Goutal
Goutal
146 votes
A unique visual signature based on accords, character, and seasonality
The citron and bergamot strike with immediate clarity, almost effervescent—like biting directly into candied citrus peel—whilst the grapefruit adds a slightly sharper, almost galbanum-like green edge that prevents any sweetness from blooming. Within moments, you're standing in a Mediterranean garden at dawn, when the fruit still carries morning dew.
The juniper berry emerges with subtle minerality, making the mandarin orange read less as confectionery and more as green, slightly bitter pith. The composition settles into a distinctly herbaceous phase where cypress begins its slow ascent, creating a tension between the fruity-citric topnotes and something drier, more resinous lurking beneath—like fresh laundry hanging above an old cedar chest.
The cypress fully asserts itself, joined by the faintest suggestion of ylang ylang's creamy warmth and a clean musk that anchors everything to skin rather than air. What remains after five or six hours is barely perceptible—a green, woody whisper that smells less like fragrance and more like having walked through particular places, the scent now part of your clothes rather than a separate entity.
Eau d'Hadrien Hadrien Absolu arrives as a meditation on Mediterranean clarity rather than a perfume of bombastic charm. Where its predecessor whispered, this absolute iteration speaks with deliberate conviction—the citron and Sicilian lemon open with an almost austere brightness, their acidic precision cutting through any pretence of sweetness. What distinguishes this from the glut of citrus fragrances is how Goutal resists the urge to candy-coat; instead, she lets the Italian green mandarin orange and juniper berry create a slightly herbal, almost savoury counterpoint, suggesting the crushed green leaves clinging to sun-warmed skin rather than a glass of fresh juice.
The base reveals her true intention. Cypress—that resinous, slightly dusty green wood—anchors everything, preventing the composition from evaporating into mere cologne territory. Ylang ylang enters not as the creamy floral bombast one might expect, but as a whisper of animalic warmth that prevents the whole affair from becoming too austere, too architectural. It's masculine without aggression, feminine without capitulation; genuinely unisex in the way only truly confident compositions manage.
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3.9/5 (150)