Eau d'Italie - Sienne l'Hiver

Eau d'Italie is an Italian line of perfumes that has been inspired by a wonderful hotel in Positano, Le Sirenuse. Look at the pictures and admit that I´m not the only one that would love to go there:

http://www.sirenuse.it/Intro.asp



Eau d'Italie offers six different scents, Eau d'Italie, Paestum Rose, Sienne l'Hiver,Bois d'Ombrie, Magnolia Romana and Baum du Doge, or really seven, but I´ve not tried their newest, Au Lac. You can read more about Eau d'Italie´s products here:
http://eauditalie.com/index.html


Eau d'Italie and Magnolia Romana didn´t impressed me. But, I am anosmic to all of the heart not in Magnolia Romana and cousln´t smell almsot anything for several hours except of a little aquatic note, I´m sure Magnolia Romana is a great perfume on people that can smell it. But, it´s impossible to like everything just as much.


However, I have been enchanted by Sienne l'Hiver, a scent that one of my blog readers made me curious about. Sienne l'Hiver means "Winter in Siena" and I can sign for that. Not that I´ve visited Siena neither in winter or any other time, but Sienne l'Hiver seem both wintery and Italian to me.


Some scents that takes me on olfactory trips are filled with adventure, imagination and almost a little wearying, but Sienne l'Hiver isn´t at all like that. It´s sober, slow and very unique. It takes me on a walk through a wintery Siena. I imagine I follow a little boy around that like to show me the town.


We´re starting in the boys grandmothers and grandfathers Italian deli store. Here it´s cozy and homey. The air is filled with scents, pickled olives, truffle, some smoke, soft vinegar and hints of leather. This sin´t like any other scent I´ve tried. In this phase Sienne l'Hiver is a gourmand, but a very different one. I can´t help wondering if I really wants to smell like an Italian deli, but no matter what I think about that, still this smells really good, genuine and also odd in a pleasant way. Sienne l'Hiver is a subdued scent, but not discrete, you don´t have to hunt it down, it takes an obvious, self-consious and masculine place at once.


Just when I´m getting used to sitting in the cozy deli, it´s time to go out in the streets of Siena. The alleys of Siena is narrow and winding, and now Sienne l'Hiver become a little colder and more like an outdoorsy scent. I can smell a very prominent scent of moist bricks (tiling), just like I´m walking in the shadow of old houses. The scent of bricks are really unique and I find it interesting and nice. The scent of smoke and wood also becomes more noticable now. Below this barren and somewhat inhospitavble scents I can also sense the scents of soft flowers and/or something sweet. But only when I sniff up close. Sienne l'Hiver is pretty much a very unsweet scent.


Sienne l'Hiver is an unique and refreshingly different scent. It´s filled with imagination, happiness and creativity. On me it becomes a little hard to wear as a perfume, but my husband wears it from start to end without any problem. I´ll surely return to Sienne l'Hiver but more because the feelings and moods it manage to wake within me, than to wear it as an ordinary perfume. Even though Sienne l'Hiver is different on the border to odd, it isn´t as odd as some scents that become impossible to wear at all.


The lasting power of Sienne l'Hiver is good, but not amazing, around 6 hours. The sillage is obvious, especially from start. The basenote is a little softer than the rest with nice notes of warm wood, smoke and very, very soft sweetness (maybe from chestnut?). Sienne l'Hiver is an unisex, but towards masculine. There is probably women that can wear this without problem, but on me it becomes alittle to "large". I recommend it to anyone that feels like testing anything very different and no perfume interested man should miss this one!


Sienne l'Hiver isn´t the only interesting scent from Eau d'Italie, but to me it´s the most unique if not the easiest to wear. Do you have any favorite fragrance that smells unique and different, but that you don´t really want to go around and smell like?


Pic: Above from flickr, and below from Panoramio