SOTD 10/13 - Lattafa Asad · Brotherhood Of Scent

SOTD 10/13 - Lattafa Asad

Continuing to explore and discover the world of fragrance with a popular offering from the UAE-based house of Lattafa, widely known for their affordable clones of high-end designer fragrances. Lattafa Asad is widely considered to be a clone of the popular Dior Sauvage Elixir.

There is something extremely familiar in the scent profile that I struggled for hours trying to place. My first thought was that it smelled like the bubble gum that came in packs of baseball cards. Eventually I also remembered the smell of vanilla Cavendish pipe tobacco. Much later I also considered that I might be reminded of cotton candy.

Dior Sauvage Elixir is notorious for being described as strong, and potentially overpowering. I had concerns about overdoing it with Lattafa Asad, but I did see reports that it was toned down compared to its inspiration fragrance. I conducted two experiments to try to dial in what is reasonable application.

First, I sprayed about a dozen times and immediately went outside to go running in the rain. I continued to notice the scent for a few minutes, but thereafter the cool 60F/15.5C weather plus the rain likely deadened my sense of smell even further. After I returned indoors moderately soaked 15-20 minutes later and had a chance to readjust to room temperature, I could smell the fragrance on my skin, but only from an inch away.

Second, after a good shower I reapplied relatively liberally. About 2 hours later, I had dinner with my wife, and after spending about 2 hours intermittently in her general vicinity, I inquired to make sure I hadn't overapplied (in case she was politely refusing to notice). She said she hadn't noticed any scent at all (which conformed to my own experience). When coming within a couple inches of me, and after having already been prompted, only then did she perceive it.

Bottom line, first experience was positive. The scent subtly accesses old memories and is pleasant but for now seems not too overwhelming. While I did not pick up on the reported super-masculine nature of the scent, neither did it come across as overly sweet and feminine.

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