African Night
by AbdesSalaam Attar Profumo

On paper, I smelled Star Jasmine, the kind I used to have growing outside my house in northern California. When baking in the sun, Star Jasmine has a different quality than at night. African Night's jasmine smells more of the cool scent I smell from Star Jasmine in the evening--sweet and cool, a bit less indolic than during daytime. The jasmine fades to reveal ylang ylang, and it has the typical lemon-woody on the verge of furniture polish smell that I associate with this essence. The floral combination is rather intoxicating and also gives a sense of calm. I am not sure if there is actually spice in this fragrance, but I do smell a little bit of clove. Some flower essences such as carnation give this effect. It is very pretty, and the floral accord seems to last a long time. I really love the softly spicy drydown. Overall, it smells mostly floral and is a rather soothing scent.

On my skin, I can detect the jasmine and ylang ylang quite strongly. However, unlike smelling AN on paper, I smell a gasoline note. The gasoline note is somewhat like what I found in Profumo's two African Queen fragrances (on paper), but not quite as overpowering. There is definitely an animalic tone which I didn't find to be as forward on paper. I do not feel nearly as calmed with this fragrance on my skin, probably because the gasoline note, while greatly subdued compared to African Queen, is a bit offputting. As the fragrance starts to dry, I smell the hint of spice I noticed before.

African night really comes on strong in the top notes, but settles quickly. Unfortunately, I feel like I can't even get in the door with it. For me, it is obviously better if it is not used as a personal fragrance, but rather on paper or other evaporation method in a similar application to aromatherapy. I recommend testing this, especially for jasmine lovers. It is really quite lovely!