Areej Le Doré
Areej Le Doré
80 votes
A unique visual signature based on accords, character, and seasonality
The aldehydes crackle across your skin with almost effervescent brightness, immediately joined by bergamot's sharp citrus bite and orange's warmer sweetness—a fleeting moment of Mediterranean freshness that feels almost incongruous with the woody depths promised below. Within moments, you sense the oud beginning its ascent, smoky and slightly animalic, immediately grounding the top notes' vivacity.
The florals bloom into their full, multidimensional presence as the composition settles into your skin's warmth. Gardenia's creamy, almost coconut-tinged opacity softens the oud's angular character, whilst rose and jasmine weave between them like silk ribbons, adding diffusive elegance. The sandalwood absolute begins its gentle emergence, introducing that creamy accord that gives the middle registers an almost luminous quality—woody, yes, but with unexpected softness.
The fragrance contracts into its most refined iteration. Patchouli's earthy, slightly leather-touched character anchors the composition as the florals retreat, whilst Indonesian vanilla and oakmoss create a warm, mineral-tinged base. The oud resurfaces here, no longer sharp but integrated, almost ambient—a faint woody-spiced whisper that persists alongside creamy sandalwood for hours. What remains is intimate, skin-scent territory: barely projecting but deeply present, a fragrance that prefers whisper to proclamation.
Chinese Oud II announces itself as a meditation on floral restraint wrapped in woody warmth. The aldehydes arrive first—crisp, almost champagne-like—before the bergamot and orange flesh out a citrus frame that's decidedly Mediterranean rather than Oriental, a clever counterbalance to the perfume's olfactory centre. But this is merely prelude.
What distinguishes Chinese Oud II is the architectural precision of its heart. Rather than the typically murky, animalic character of oud compositions, here the Chinese oud sits luminously within a gardenia-rose-jasmine trinity that renders the woody element almost translucent. The gardenia especially brings a waxy, slightly creamy character—that accord registers at 76%—which softens the oud's inherent austerity and prevents the composition from veering into incense-like severity. This is not a fragrance obsessed with oud's potency; instead, it's genuinely collaborative, the floral notes (100% accord prominence) acting as willing partners rather than secondary players.
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4.0/5 (105)