Jovoy
A unique visual signature based on accords, character, and seasonality
Bright bergamot cuts through with an almost spartan energy, immediately met by a somewhat austere rose that feels more like a dried textile than a living flower. Within minutes, a powdery haze begins to settle around both, softening their edges but not obscuring their essential character.
The ambrette seed emerges with its peculiar earthiness, creating an almost faintly fungal quality that's oddly compelling against the delicate rice powder and elemi resin's subtle bitterness. This middle phase is where Rouge Assassin reveals its philosophical underpinnings—nothing feels conventionally pretty, yet everything coheres into something strangely magnetic.
Tonka and benzoin provide warmth without overstating themselves, whilst cedar and sandalwood create a cool, almost architectural backbone that prevents sweetness from taking hold. The musk and iris fade to a barely-there softness, leaving behind something closer to powdered skin than fragrance—intimate, understated, and genuinely difficult to forget.
Rouge Assassin arrives as a deliberately contradictory proposition: a fragrance that whispers rather than shouts, that seduces through restraint. Amélie Bourgeois has constructed something genuinely unusual here—a powdery floral that refuses the typical frilly femininity of its category. The bergamot opening is crisp and almost austere, immediately tempered by a rose note that feels more like dried petals than fresh blooms, lending an almost archival quality to the composition.
What makes Rouge Assassin genuinely compelling is how the ambrette seed takes centre stage in the heart, bringing an almost mushroomy, slightly animalic undertone that sits uncomfortably against the soft rice powder—this juxtaposition creates genuine tension. The elemi resin adds a subtle incense-like bitterness that prevents the composition from becoming cloying. This is a fragrance for someone who gravitates towards the margins of perfumery: those drawn to vintage Chanel aldehydes, to obscure olfactory references, to scents that require a certain sophistication to appreciate.
Add fragrances to your collection and unlock your personalised scent DNA, note map, and shareable identity card.
3.8/5 (84)