Syprus

Syprus opens with a fizzy, aldehydic flourish of lavender, clementine and galbanum laced with labdanum and sage, an ambitious nod to MDCI Chypre Palatin's symphonic overture. The heart turns floral and slightly fruity with plum, rose, jasmine, iris and gardenia, before a base of oakmoss, leather, benzoin, immortelle and vanilla settles into a warm, faintly animalic amber-chypre drydown. On skin it reads as a sophisticated, refined and opulent scent, old-school in the best way. What it cannot match is the original's restless complexity and decadent richness: the constantly-morphing structure is simplified here, the costus-castoreum funk muted and the precious-feeling balsams thinned. Projection stays close and longevity is the chief compromise, but for formal autumn and winter evenings it offers a remarkably convincing, affordable echo of a connoisseur's chypre.