Monsieur Zafran: Imphal

How do you make a cologne out of oud oil? This is a question that burns in the mind of an oud man.

This is how this perfume began.

Colognes and oud are like the in-laws that never get along. You can’t imagine the zest and citrus that define classic colognes backed by the dark, leathery animalics commonly associated with oud. Colognes are bright, ouds dark. Oud is everything a cologne is not. And vice versa.

Monsieur Oud, which is the bedrock of this bespoke took shape in my mind’s nose because of my infatuation with Walla Patta. The notes of frangipani and osmanthus and orange blossom and mimosa it naturally displays.

Some will recall the days I would wear Suriranka Senkoh like there was no tomorrow, taking swipes that probably added up to a few hundred dollars a day. I’d wear it to bed, then again at breakfast, when heading out, when coming home, swimming unendingly in its heady florals and aquatic caress.

Then the desire crept into my artistic other to bring out these notes and accentuate them with the actual flowers. To create a cologne-like citrus bomb, rounded off with all the frangipani, mimosa, osmanthus tonalities of pure Walla Patta.

There are three main chords humming in the base: that aquatic cool of incense-grade Sri Lankan oud oil, joined by one of my oldest and most precious musk infusions into Mysore exalted by vintage 1998 Kupang sandalwood from Timor. Each of these oils is a collectible aroma in its own right. But I haven’t even gotten to the base proper.

The true pulse of Monsieur Zafran’s foundation beats loud and clear with wild Sri Lankan aloes. Featuring the mintiest, greenest incense-grade Walla Pattas bubbling on a coal, the base is further cranked up with the historical distillation of Royal Imphal to thrust the Sri Lankan legato into turbocharge.

In the heart notes, you’ll smell the most expensive flowers on Earth. From red champaca to Thai frangipani, French mimosa, osmanthus, iris, and sumptuous orange blossom, paired with rare flowers sourced from Italy, Bourbon coffee blossoms from Madagascar, and the most sought-after jasmine in existence: It’s so unique you won’t even recognize it as jasmine, but rather as pure animal musk.

For the top notes, I picked the choicest

Unlike working with synthetic ingredients, the interplay of natural aromatics coming together takes time to happen, profiles change, develop in unforeseen ways. One slip of the pipette and it’s back to the drawing board—or the waiting list for next year’s harvest… which may or may not turn out the same.

This bespoke edition goes even further by incoroprating our in-house saffron infused with vintage musk grains, along with musk and ambergris in the carrier – which brings the concentration towards 40%.

Monsieur Zafran builds on this encyclopedia of flowers, of oud, of natural perfumery that I’m never really going to consider finished. The foundation has gone through so many revisions I’ve lost count. And I’ll continue to working on it. Some close friends of mine own versions of it which I don’t have the recipes to anymore, due to

Featured Testimonials…

I sprayed Monsieur Zafran immediately. I try not to rush to judgement on the first spray, 5 minutes after the package arrives but some super early impressions.

MZ opens up very tight, with bitter citrus, bright pepper and some wood up front, and a looking hint of blue aquatic oud notes and musk. For the woody note, the sandalwood is so elegant here, and plays nicely without shouting or standing above the other elements. I would love to smell this sandalwood tincture alone, it must be magnificent!

20-30 minutes in, the oud and musk start to come forward like a chord rather then two separate notes. It’s a bright composition with some heft behind it, and nothing weighing it down or muddling that brightness.

20 minutes more and It’s really blooming! The florals are here now in full force. Osmanthus and mimosa and now I’m on a beach somewhere in SE Asia??

Anyways I love this and am excited to see how it evolves as it settles. Shoutout EO team!

I love what’s going on here.

—Steve W

/ USA

Colognes and oud are like the in-laws that never get along. You can’t imagine the zest and citrus that define classic colognes backed by the dark, leathery animalics commonly associated with oud. Colognes are