Launched in 2013 by Italian niche line O’Driù, Eva Kant was signed by contemporary artist and self-taught perfumer Angelo Orazio Pregoni, the line's creator. For him, perfume is art that is only fully realised when it is placed on the human body. From then on, it lives with the wearer, moving through the world with them.

Sig. Pregoni is a non-conformist, an original with the soul of an artist. The fragrance was inspired by a character in the wildly popular Italian pulp-fiction comic series Diabolik, a ruthless thief who uses disguises to conceal his identity. Eva Kant is his partner in crime: a glamorous blonde and, like Diabolik, a master of disguise. Diabolik and Eva carry out their nefarious deeds and work together to avoid capture by Diabolik’s arch-nemesis, Inspector Ginko.

This explains the exciting, original and complex nature of Eva Kant.

On me, Eva Kant opens with bitter, sharp grapefruit, tempered by pungent lavender—herbal, floral, and medicinal; it’s more of an announcement than an opening.  A note of damp woods smooths the edges perfectly. I love the bold confidence of the opening. The medicinal, woody facets of the top notes carry through the fragrance in myrrh, sandalwood and warm, fresh, juicy ginger. This is a tease: Eva Kant disguises her heart by echoing that strong opening until she is ready to reveal her inner beauty. The fragrance doesn’t evolve so much as shift to reveal a heart of creamy magnolia and rich, tropical ylang-ylang. These florals are carnal, unctuous and beckoning. They rest on a carpet woven from warm, sweet chamomile twinned with aromatic, resinous cardamom, creamy vanilla and benzoin.

The drydown isn’t romantic or charming; rather, it is complex, with different notes coming forward and receding for hours and hours. At times it is dry or creamy, floral or animalic, carnal or woody, camphorous, bitter and sweet — a true olfactory expression of the concept that the fragrance lives and evolves with the wearer and I am besotted with it.

Notes: Grapefruit, lavender, damp woods, myrrh, sandalwood, spicy ginger, magnolia, ylang-ylang, chamomile, cardamom, vanilla and benzoin.