Van Cleef & Arpels pour Homme by Van Cleef & Arpels

Van Cleef & Arpels is probably one of the best men’s perfumes ever created. It has everything to be a legend that withstands time surrounded by outdated similars. When it launched the gods agreed so that after thirty years it still smells as evocative and dramatic. It follows the First emblems to which low prices and poor communication haven’t detracted from their stature. Both show character packaging that pride of well-made products that remain modern. These can’t be called antiques lightly; they’re classics they’re emblems. And that in a world that launches twenty million perfumes a year is saying a lot. Trying Van Cleef Pour Homme again is falling under the spell of perfumery. Pour Homme is a work of art. And I say it someone who hasn’t used it or I don’t think I ever will in my life. Too dusty. Not powdery or talcum… dusty. Let that nuance not prevent me from valuing it because without feeling comfortable I’m left mesmerised by this decadent and gloomy work of art that sits beside the great classics without asking permission part of their lineage the lineage of darkness. Van Cleef has it all: aromatic nuances smoky chords peaks of herbal and spicy acidity an animal current that lasts a sigh. But the key is a dry and broken rose that makes the hair stand on end. It will never cease to surprise me the art of perfumery. Depending on the composition you can savour a young vegetal proud fresh green rose soaked in dew; or one soaked in water drunk and agonising. The Van Cleef rose is very dry a cracked withered flower covered in dust that would make Count Dracula shudder. There’s no life it’s openly melancholic; in drying only remains a rose spiced spicy dead diabolical. I who neither commune with this flower nor with powdery tissue fragrances have to recognise: ‘friend I’m not up to your level you don’t suit me’. Van Cleef is decadent haughty threatening dangerous and selfish. More than a chypre it’s a decomposition of chypre withered aged torn ready to fight until the end. Dying killing. PS: It doesn’t remind me of Antaeus one of my favourite chypres. In Chanel reigns an armoured and animal rose very refreshing with basil and myrrh. In Van Cleef the whole genre is dry and withered. It could be the perfume of the mummy but of some German or English chancellor or great man dead a century ago. Smelling it is thinking of cloudy skies rain wild lands and estates in decay. The sunset of a lineage made into fragrance.

Oh Rose Rose! As wonderful as the white goddess your love condemns me to the sweet pain of suffering… (Sandro de América). Another great fragrance born in the same year as me: 1978. The talc-dusted aged mature rose is a seductive enchantment. Who would have imagined that the scent of roses could be so masculine? It’s not a garden rose in spring but a bunch of roses and carnations cut and kept in a leather bag like a postman’s. It is the scent of red flowers almost decomposing. This perfume is an acrobat dressed in a black tuxedo on a tightrope walking tentatively almost to fall into the abyss of putrefaction but it holds on advancing little by little until firm ground moving away from the black abyss to walk over fields of hay mossy trees and herbaceous gardens. Van Cleef Pour Homme is like a good French film: it makes no concessions. Unlike American commercial cinema that makes everything easy this film noir is a challenge a crossroads for the intellect. It is not only classic but very special. It requires bearing and a passion for perfumes of this level. Not everyone will know how to wear it and I like that; it’s not a Hugo Boss for everyone. It emits class and elegance. If you try it and say it smells like an old man go on! Take your trousers and leave or stay and open your mind to learn to love perfumes like this. When you understand and love it you will know how to distinguish between a work of art and harmless water. Oh such a wonderful rose! Every time I pass a garden and smell rose bushes I cannot get out of my mind that I possess a dark bottle with thousands of them trapped waiting impatiently to be released into the starry night.

Memories only smell when emotion reaches them. Van Cleef shook me with a professional hook that left me knocked out for days. I walked around anxious trying to probe that messy drawer where the unsolvable things get left. Suddenly I deconstructed my riddle and stammered a word: plasticine. I saw myself at three years old moulding multi-coloured dough in the yard with that blue ‘baby’ painted on. My carer looked at me smiling and gave me a loud kiss: ‘Handsome’. I rubbed my face with my paint-smeared hand. Even then I knew there is only one mother. I could smell the miracle passing through the kitchen on the way to the dining room. I loved that indescribable aroma that visited us once a week: lentil stew. Nowhere else could such a pot be stewed like in my first school the origin of my synaesthesia. That mixture of pencils chalk waxes plasticine childish sweat soap and my carer’s maternal scent unconsciously fixed the idea that life throbs through the nose. Now always I am a time traveller. It is 1979 a year before Van Cleef Pour Homme was born. I am a child chasing the tail of a cat or emptying toy buckets to find a flute from a ‘knife sharpener’ the beginning of a vocation chosen as a perfume that arrives without seeking it. Thus has this time machine arrived to me: a hard blow that knocks me down and intoxicates me with ancestral essences full of ambiguity kind and solitary with a seductive heart of a black suit and a beautiful rose with thorns. It returns the days of splendour in the street the yard the sand the grass.

