Today I decided to give my sapphire collection by BTV a spin again. I had tried them when I first got them and then both our own @Justin Tillery and @Jonathan Ventura tried this set after me. Truth be told I wasn’t very excited about them as I found them all harsh and synthetic. Performance was beast as expected. But the scent profile was offensive. Fast forward 8ish months and I decided to come back to them. It’s actually much better than I remember and smooth now. Still beast mode but though. This frustrates me as for what BTV charges the frags should be aged to perfection no matter what size you purchase. Let’s face facts here. None of BTV contain real oud and anyone that tells you they can smell oud don’t know frags or oud at all. They are smelling a chemical woody derivative that in know way can compare to the intricacies of oud distilled in various countries and ways. Whether steel or copper pot distillation matters nothing. Every batch of Oud that’s distilled is completely different and there is zero chance of frag consistency between batches. But I’m getting on my high horse about actual Oud vs synthetic derivations of certain notes. Bottom line here is this is MUCH better now. FBW? At this price point imho? No. But and this is a big but, I’m not upset at purchasing the sapphire set currently. 😂 now I have to go through them all again to see if this trend continues with the other three…. What say you fam????

This one is a powerhouse from the Hawas line. An alternative to Nishane Hacivat. It opens with a very juicy and delicious punch of citruses along with woody and earthy undertones. As it dries down keeps its citrusy nature, while make space for the mossy and ambery nuances to shine that along with its woodiness, rounding up the blend with more depth. It’s attention grabbing, very masculine and addictive. Projection and longevity are A+. Love it!