Domenico Caraceni 1913 Eau de Toilette

Oh, what an underrated gem. Possibly the best masculine rose scent ever for me (yes, taking into account Amouage, Czech & Speake and others). The opening of 1913 is surprisingly pleasant, with a bold barbershop/“antique grooming toilet” feel mostly centered on rose, carnation and tobacco, posed on a dark, camphorous, dusty and slightly indolic base (jasmine?) like in many old masculine chypres. The floral accord is dark and lascivious, quite more bold than usual for this kind of “traditional” masculine colognes, and gives 1913 a really peculiar and distinctive austere but irresistibly sophisticated grace; a sort of decadent, shady, vaguely “dandy” kind of refinement, mixed to an austere feel reminding me of classic Italian aftershaves – kind of more nutty and floral, no citrus-lavender-leather “Britishness”. Extremely classy, mature and pleasant, slightly “outdated” in a totally positive way; one of the very few Italian perfumes which indeed speaks Italian to me, meaning that it makes me think of the dusty, cozy, shady, kind of shabby and modest beauty of barber parlours and small tailors’ ateliers – the kind of places where our beloved Italian heritage of elegance was born and is still being kept alive (nothing fancy or luxurious, I rather think of understated, shabby boutiques). “Penhaligon’s Sartorial”? Meh... this is possibly the closest fragrance to my concept of “gentleman” I’ve ever tried - and that surprises me given that I usually tend to associate vintage scents to that idea. The drydown is just fantastic and irresistibly classy, rose and dry tobacco. Persistence is everlasting, just a bit cloying after a while, but really solid. Great (and obviously, discontinued).

8,5/10

EDIT (05/2015): If anyone's interested, they relaunched this scent recently. Different bottle, slightly different juice, but totally good the same for me. It is already available at some local Italian shops, I guess it will be available online as well at some point.