Let’s say God exists. A Gnostic God, immaterial, inaccessible. It would be absurd to ask what it smells like. But we can certainly fantasise about lower deities. In my experience, I would assign two to the myth of the androgyne: the feminine Jaipur by Boucheron and the masculine Van Cleef & Arpels Pour Homme. I will write about the first another day. I first sniffed VC&A PH on a rainy Day of the Dead. I had read about it but didn’t know what to find. I thought few scenarios were better for that first encounter: not because of the roses in the graves or the cypresses, nor because of my black leather jacket, despite all that being here. It was ideal because they are usually introspective days, for reflection. I will start by saying it doesn’t seem tectic to me, I see it as more diurnal than nocturnal. It smells of a dense, wet and silent forest. It is challenging at first, like choosing a new path. But as we go deeper into the thickets we become familiar with the vegetation, we adapt our pace to the roots. The heather mixes with aromatic herbs, scrub and green vapours from the stream. Everything is green, but dark green. There is gravity and natural magnificence, like a millennial oak forest. When I spray myself, I feel back in Arcadia, connected to those forests of offerings and prayers, source of abundance and mortal trap. For an urbanite like me, a luxury I will treasure until the last drop. May these scents have no place in contemporary perfumery…

A brutal perfume. Among my 5 favourites of all history. It has vintage and timeless aroma. The citrus opening is piercing but lasts seconds; then comes a party of rose, carnation, jasmine over a earthy and woody base with spicy touches. Every time I use it (counted occasions, mostly formal and in winter) I feel imposing, elegant and very confident! Compliments by the dozen. Even from young people (age group I believe I belong to with my 31 years, haha). In projection and trail: a beast, with 2 sprays you make yourself noticed, with 3 you impose and with 4 you are a God walking among mortals. In any of those scenarios you will be perfumed for more than 12 hours, surely. A pity it has been discontinued. I have the luck of having got last week a 2017 batch of 100ml sealed with cellophane, at an excessively low price for what it is (60 dollars in Buenos Aires). And there were many bottles left. I think I will buy more; this is a perfume without which my life would not be the same. A masterpiece that even the mentioned niches don’t touch in quality.

There are many olfactory families like colours in the rainbow; not everyone likes all of them. Every person is a world and their pH is different. Depending on the case and the moment one will like it or not. When I was young I wouldn’t dare approach it but now on a night out yes. It’s not cheap; it depends where you buy it. Before the reformulation it was expensive but today its real price hovers around 80 euros yet in certain perfumeries there are good discounts like at Paco and you can get it for 40. But above all it comes down to taste. Van Cleef Pour Homme is to be savoured with patience at night at dinners and cocktail chats. It shines in that field resulting in sensuality and mystery. It’s not a scent for everyone especially if you like sweet and uncomplicated fragrances because the complexity of the notes will overwhelm and sit ill. If the wearer doesn’t like it probably others won’t either. But if you appreciate it you can open an interesting fan of scents around you. It’s a matter of taste.

Thanks to my friend Jerry Drake, who sent me a sample, I have been able to try it for days. I expected more rose in the heart; it does not appear to me, at least on the surface; it is as if you feel the rose but it is masked by the leather and green notes, becoming totally distorted. Curiously, what I have noticed most is its dry-down and the notes it leaves: it smells very much of incense. I had to read the composition to realise that incense is not declared, but I smell it and a lot, in the final phase, like the one you smell in the sacristies of some churches, pure incense. It might be the blend of suede, leather, and musk, but it is a note I have not liked too much; I am not a big fan of pure incense and here I smell it a lot. It is a classic fragrance but risky due to the multitude of notes and its spiciness; it lasts a long time on skin but I would not buy it without smelling it first.

