Futur by Robert Piguet, 1974

Futur was marketed as avant-garde at its release in the late 1960s, an era known for its conviction that the future was more about style than science. In the 60s, the future was in fact the 1960s with sleeker fashion, poses and objets (rayguns and cocktail glasses). Smelled in the present, the revived Futur can be considered a bit retro not because it smells tired, but because the green floral didnt so much evolve as (with a few exceptions) become extinct. Futurs points of direct comparison are this handful of extant green florals from the 1960s-1970s: Chamade, Metal, Silences, Weil de Weil, No 19, Alliage and especially Private Collection. (Im not going to stare into the abyss of attempting to distinguish the green floral from the green chypre.) Niche perfumery has produced a few examples of the style since the late 1960s, but mainstream perfumery has more or less dropped it. The green floral might appear out of step with current trends in mainstream perfumery, but Robert Piguet are smart to include it in their line. It is comparable in archival tone to Fracas and Bandit, and like these two, smartly encapsulates a genre. Additionally, as a well composed melodious floral it fits in with more recent releases from Piguet such as Douglas Hannant and Petit Fracas. It is also composed by Arelien Guichard, the perfumer responsible for the recent spate of new RP releases (Casbah, Mademoiselle Piguet, etc.). Futur is a beautiful green floral. It reminds me that green florals can capture beauty, complexity, and intrigue in ways that mixed white florals aspire to and fruity forals dont even attempt. Green florals are alluring, and Futur is no exception. It has a bright-eyed composure and doesnt come off as heavily coiffed and made up as Private Collection and Chamade do. Its not as stagey as Metal. Informal, but not slack Futur has a simple chic to it. It shows an astute abstraction in the composition that makes it one of the black-box perfumes. You can see into it whatever you please, and as a result, it works in most any context.

Off Scenter and the others described well the facets of the smell and the evolution itself. This is an unisex herbal dark chypre (with a sophisticated floral soul) coming from the abysses of the past but recently reformulated and obviously updated.  In its perfect combination of herbal sharpness and woodsy darkness, water and night, old-fashion and modern, transparence and density this  green-slightly incensed fragrance  strikes out as a typical Piquet as many others had to affirm relatively to its resemblance with Bandit (a Bandit without Birch Tar and with less leather and pungency, that's right). Greens, citruses, ylang-ylang, incense and patchouli imprint a sort of old-fashion aura. The opening under my nose is made of bitter herbs, hesperides (a starring bergamot and orange) and aldehydes and turns out pungent, boisterous and aromatic, than the smell starts to go gentler, with a touch of nocturnal flowes (i smell the violet) and darkens with an obscure blend of olibanum, patchouli and labdanum that is dark-green, incensed, woodsy, bitter-spicy and sweetly leathery. Some balsams have been added to the woodsy incense and are assigned to smooth the rootness, doing it finally in a clever way. The fragrance ends with tamed base of cedarwood and vetiver. The others talk about soapiness, i think just that the herbs, the patchouli and the citrus lose in the time the angular temperament that turns out slightly tamed but basically the fragrance remains humid, earthy and floral. A stark fragrance with a serious, introspective but autoritative temperament.

There's not much I can say that Off-Scenter didn't say express better than I could, but here's my take. This is a very unusual scent: it does smell "modern" but at the same time it also feels like a vintage composition because it's so rich and complex compared to most of today's scents. Futur definitely starts off extremely green, in a way that almost brings Estee Lauder's original Private Collection to mind. It's a delicious note, well described by Jardenel. It then moves into a floral-woody base, with the woods becoming increasingly dominant as time passes.The ending features a surprisingly spicy note that I haven't identified.

The most surprising thing to me about this composition is how quiet and subdued it is: this fragrance does NOT scream. It's mellow in its richness, and brings to my mind a green deciduous forest on the East Coast in the middle of July, dark and mysterious, but not somber, as a result of the leaves filtering the sunlight out. It's so subdued, in fact, that you might want the EdP over the parfum because the sprayer will have greater impact.

As to gender, I think this is perfectly wearable by men. The florals are not of the "feminine" type (by this I mean white flowers or sugary rose) and are mainly in a supporting role. It's less overtly floral than my other favorite green fragrance, Guerlain's Chamade, or the aldehydic Chanel no. 19.