1740 Marquis de Sade
Fragrance notes
Character
1740 Marquis de Sade opens rough, artemisia and bergamot together reading bitter and a little medicinal before anything softer arrives. It is not an easy top note, and it takes real patience to get past it to what comes next.
Patchouli, cardamom and coriander move in fast, warm and a little dusty, but the real turn happens in the base. Birch and leather bring a smoky, almost tarred quality, immortelle adds a dry, hay-like sweetness, and french labdanum and elemi resin thicken everything into something close to old leather furniture left in a warm room. Coriander adds a faint citrusy lift that cuts through the resin just enough to keep some air in the composition.
It stands out for how much it projects. It is long-lasting, holding its dark, resinous character well, and the sillage has real reach, leaving a trail that people register before you say a word.
Fall and winter are unmistakably its seasons, when the leather and resin have cold, dry air to expand into, losing some of that density in warm weather. The bitterness from the artemisia opening stays present in trace amounts, folding into the leather and resin all the way to the base.
Smells similar
Built from the same materials — ranked by how unusual the shared notes are, not by how many.
