing. I suppose there's an advantage to this, in that you'll know immediately whether or not you like it, and there won't be any unpleasant surprises as the hours pass.

Opone is attractive and well-executed, but it ultimately fails to excite me as do some of the more aggressive rose fragrances, including Black Aoud, Royal Aoud and Sa Majeste la Rose.

I find that the wood and spice sometimes make this a good winter scent, but golly -- how I wish there were more rose! Perhaps it's my skin chemistry, but the saffron is so heavy on me that it overwhelms the rest of the notes and not always in a good way... someone even told me I smelled like "an Indian restaurant"! The lasting power is great, and sometimes I'm in the mood to smell a bit like spicy wood, but a touch more rose and this one could have been in my regular scent stable.

Ingredients: saffron, roses, spices and wood.

Opone was named after an ancient trade center in Somalia on the east coast of Africa. The fragrance description says it all for me: "Rounding the cape where spices are grown, under full sail, bound for the fragrant gardens of roses and saffron." Wow, I'm there on the deck with this one, pretty much literally. I can feel the warm, curiously dusty, spice laden sea wind, huge ocean vistas dropping away over the horizon, creaking wood and hemp ropes. I don't know why it sparks my imagination, but it does. I can't get enough of this fragrance sometimes. If there was any fragrance that makes the term 'past life' make sense, it's this one.
This dry warm saffrony rose has that slight tinge of stale, dying rose vase water that usually turns me off (like Voleur De Roses), but adds to the hot equatorial inertia here. Some reviewers have called it luscious, sweet, sexy, moist... but it is none of those for me. It's not really even a rose fragrance to my mind. It's just 'Opone' - a unique fragrance that sets my imagination free to go to those spice lands near the equator. Oftentimes it takes me to a dark dry airless room in the heat of the day, searingly bright light peeking through the window shutters. That being said, it's not really a romantic fragrance, nor a sweet or a luscious one - it's all heavy saffron/cumin floral with deep equatorial earth, wood and air overtones. One of those perfumes that you sort of experience, not wear. Sample it first - everyone gets different reactions from it.

I can see where the Voleur de Roses comparisons are coming from, but Opone is much less earthy. It reminds me more of White by CdG because of the spice.

The nice thing about Opone is that, because of the spice and fairly restrained use of roses, it is wearable by a man. But, I don't love it for men or women. The spice makes it resemble potpourri and I don't think it goes particularly well with the rose.

The opening doesn’t satisfy me—I like the rose note in it as much as I’ve liked any rose note, but I find the saffron interferes with my appreciation of the accord. I think that I don’t like saffron as a fragrance note and I am apparently a little iffy about rose notes, too. My reaction to Opôné is that it is excellently constructed, wonderfully progressed, has a very present sillage, and lasts beautifully—in other words, nearly a perfect fragrance; but I just can’t get into the particular saffron and rose notes…Now, the pinks note in the middle—THAT is nice.

The Baron de Charlus once told me: 'Once I dreamed I was out riding with Marie Antoinette in the lanes around old Versailles. "Scenty-scent for Charley-Charl," she tittered, playfully spraying me with Diptyque's Opone. I sniffed myself. "Indeed, Your Majesty," I declared, "definite aroma of an old tea chest - surrounded by I know not what melange of herbs, fruits, flowers and spices." The Queen drew her mount to a sudden halt, her eyes rolling wildly. "Straw and cake!" she burbled, "Straw and cakey-cake for me!" "Yes, you royal poltroon," I agreed, "you could well be right for once. Anything might be lurking within this indecipherable scent, straw and cakey-cake included."'

In *Opôné*, the saffron note is tightly blended with rose, spices, and wood notes, and what an exquisite, dry combination the achieved accord is. Dry yet luscious at the same time thanks to the rose (Rosa damascena, in this case), astringent yet perfectly balanced between the sweetness lusciousness of the rose and the astringent, woodsy spicy elements of the saffron echoed in the spice and wood notes themselves. It’s simple, and it’s very Mediterranean in its simplicity, but as with all such simplicity, one marvels at how such a combination works to produce such enchantment. This Mediterranean ethos is a decided and calculated ethos with Diptyque; its original founders were very much influenced and galvanized by their travels in Greece and the Mediterranean region in general.

Furthermore, *Opôné*, like all Diptyque fragrances, starts off strong and finishes strong, and, like most Diptyque fragrances, it doesn’t evolve much, which is fine by me because it smells so beautiful right out of the bottle. Diptyque fragrances have such presence and such an amazing tenacity. They’re pure, honest, and there’s a clarion quality to the tonality of their ingredients. *Opôné*, like all Diptyque fragrances, is intense from the first moment you spray it on to the last moment right before it fades, and Diptyque fragrances work like certain batteries which provide optimum performance and then all of a sudden just die out. I’ve never sampled scents with such redoubtable presence. I think the fact the company first made candles before it made scents might have a lot to do with the fact that their fragrances are a lot like their candles: they have amazing, redolent output right till they burn out.

For a similar experience of Saffron, Rose, and woods (in this case oudh), minus the spices, one should try Czech & Speake’s very accomplished *Dark Rose*, if one can find it. If you love rose as a key element in an accord, you'll more than likely love *Opôné*, which is, in my opinion, along with Dipytque’s own *L’Ombre dans L’Eau*, one of a handful of the truly great rose-based fragrances ever created.

Ya know, I wanted to like it. I tried it again, and again, but there was something just slightly too raw for me in the saffron and rose pairing.

A rose fragrance for men who are afraid of roses, this is neither flowery nor overly aromatic. The saffron and other spices temper the rose so that it is noticeable but not overwhelming. I, for one, love the scent of rose, and prefer L'Artisan's Voleur de Roses and Penhaligon's Hammam Bouquet in the evening, but find this one to be a little more wearable in formal environments.

Opôné isn’t a terrible rose based fragrance, but it’s not very good either. It’s smell and poorly made. It’s got that health food store/head shop store blending technique that all the Diptyque’s seem to have. It’s not herbal, per se, but rather, it’s unbalanced and slightly medicinal. I much prefer Dark Rose, which has almost the same note pyramid.

My first Diptyque fragrance and I'm amazed. Roses in a very masculine blend. I've tried a couple of other "masculine" rose blends but this one beats them all. Very dressy and mature. I'm wearing it during the day in business dress clothes and it's very appropriate. I could absolutely see this at night or for a formal event.

Next to Philosykos, this is my hands down runner up favorite. A fairly masculine blend of spices, Turkish and Bulgarian rose. This WILL turn heads.

The drawing on the bottle shows palm trees and number of sailing ships that look Arabic. The scent is a strong rose fragrance with a mixture of spices. Saffron is in there as well but it is not overwhelming. An unusual and intriguing scent for the adventurous guy. I think it would be ideal for evening wear. Or a hot date.