Launched in 2014 Harmattan is part of the Core Collection, from ROADS Fragrance collection from the Roads Luxury Group, the Dublin-based international lifestyle brand launched in 2013 by Danielle Ryan, the granddaughter of Tony Ryan, the founder of Ryanair.

Each fragrance in the line is based on a specific theme – a place, an event, a person, an emotion or a historical period.

Which brings me to Harmattan.

Harmattan is a dry, dusty, northeasterly trade wind that blows from the Sahara Desert over West Africa into the Gulf of Guinea during the dry season. As it moves across the Sahara, it picks up fine dust and sand, making the air heavy, blocking the sun and limiting visibility, like a heavy fog. It is this warm, hazy atmosphere that inspired Harmattan.

Harmattan opens with a soft, nose-tingling bergamot note introducing a note of fresh, fragrant lavender. The lavender doesn’t linger long before earthy, woody vetiver appears. Then, there is the oud, rich, musty and heady – it is perfect here, and I cannot get enough of it. The oud does linger, with saffron giving it a sweet, hay-like aspect and black pepper giving it a spicy warmth just as tuberose, rose, and ylang-ylang creep forward, all heady and aromatic. The flowers balance the woodiness and give Harmattan an intriguing complexity. At the base, Tonka bean echoes the saffron with its bittersweet almond facet as it settles onto a woody base rich in sandalwood, frankincense, patchouli, and myrrh.

It dries down to a dry, warm, woody/resinous skin scent that gives the impression of scents carried over your skin by a dry wind. It’s an exceptional unisex fragrance that satisfied my inner Goldilocks and filled a scent longing in me that I didn’t know I had until I wore it.

Notes: bergamot, lavender, vetiver, oud, saffron, black pepper, tuberose, rose and ylang-ylang, sandalwood, Tonka bean, frankincense, patchouli and myrrh.

Type: EdP

Nose: Celso Fadelli in collaboration with Intertrade Europe.