Dirty English (2008)
by Juicy Couture

Genre: Leather

By way of a prologue: The cashier at the local pharmacy refused to wait on me while I was testing this. She winced, made gagging faces, wailed “I can’t take that perfume!” and waved me over to another counter. I was wearing one(!) spray of Dirty English on my left wrist.

Me, I don’t think it’s all that bad. (Though it’s perhaps deceptively loud.) Once past its rather jumbled array of citrus and spice top notes, Dirty English resolves into a boozy, animalic leather set alongside a dry, scratchy, spiced conifer wood accord. To my nose, these two fragrance blocks do not blend, but rather run their separate courses in tandem. There are moments in the music of Charles Ives where the orchestra plays two different tunes in two unrelated keys at once, at the same volume, and that’s what the heart of Dirty English smells like to me. In music or in fragrance, it’s a clever trick, one played successfully with different materials in scents as diverse as Angel (fruity floral and patchouli oriental), Baldessarini (spiced fruit and dry cedar), and Aramis 900 (amber oriental and aromatic green chypre).

The first key to success in this maneuver is balance. The two opposing fragrance blocks must be of nearly identical weight in order to maintain tension. This kind of balance is relatively easy to achieve for brief intervals, but to make it endure for any length of time is an act of great art. The second key is distance: the two blocks must be distinct enough to contrast with one another, yet share just enough in character to relate in some manner. Otherwise, the result is more of an olfactory stunt than a fragrance. (Smell Annick Goutal’s Eau du Fier or Etat Libre d’Orange’s Vierges & Toreros to see what I mean.) Dirty English succeeds admirably in terms of balance, but I’m not sure that the distance between its boozy leather and its dry cedar blocks is as well judged.

I must admit to some bias here. You see, I find the scent’s animalic leather aspect far more interesting than the crisp woods. Set by itself, I imagine the cedar/cypress/cardamom complex in Dirty English would smell like any one of a thousand cheap, generic masculine scents that clumsily ape Jean-Claude Elléna’s superb Déclaration. Meanwhile, the boozy leather on its own might smell something like Czech & Speake’s Cuba, or maybe a tamer version of Idole de Lubin. To my disappointment, it’s the scratchy woody amber behind the cedar that endures to dominate the drydown, while the leather, booze, and spices peter out after about three or four hours.

Even so, in a fragrance market where the men’s fragrance aisles are crowded by bland, cynical scents distinguishable only by their packaging, the nose, creative director, and marketing team behind Dirty English deserve high praise for producing and promoting something with a real personality and a clever structure. I consider it a step, albeit a slightly faltering one, in the right direction. I hope it works.

12 June, 2014

Really not sure why this gets so much attention, I'm hardly a niche fragrance snob but this smells really cheap to me, there's a boozy note in there along with some real drugstore budget smelling woods. This is the sort of thing a 16 year old would wear when going on the pull. Longevity is rubbish.

14 February, 2014

Spicy, woodsy, a little dry, a little dirty, and with some subtle warm sweetness underlying. The package/bottle design makes me think they were trying to convey somewhat of a rock n roll vibe with this. They were pretty accurate, imo. But not in some blazing lead guitarist kind of way. More like a solid rock bassist. Cool, but not flashy.

I love the scent, but the longevity just isn't that great. The projection is also fairly moderate, but that's probably a good thing as any more projection and it would be too cloying. Some may already think this is cloying.

Longevity is somewhat of a pet peeve for me so I give it a neutral rating. Otherwise a thumbs up.

Recommended wear: day, casual. Seasons: fall, (early) spring.

30th December, 2013

spicy and dirty yet smooth

i like the dirtiness and spice but done in a smooth way almost like a very muted forest fire smell but not really...lol....sexy as hec!

24 July, 2013

Outstanding, but...

Got this 100mL bottle a month ago as a complete gift set. Kinda excited to prove how "bad boy" this fragrance turn out...

It starts with a smoky burst of wood (cedar, perhaps?) and crisp mandarin sneaking within. As seconds ticking, I get some feel of oak and leather as I long for heavy oud aroma that defines its masculinity.

My conclusion, this isn't a fragrance for picking out clear notes. It's better to be appreciated as an harmonious ensemble of masculinity. It definitely captures the woody & smoky feel, enriched by a sense of cedar.

Cons are the projection, and definitely a serious matter of longevity. It's only skin scent for me. Aside that, this fragrance undeniably masculine, sexy and most definitely strong enough to make an impression. It is a very safe bet to show some manly charm. Score? 7.5/10.

Pros: Unique harmony of masculine fragrance
Cons: No projection, definitely skin scent & short longevity.

28 May, 2013

Such a shame...

Awash all the overly sweet, inoffensive, androgynous designer fragrances popular among men these days, this stuff came completely out of left field.
An uber-masculine, hard edged men's cologne.

From Juicy Couture?
What? Seriously? Well, I did not see this one coming.

I love this damn stuff, and it has probably the coolest bottle design of any fragrance I've ever owned, but it just has absolutely no projection or longevity. Purely a skin scent, no matter how much you spray.

Here's to hoping J.C. re-releases this stuff, and in a eau de parfum version that fixes the staying power issues.
...Yeah, probably not going to happen. It's a fickle market.
*sigh*

Pros: Masculine, Unique
Cons: Longevity, Projection

20th May, 2013