Black Soul Imperial by Ted Lapidus bottle
Ted Lapidus

Black Soul Imperial

4.1/5 · 615 votes Masculine 2011
Main accords
Where to buy
Love Black Soul Imperial?
Save it to your favourites and discover similar scents in the Nardinum app.
Get the app

Fragrance notes

Top notes
Heart notes
Base notes

Character

Longevity3.7/5
Sillage3.3/5
Day48
Night95
Winter100
Fall89
Spring38
Summer12
Our take

Black Soul Imperial opens with a startling jolt of coffee, dark and almost burnt, cut by an acidic citrus squeeze that keeps it from tipping into syrup. That bitter spark gives way to a surprising coolness, mint winding through spices that crackle like fresh pepper and clove. The whole thing settles into a leathery, woody base where amber adds a faint animalic warmth, like a leather jacket left overnight in a smoky coffeehouse and then spritzed with minty aftershave. It is dense and assertive, leaning heavily synthetic in the way that early 2010s designer releases often did, but with a rough-edged charm that feels more niche than your average drugstore bottle.

The sweetness is restrained, the heaviness real, the freshness only a brief guest. With a longevity score of 3.70 and sillage at 3.31, this is not a room-filler; it sits close after a few hours, a quiet growl rather than a roar. The 4.05 rating from over six hundred votes suggests many find it compelling, though I suspect that admiration comes from those who enjoy a fragrance that does not apologize for its density. Who should wear it? The night owl who prefers winter over everything else, the man who wants to smell like he belongs in a dim bar with leather seats and a jukebox. Skip it if you crave fresh, airy scents or need performance to last through a long shift. On the right skin, during a cold evening, it hums like a rusty engine you cannot stop listening to.

Smells similar

Built from the same materials — ranked by how unusual the shared notes are, not by how many.

More from Ted Lapidus

All Ted Lapidus →