Good afternoon thanks Espartaco for your review to which I have little to add just my experience. ‘Pour Homme’ by Van Cleef & Arpels is masculine but I bought it for myself a year ago. If you look at the components it’s perfectly unisex. It’s a chypre-leather powdery dark mysterious and of evident quality. It goes perfectly for a cold made-up night with elegant clothing. Created in 1978 it stays true to itself. It shouldn’t please the majority which is why they discontinued it. I was pleasantly surprised by its low price when I bought it on offer. Now if you find it it’s worth a fortune. Before it was unique now it’s exclusive. Another great perfume out of play. What joy to have an almost full bottle! I’ll keep it as a treasure. A few drops are enough. The packaging is very elegant in black the colour par excellence. Greetings.

Puff perfumón at a bargain price. I must admit I love perfumes for older people with a barber touch. Only that there is a problem with this beauty… it doesn’t fit what I want to project nor my personality. I bought it because it is a VERY good fragrance with excellent projection and longevity, although strictly for autumn/winter because it is a dense lotion that to my psyche suggests the hug of a father or the memories of when the grandfather shaved and put all his arsenal of ointments (now after shave). I spray it to evoke those memories rather than for my use. I don’t think I will ever use it because even as an old man I imagine fragrances of another style… more of an adventurous grandfather than the tender conscious grandfather. 9/10.

After six years and about 70 perfumes in my history, this is my favourite. The one that evolves the most throughout the hours. Masculine, elegant, strong, self-assured, without fear of being noticed, on the contrary, controlling being the centre of attention, mysterious, dark. Strength of character with nobility and elegance. Not suitable for novices with fresh and sweet waters. Yes, security and strength of character are needed for the personality of the man and the fragrance to sync, so the fragrance is the expression of a strong, mysterious, and elegant masculinity. It is for the man who has understood that it is not about smelling pretty, but of expressing masculinity.

Incredible fragrance, unique, it brings me too many memories. Although I am 26 years old, it takes me back to my childhood; I do not know who wore it but it clearly transports me to when I was a child, and also to my travels through Europe, as I used this perfume back then. It is incredible because as soon as I put it on, it transports me to those impressive travels. It is dry and quite intrusive, but what is wrong with such an aroma being intrusive? I received many compliments even from young people. It is very similar to TSAR but the latter is not even half as spectacular. Van Cleef Arpels Pour Homme Scent 9/10 Trail 10/10 Longevity 10/10 Age: 25 and up.

You’re going to kill me… I don’t see it as a work of art. I’ve always seen it in perfumeries at ridiculous prices under €20 and nobody would approach it. I bought it years ago because it reminded me of Antaeus (which is sublime for me) but although it resembles it they have nothing to do with each other. I would never pay what they ask. It’s a good fragrance with brutal performance and a very noticeable almost excessive scent very different from what’s in style today. That scent that won’t fade is what I can’t stand. For under €50 it’s worth smelling from time to time but no more.

When I bought it I feared the rose note which isn’t my favourite but it turned out to be a delightful surprise. The opening is classic reminiscent of Cartier’s Santos but it fades quickly to focus on the basil. Combined with carnation and jasmine it wraps the rose in life: not a cut rose in a vase but a rose on a spring bush. It has a soapy dry-down like Paco Rabanne but more subtle. Although I’m not entirely sure where it’s heading it is definitely worth collecting. It has nothing to do with Antaeus; they are two distinct styles in a dark bottle.

Well done Juan Pasiones it is the best review I have read here and underscores point by point what was written. It is one of my favourite perfumes and undoubtedly the one with the greatest longevity and trail on me of all those tested. It has a lot of body and the rose carnation and leather are among the best I have ever smelled. It’s a pity they no longer make fragrances like this but luckily I can always rely on this masterpiece.

There’s not much to say about this perfume. The only thing is that it’s the best perfume in the history of men’s perfumery. It’s everything others wanted to be and couldn’t. Floral woody and armoured. Masculine intense elegant. With impressive projection and trail. With personality ideal for night and winter. It’s the Bohemian Rhapsody of perfumes: from the 70s but still a beast today and nobody has surpassed it.