Spicebomb by Viktor & Rolf - fragrance review

11:48 AM

Not to generalize (yep, I'm totally going to generalize here), but all guys, everywhere and forever love Viktor & Rolf's Flowerbomb on their lady love interest. My extremely detailed research and expansive sample size (asking guys in my office, plus boyfriend, plus guy sitting next to me on bus) reveals that 100% of guys thinks Flowerbomb is just dandy. Don't even try to disprove me - it's Science.

While V&R have introduced fragrances for men before (the nicely down Antidote), they hadn't worked in a partner for the massive commercially successful Flowerbomb. Spicebomb might be late,but it's also a nice sentiment that the designers held off for a few years before cashing in.

First impressions are great, with the bottle following on with the grenade seen with Flowerbomb. There's an definite effort to make it more masculine with the brown glass, defined ridges and the very nifty pin you have to remove to use the spray and which I'm guaranteed to lose in about five minutes.

Either lose it or choke on it. I'm a sucker for choking hazards.

Now I know I'm not one to subscribe to 'for her/him' branding and that I tend to disregard whether a scent is marketed towards female or male markets. This is because notes can change and nothing should be separated into a guy or gal smell. Sometimes I like smelling like white florals and pink cupcakes. Other times I want dirty leather, warm woods or sharp citrus. Cover the packaging and many perfumes become equally masculine and feminine in their composition. Spicebomb is an excellent choice for women unsure of escaping the binds of gender-specific marketing. Seriously, sniff this blind and the sweet pastryesque spice fronts as the perfect comfort scent for ladies and gents alike.

Getting down to it, I love Spicebomb. It steers away from the black pepper overload expected in men's 'spicy' scents (that's you Marc Jacobs' Bang) and gets all foodie on me with a opening of dried orange peel, and something that reminds me of an almond croissant with vanilla and sweet cinnamon, served with a cup of black earl grey. There is pepper, but it's pink and a little fruity, tempering the orange rind bite rather than adding to it. A base of ambery leather, warm like recently worn gloves, traced with smoky tobacco keeps it sexy. The official notes are bergamot, grapefruit, elemi ,pink pepper, leather,tobacco, vetiver. The vetiver must be very well-behaved as it never showed up for me.

My boyfriend rates it, both on himself and me, although I never told him it was the same scent!

I also love the ad. Sexy guy, catchy song and explosions. Perfecto and guranteed to stick in my head all day. I had to watch a few times for....research purposes. Yes, those.

Spicebomb by Viktor & Rolf is now on counter at Myer and David Jones, 50ml RRP A$95, 90ml RRP A$125.