Galaxy Eau de Toilette Gift Set

If you are giving fragrance to someone who complains that everything smells the same, the Poseidon Galaxy Eau de Toilette Gift Set is a reasonable way to prove otherwise. The scent is built on five materials and the one that matters sits in the middle. Smoke is the heart in its entirety, dry and ashy and faintly charred, and it is what gives the fragrance a character you will not confuse with anything else on the shelf. Nothing else in the composition is allowed to compete with it, which is why it registers so immediately on skin.

Inside are the 150ml Eau de Toilette, a 150ml aftershave and a 150ml shower gel. Around it, the arrangement is sensible. Lavender and lemon open, herbal and sharp respectively, and they clear quickly rather than fighting the smoke for attention. Vanilla and vetiver sit beneath, the vanilla smoothing the ash into something comfortable and the vetiver keeping the base dry and earthy so it never turns sweet. The balance between the two base materials is the thing that makes it wearable rather than merely unusual.

Expect a short composition with no great evolution, which in a present is arguably an advantage: whoever opens it will know within a minute whether they like it. It is a cold weather fragrance for men, and it suits someone with slightly adventurous taste rather than a safe pair of hands. Five materials in total, so there is very little to decode; the scent states its case and holds it.

Behind the name is As a present it is a small gamble with a decent chance of paying off, and the set presentation means it needs no wrapping. Eau de toilette strength keeps it comfortable in company. Instituto Espanol, a third generation Spanish family business that dates its own beginnings to 1903 and makes colognes, shower gels, creams and deodorants at its plant in Hinojos, in the Donana area of Huelva.