It is interesting to watch a brand evolve over time. Parfums de Marly seems to be a recent example that wants to provide luxurious niche alternatives to mainstream styles. Over the past couple of years this has seemingly become a winning formula for the brand. I like it because it has become a place where I can point someone looking for a niche alternative to their favorite commercial fragrance. If there is a style where I wasn’t sure I would be as interested it would be fruity floral. With Parfums de Marly Cassili it turns out I am interested.
Julien Sprecher
The Creative Director Julien Sprecher has chosen to collaborate with perfumers Calice Becker and Nanako Ogi for Cassili. Both women design a top fruity floral accord layered under a heart fruity floral accord. All of this was directed by M. Sprecher to be an “indulgent” “sweet perfume”. His perfume team delivers.
Calice Becker
The top accord is a typical combination for the genre; berries and rose. The perfumers delve a little deeper to create a more satisfying effect. One of my main complaints about fruity florals is the perfumes just assault you with sweet notes. Cassili comes at it in a slightly different way. The berries and rose are intense but the perfumers also found a way to make them more harmonious instead of being two ingredients screaming at the top of their lungs. There is a velvet sophistication to this opening which is not often found. The heart accord is a pairing of plum and mimosa. This is not so common a duo. The perfumers use a restrained greener version of plum which dials back the sweetness. It also makes it a less lush underpinning as the mimosa takes over with its green facets picking up on the same in the plum. Once both were in place the overlap of the two accords was delightful. The base is a typical sweetly woody accord of sandalwood, benzoin and vanilla.
Cassili has 12-14 hour longevity and average sillage.
I applaud the work done here to make a more opulent fruity floral. I think it shows how a more imaginative creative direction can turn the tritest forms into something worth trying. M. Sprecher pointed the way for his perfumers to turn Cassili into a fruity floral of a different stripe.
Disclosure: This review was based on a sample provided by Parfums de Marly.
–Mark Behnke
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