Bottles of Rogue Perfumery Tuberose and Moss, Jasmin Antique and Chypre-Siam

From time to rare time, I come across a line of perfumes so gorgeous, so wonderfully imagined, I feel compelled to plug it to anyone will listen to me. Coworkers, friends, neighbours, doctors (my dermatologist and I bonded over our mutual knowledge of Firmenich, where his wife used to work), shop assistants, and my poor mother have all heard me raving like a QVC sales pitch since last winter about an artisan line I happened upon in New York last Thanksgiving. Now it’s your turn. Enter Rogue Perfumery.

Manuel Cross, photo via Rogue Perfumery

Rogue Perfumery founder, nose and creative director Manuel Cross, a former chef who once worked for Wolfgang Puck, is an enthusiastic perfume collector with a predilection for vintage florals. He explains the genesis of Rogue Perfumery as part of a ten-year process to teach himself perfume-making: “The drive to learn perfumery was from the frustration of trying to track down older perfume formulations and the high prices they commanded. I was really stuck on the nostalgia of the accords and themes of fragrances that I remembered growing up with … I later began digging deeper into the makeup of floral fragrances which always fascinated me, especially narcotic white florals. This eventually led to my tuberose fragrances and Jasmin Antique.”

 Rogue Perfumery sample set

Those ten years prove a worthy investment. With its saturated, full-bodied fragrances, Twenties-style bottling and artwork, and unafraid use of high-quality ingredients, Rogue Perfumery is one of the best lines to come out of America in the last decade. Here are three of the best.

Rogue Perfumery Chypre-Siam (2017): Chypre-Siam was my introduction to Rogue Perfumery. I came across it at Scent Bar in Nolita, attracted by its retro label (and, of course, I see the word “chypre” and am hopeless to resist). I sprayed a bit on a card and was struck immediately by the resemblance to Coty Chypre, including that masterpiece’s tangy citric opening and soapy-musky dry-down. But when I dabbed some on my skin, a new world opened up. Chypre-Siam is indeed a wonderful riff on that grande dame of perfumery but sends the classic chypre structure of bergamot-oakmoss-labdanum eastward with Asian ingredients such as holy basil, ylang, and kaffir lime.

Elisabeth Moss, photo by Tom Lorenzo for Harpers Bazaar, February 2020

As Rogue Perfumery Chypre-Siam spread out on my wrist, my eyes widened. A second of soap suds followed by a sharp, brilliant note of kaffir lime cuts the air like a rapier, accompanied by the anisic, leafy scent of basil. But then magic happens. A thick wave of woodsy, chartreuse oakmoss washes in. This multidimensional oakmoss smells of ancient things, of the aromas that precede the Green Man’s appearance in a solitary glen. No aromachemical can compete with the real thing, which is used generously here. Oh, but the middle practically breaks my heart. Jasmine and ylang dot the greenery with floral trills that make Chypre-Siam soar. Soft animal notes begin a catlike purr in the background, becoming more prominent towards the dry-down. The contrasts and balance of the fiercely bright lime, earthy oakmoss, achingly lovely jasmine and rich ylang are so gorgeous that I have been wearing this to bed night after night to dream well. Chypre-Siam is one of the most gorgeous chypres I’ve ever smelled. Notes: Kaffir lime, basil, spices, jasmine, ylang, oakmoss, sandalwood, benzoin, soft leather, civet.

Rogue Perfumery Jasmin Antique: Now, I’ve smelled a whole lot of jasmines in my day: indolic, virginal, spring-like, heady, creamy – but very few that have balanced all of those characteristics in a single, swooningly lovely scent. Rogue Perfumery Jasmin Antique is intended to “convey the fantasy of discovering a long forgotten vintage jasmine perfume,” and if I didn’t know better, I’d swear it was made in the 30s, alongside Le Galion’s stunning Jasmin and Patou’s classic Joy.

Image via SBChic

Cross relates that “Jasmin Antique is modeled after the fragrance of the jasmine we had planted in our garden twenty years ago. The plant still lives on and every early summer evening the fragrance of the blossoms hang heavy in the air.” As soon as the perfume began to heat on my skin, that is exactly what came to mind – a night garden in summer overhung with showers of jasmine. The flowers are lactonic, rich, quietly indolic, with the indefinable sweet spice warm night air outside cities sometimes has – the smell of things that bloomed earlier in the day combined with damp wood, dark wine and grass. Jasmin Antique feels as though a cloak of white flowers wrapped itself around you while the stars watched and smiled. Notes: Jasmine grandiflorum blossoms, musk, cloves, vanilla.

Rogue Perfumery Tuberose and Moss (2020): Chypre is also the backbone of newcomer Tuberose and Moss, a delicious combination of acerbic, loamy oakmoss and the creamiest Jean Harlow tuberose around. This is a pas de deux between two take-no-prisoners notes, each of which could have overcome the other. But Tuberose and Oakmoss is a prismatic fragrance in which tuberose shines center stage for its solo and then, with a turn of the wrist, has oakmoss leaping across the floorboards.

Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Rogue Perfumery Tuberose and Moss has the tweedy sexiness of that college professor you had a crush on. It starts with a buttery, clotted cream tuberose, enriched with vanilla, a little disheveled from an encounter with musk. This curvaceous flower expands indolently, taking on some sweet spice and revealing indolic facets and  a touch of menthol. Quietly, oakmoss begins sneaking up, starting with a dab of bitterness that undercuts all that dairy voluptuousness. The moss comes forward abruptly in the middle, and I get the delicious, sweaty tang of labdanum next to it. Tuberose and oakmoss continue to project and recede for some time. Towards the dry-down, cedar lends a darker, more somber woodiness that adds a bit of depth and weight. As Tuberose and Moss dries down, flower and moss eventually marry and live happily after. Notes: Tuberose, oakmoss, vanilla cream, allspice berries, cedar, labdanum, musk.

 Snap up a sample set on the brand’s site. This line is the bomb, it’s the bee’s knees, the cream in my coffee – all that and a bag of chips. Yes, it’s really that good.

Lauryn Beer, Senior Editor

Disclaimer: All samples of Rouge Perfumery were bought by me

Thanks to the generosity of Rogue Perfumery, we have a choice of either a deluxe sample set of 1.5 ml roller bottles of all 10 Rogue Perfumery fragrances OR one 50 ml bottle of either Chypre-Siam, Jasmin Antique or Tuberose and Moss for one registered reader in the U.S. or Canada. To be eligible, please leave a comment saying what appeals to you about Rogue Perfumery Chypre-Siam, Jasmin Antique and Tuberose and Moss based on Lauryn’s review,  which you would choose should you win (if it is the sampler… which other perfumes  from the collection intrigue you) and where you live. Draw closes 7/11/2020.

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