Beaufort London Rake and Ruin courtesy of Beaufort London

In Gray’s Inn, London is tucked away one of London’s finest and weirdest museums, Sir John Soane’s house. Soane, an architect of some note, imbued his Georgian house with odd architectural perspectives and an idiosyncratic collection of furnishings and artifacts that include stunning inlaid marble tables, bits of tombs (including a full casket), dozens of classical and early Egyptian statues and friezes, and, the piece de resistance, a room whose wooden panels, when peeled back, reveal the 8 paintings that constitute Hogarth’s The Rake’s Progress. The paintings, based on a play of the same title, illustrate the fall of a young man of means into debauchery and penury. And they are the inspiration for Beaufort London’s newest addition to their Revenant collection, Rake and Ruin.

The Rake’s Progress III, William Hogarth, 1734

The third canvas of the Rake’s Progress shows the antihero, Tom Rakewell, falling in with a bad lot in a brothel, where gin is being slugged like water and all sorts of naughtiness is in full array. Using a 30% concentration, Beaufort London Rake and Ruin is premised on gin, with its distinctive, medicinal-herbal bite. And, sure enough, in the opening, gin – juniper berry, alcohol and a woody, damp branch smell – swashbuckle their way out of the bottle. The damp wood has an aged feeling, like ship planks or whiskey casks.  As the gin coalesces around this woody accord, something distinctly animalic – castoreum — pounces on the top notes and turns them suede-like.

Dandy Pickpockets by Isaac Robert Cruikshank, 1818

Splashing it on a bit more aggressively, I start to get the full effect of this fragrance. A bite of herbal-sweet angelica hits me, and hot, pungent spice, like fresh pepper plant, as Rake and Ruin’s progress continues. But it is a haunting, toasted, burnished wood that comes back like a revenant; mesmerizing: ancient, trod upon, waterlogged, the remnant of the Flying Dutchman’s ship after a soaking rain. I feel like I have travelled to somewhere long ago I have only ever read about. The booze- and damp-soaked planks smell is almost unbearably realistic and yet, as unfamiliar as someone else’s dream.

Photo by Guzman, GQ Style UK, Fall-Winter 2011

There are hints of the debauchery of Hogarth’s canvasses as they advance in time. The sweaty tang of labdanum comes in rather subtly in the middle stages, a perfect foil to castoreum; the polish and herbs scent of licorice echoing the old floorboards a little later. Musk and more woods settle into a frayed armchair of light amber and pine needle as Beaufort London Rake and Ruin starts to dry down. But the medicinal top note, castoreum and, most of all, that wonderfully evocative wood accord dominate the fragrance all the way to its final canvas.

This is not a perfume for shrinking violets. But if you like your history straight up with a twisted woods-and-booze aroma, Beaufort London Rake and Ruin is for you. You naughty thing.

Notes: Gin, juniper, coriander, angelica, orange, lemon, iris, licorice, Sichuan pepper, pink pepper, cypress, pine needle, violet, castoreum, costus, ambrarome, labdanum, amber, musk, sandalwood, dry woods.

Sr. Editor, Lauyrn Beer

I received my samples from Twisted Lily, thank you. Opinions my own

Thanks to the generosity of Twisted Lily, we have samples of Beaufort London Rake and Ruin for 3 registered readers in the U.S. To be eligible, please leave a comment saying what appealed to you about Beaufort London Rake and Ruin based on Lauryn’s review.  Draw closes 6.19.2019.

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