L'Ambre De Carthage by Isabey, 2011

A dense mix that incorporates an awful lot of things. It kicks off slightly amber, but with a big green mossy smell over it and then, within minutes, changes into a fruity floral with fake jasmine, fake peach, and that too-sweet fake orange, all glued together by pink pepper and patchouli but enriched with a buttery quality. Hints of tobacco came in as the fruity florals died off, leaving most of the afternoon smelling like the cheap pink pepper/fruitchouli drydown of a mediocre fruity floral mixed with the smell of a just-sharpened pencil, which was more intriguing than I'm making it sound. Finally, it all died down to a dark woody chocolate smell with a strangely aromatic pine poking out of the rich cocoa. I wore this all day without knowing what it was supposed to be and I'm shocked that it's supposed to be: #1. Amber #2. Masculine #3. Niche. It has some interesting twists and turns, but it smells like a better than average mall fruity floral, like the kind with a slightly bigger budget that debuts at Saks or Neimans instead of Macy's. That's not to say that it's terrible, it just has a lot of ingredients that are fairly established codes meant to portray "youthful" "girly" and "commonplace" fighting for space with some interesting "niche" notes.