Kit de Muestras for HER

The groom is seen less, but he’s smelled just as much. The first dance, your father’s hug, the yes from twenty centimeters away: fragrance is the only part of the suit that works up close. And the suit gets rented or repeated; the scent is what lingers in the embrace of the people who love you.

For years, “groom fragrance” meant the same fresh cologne as always, the office one, just with a tie. This kit proposes something else: five ways to smell like a well-dressed man. From the fougère that invented men’s perfumery in 1882 to a vanilla named after a Roman goddess. Try them for as many days as you want, on your skin, before choosing which one you marry.

Each 1.5ml sample is 30 sprays: enough to wear each fragrance for several days in a row and see how it holds up through a long day. And a wedding day is one.

Fougère Royale · Houbigant
Let’s start at the beginning, literally. Houbigant launched Fougère Royale in 1882 and, without meaning to, founded an entire family: the fougère, which in French means fern. Ferns don’t smell like anything, so Paul Parquet invented what they should smell like — lavender, oakmoss and coumarin, the first synthetic molecule to enter a perfume. From that mold came almost all men’s perfumery of the following century. 

Beso Dorado · Beso Beach
Beso Beach started as a beach bar in Formentera and ended up as a perfume. What’s interesting is who signed it: Dominique Ropion, one of the greatest noses in the world, here bottling a summer sunset. It opens dry and sparkling, with juniper, pink grapefruit and lavender; at the heart come cypress, cinnamon and geranium; and the base is Haitian vetiver, resinous labdanum, a touch of saffron and patchouli. It starts fresh and grows warmer as the sun goes down, just like the party. The fragrance to get married in during August, barefoot, near the sea.

Your Oudhness · Jeroboam
The name says it all: Your Oudhness, his majesty oud, wearing the crown. But this is an oud without a turban or a thousand and one nights: it opens clean with bergamot, saffron and elemi, moves into a heart of Vietnamese oud, styrax and leather, and settles into sandalwood, vanilla and white musk. Intense, but tamed. The fragrance for dinner, the toast and whatever comes after the guests have left.

Alhambra Oud · Monegal
And here, oud told in Spanish. Ramon Monegal is from Barcelona, heir to one of the oldest perfumery dynasties in the country, and in Alhambra Oud he does something unusual: he brings the most Arab wood in perfumery back home, to Granada. It’s his portrait of the Alhambra and of Al-Andalus. The oud opens raw, then a green, juicy apple and orange blossom quickly tame it; the heart softens with rose and jasmine; and it finishes with aged Assam oud, smoked birch and amber. Brighter and more Mediterranean than most ouds. If Your Oudhness is the Parisian night, this is the afternoon in a courtyard with fountains.

Vanilla Edesia · Electimuss
Electimuss is a London house that names its perfumes after Roman mythology. Edesia was the goddess of banquets — of feasting, excess and good food — and this is her fragrance. It is signed by Cécile Zarokian around one idea: vanilla has two sides. Here it’s not the one from custard. There’s an opening of incense, bitter almond and pink pepper; a spicy heart of cumin, cinnamon and rose; and underneath, a dark, almost salty bourbon vanilla, stitched together with leather, amber and woods. The vanilla for the person who swears they don’t like vanilla. The banquet fragrance, once the cake has been cut and things start to get interesting.