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L'Homme Ideal Gift Set
Some men buy one fragrance and wear it for a decade, and the Guerlain L'Homme Ideal Gift Set is a good thing to put in front of that sort of wearer.
You get the Eau de Toilette at 100ml with a 75ml shower gel. It is distinctive without being difficult. The opening is clean and bitter at the edges: bitter orange sharp and peel like, orange blossom white and soft against it, rosemary dry and herbal with a cool camphor edge. What follows is the part that makes the fragrance recognisable, because almond is not a material men's perfumery uses often. It is treated cool and faintly bitter here, nothing like a dessert, and tonka bean sits beside it with a powdery sweetness that softens the whole middle. The end is dry and dark: leather smooth and warm, cedarwood sharp and pencil like, vetiver rooty and earthy underneath. Eight materials, well organised, with a bright start, an unusual heart and a conventional masculine finish. It is wearable in any weather and it fits an office as comfortably as a restaurant. At eau de parfum strength it has presence for the first hour and then holds close for the rest of the day, so one application in the morning is normally the end of the matter.
As a present it works precisely because it is not a safe, anonymous choice: the almond gives it something to talk about, and a set gives the recipient more than one way to use it. The composition is by Thierry Wasser.
The house dates from 1828 and has always worked out of Paris; LVMH owns it today. Its founder's Eau de Cologne Imperiale, created in 1853 to mark the marriage of Napoleon III and Empress Eugenie, earned him the title of official perfumer, and the generations that followed produced Jicky in 1889, the first scent to put synthetic materials alongside natural ones.
Please note: images are a guide only. Packaging and bottle design may occasionally differ from those shown due to manufacturer updates or promotions.
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