Italian Cypress (2008)
by Tom Ford

I love a great cypress note (Cypres Musc by Creed was love-at-first sniff when I smelled it years ago) and Italian Cypress is a great cypress scent. In the first few seconds the resinous, coniferous notes are stiff, dry, bitter and very wonderful. Let’s call it the Yatagan-effect (I love it!) but then it head spinningly transforms into a wide expanse of green pine needles, fresh air (well, the effect of oxygenated pine needles) and a breezy mosaic of cypress trees, leaves, twigs, branches, sap, the whole darn forest. An extraordinary beginning! A green so true, that if you gathered together all of the shades of green in the world and picked the greenest, the epitome of green, this is the one you would choose.

But the top notes are not enough to win me over completely. The base notes are just like Polo (1978) by Ralph Lauren. As the scent progresses its parallel similarities to Polo are astonishing. The creamy wood effect. The whiff of leather at the edges of the green. Ford managed to copy everything about it except for Polo’s longevity since Italian Cypress lasts on me only about 3-4 hours and then disappears (unlike Polo which lasts + 8 hours).

This is not in my opinion a unisex scent. It's for guys and that's that I believe. Vaguely reminiscent of Ralph Lauren's original Polo for men, which to my nose has now changed. Italian Cypress is drier, woodier and smokier, and does not seem to develop on my skin. It has great lasting power and smells the same 10 hours later. If you like cypress then this is a faithful rendition. I agree with Kaern that this is "something your dad may like" in the sense that the under 30's all smell fresh / synthetic / aquatic / ozonic, but I have 3 of the private collection- Amber Ab, Tobacco V and Italian C. None smells like a young person's scent. They all have a bit more to them than just "smelling nice".
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It's dry and woody alright, but not quite naturally woody enough for me as it has a quite soapy feeling to it too as well as a strong air of classic gentlemanly cologny. "Like something your Dad would like to wear" - not mine, he's not that kind of dad, but yes, that's the general idea. I wonder if I quickly grow anosmic to the scent (maybe because it's so close to a single note) because it's barely there, no sillage at all. I tried to refresh my nose with coffee beans but that seems to have had the opposite effect - maybe the scent of Italian Cypress is too close to the warm, roasted scent of coffee beans for it to work? The little I can smell with my nose pressed to my skin is nice enough though, a warm, comforting, soapy/smoky wood.

Check -- this is a straight up cypress rendition, which is arid and masculine. The rendition is really lovely though and it doesn't really stray anywhere else. It reminds me slightly of Fou D'Absinthe, replacing cypress for pine and smoke for booze. It has that burnt woody autumnal feel. There is one caveat -- it smells like something your Dad would like to wear.

For me, this is a low sillage, perfect for the office perfume. It's somewhat personal in that it does stay close to the skin, and it smells absolutely fantastic. Masculine for sure, reminds me of my dad and all good smells associated. Expensive yes, full bottle worthy? I don't know yet but thumbs up all the way. Only downside, for me, is that it does not seem to last all day on my skin.

Italian Cypress is a distinctive, woodsy scent that smells like the real cypress-wood deal, dry to the point of being austere, and tinged with smoke and a pleasantly salty musk.

And that's pretty much it. Italian Cypress isn't about stages of development or its many changing moods; it's about the sensation of crackling, dry wood from start to finish.

It definitely skews more masculine than the majority of the Private Blend series.