Ormonde Woman (2002)
by Ormonde Jayne

This perfume is so lovely. It makes me feel like I'm in a sun-dappled mossy forest on a warm day. It has a fairy or fantasy like quality to it as well, but is still elegant and refined. It is light and airy while also maintaining a deep woodsy feel with a little spice. The performance is good too. Nicely done!

Sweet, feminine top notes - not fruity sweet, mind you. Cardamom, touch of coriander, sweet grass, fresh hemlock, gentle violet, and jasmine. The base reveals some amber and a touch of sandalwood. Unfortunately, this fades way too quickly, for me.

What a difference a year makes. I'm leaving my first review intact for sentimental reasons; this was the first truly niche fragrance I encountered, and I still adore it. Despite the gendered names, Ormonde Man and Ormonde Woman are both quite unisex and incredibly similar--so similar, in fact, that one wonders if both of these need to exist. At any rate, I find them both beautiful. Woman is softer and a tad sweeter than Man thanks to the violet, and Man is a tad spicier thanks to the addition of pink pepper.

Overall, these two scents celebrate green woods in a quintessentially British way. This is an ancient, slightly dank forest that was spent an eternity surrounded by fog. The woods are synthetic, employing the house signature developed by Geza Schoen, and yet there is still a naturalness here. The grass oil most likely contributes to this, and I wish it stuck around longer than 30 minutes.

Fortunately, the heart and base are tenacious, still projecting softly after 10 hours from two sprays to the neck. In the far dry-down, it even gets a bit powdery--perhaps the violet is shifting focus again. First green, then spicy, then powdery woods. Galadriel floating through Lothlórien.

Overall, I think Ormonde Woman is the jewel of this house alongside Privé, though I haven't sampled the critically acclaimed Gold series yet. I still find this practically perfect, and I hope to add a bottle or two to my collection this year.

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Ormonde Woman: practically perfect in every way.

I don't mean to trivialize a masterpiece with trite movie quotes, but I honestly have nothing else to offer. I have been completely swept off of my feet. None of my past or even current signature fragrances hold a candle to Ormonde Woman. This speaks to everything I have been and everything I want to be. My entire collection, modest as it is, pales in comparison. I can only hope Ormonde Jayne never stops making this because I will be needing it for the next 60 years, give or take.

I remember smelling the tester in store, it has a somewhat sweet green grass note on top. Not as ethereal as Apsu, and sometimes I can't perceive it at all.

Back home, it then fell to the very peppery woody heart (black hemlock?). Except that, it has an oily facet. If you've smelled violet leaf essential oil, you'll know what I'm talking about. Sometimes it has a dry-tea leaves scent.

The opening sweetness didn't disappear completely, it's lurking somewhere in the background. In the meantime, the main note is still a bit sour and astringent, as you can imagine from a dry cedar base. It even turns to the slightly bitter side after dry-down.

There is a balm at the heart of both Ormonde Man and Ormonde Woman - it is a smooth and creamy thing, giving a sense of luxury and refinement and a hint of something that is somewhere between cashmere and milk (with no doubt a good helping of Geza Schoen’s beloved, velvety – and addictive – Iso E thrown in). It soothes the greens and woods that are common to both these perfumes and dissolves them into a magical and cool forest fantasia. Here are gently waving grasses, airbrushed pines, the gentle crunch of fallen twigs releasing odours not only of wood but herbal, almost floral coriander seed and the sweet, soapy breath of cardamom. Here is sunlight filtering pale green through the tall branches alive with dancing motes. And here is the unmissable elegance that is something of an Ormonde Jayne signifier, which gives so many of their perfumes an effortlessly relaxed yet polished feel.
Whereas I love a green perfume that goes for verisimilitude, I am also partial to such smeared lens explorations which seem worlds apart.
As I currently own Ormonde Man, I find the common DNA of the two perfumes does not justify also buying Ormonde Woman, but should the former run out, then it will be time to get gender fluid.