Amber fragrances are a sort of rite of passage in the first few years of one’s fragrance journey; they are un-challenging, simple in structure, and offer the kind of dopey sweetness that’s hard to pass up on when you’re in need of warmth. But what makes ambers so attractive is also what limits them. One you’ve amassed two or three of the amber stalwarts, it’s hard to find a variation that innovates or improves on the basic model to the point where you’d be happy shelling out for another.
Battaniye is that rare amber that does something new with an old idea. Meaning blanket in Turkish, Battaniye was made to evoke the feeling of restfulness and comfort of having an old wool blanket pulled over your lap, while you watch the rain bucket down outside. Omer Pekji took his inspiration from a stormy evening in Trabzon, in his native Turkey, a town on the Silk Road that served as the gateway to Persia.
The scent opens on a remarkable note of burned coffee grounds, before smoothing out into a dry, whiskeyish amber that reads more like fabric – leather, sheep’s wool, hessian – than resin. In fact, it does rather smell like an old afghan or perhaps a man’s battered leather jacket, something that you absentmindedly pull onto your bare knees and then spend the rest of the evening inhaling the rich humanity of smells bound up in its fibers.
Battaniye achieves a textured, layered feeling of warmth without ever spiraling into gooey sweetness, or at the other end of the scale, the sort of parched dryness that wears on the spirit. It’s a masculine scent, and slightly animalic in parts, a core of medicinal Peau d’Espagne-style leather hiding out in layers of wool, resin, and cool, wet earth. Once the TCP-like nuances of the leather burn off, the patchouli really piles into the scent in a big way, reminding me of the evocative smell of rain on soil. This is a scent that just gets better and better as it ages on the skin.
It’s hard to do something with amber that a) diverges from the basic model of sweet, resinous warmth, and b) doesn’t in any way call to mind the spice-rack ambers of the Middle East. Battaniye shuffles the spirit of oily, macho Peau d’Espagne-style leathers into an ever-shifting deck of resin, wool, and earth, for a result that both comforts and pulls on an emotional string.
Battaniye opens with a shock - ultra in your face sharp claws of the vetiver and patchouli. Hard to describe, more of an awakening of your scent receptors that quickly settles down. Scent of the soil or dark earth at night and the smokiness that you can find in some whiskies or the remnants of burning incense. After some time there is a light leather note which I smelled more on the paper than on my skin.
Excellent warm smoothness of the amber and labdanum and good silage too. Very comforting perfume overall. Completely surprised me with how wonderful and warm it is.
Sweet smoke. Dark gothic floral note. Darker smoke. Deep, deep fall into an enveloping warmth. There is a tobacco vibe. There is a heavy suede vibe. Neither of those notes exist here - it is only a vibration. An animal lurks - dark and heavily fur-covered. A layer of sharp vetiver and sweet honeysuckle intertwined, are amongst this blanket of aromas. Earthy, terra firma! Campfire crackling. Fireplace logs hissing.
Battaniye is very dark for the first hour or so. When it gradually settles the warmth of amber and patchouli arise. They are sweet and calming. The honeysuckle too, begins to shine, adding its floral sweet as well.
This was intriguing for me, its list of notes - I knew I would love this. As a blind buy, I chose wisely. Its deep, warm, and progressively changing character is appealing. It may be too dark for some.