Hope these are OK to discuss here- Prin Lomros is discussed a bit more in niche communities, but he’s definitely an independent perfumer with a few different fragrance lines of his own. He also develops perfumes for houses like Zoologist that are fairly popular here, and tends to do a lot of very quirky and atmospheric fragrances. Many are gorgeous and very wearable.. and then you have the more avant-garde stuff that smells a bit like a goat on fire (Homa) or Murder On The Florient Express (Sombre). Always in for an experience anyway :3
Reviewed here (all from the Strangers line):
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Salted Green Mango (green/fruity oceanic)
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Iridescent Sky (metallic/fruity cologne)
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Sangre Dulce (hot sugary gourmand)
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Kira Kira (sparkly/fruity cologne)
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Lava Rose (metallic/burning rose)
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Aroon Sawat (fruity/sunny incense)
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Sombre (very literal death)
Salted Green Mango
Main notes: Bao mango, star gooseberry, bergamot, green chilli, salty air, lime, petitgrain, pineapple, polemo, vetiver
This is one of my favourite perfumes ever: a gorgeous salty, fruity chypre inspired by Prin Lomros’s childhood memories of Thailand. The fruit that comes through most strongly is mango, but it’s not sweet, melty mango flesh to me so much as it’s exactly like burying your nose in the green skin of a mango to see if it’s ripe. That mango note is sharp and a little sour, with a lovely wash of clean, salty air, a peppery green chilli, and a very gentle woodiness from the vetiver and petitgrain.
I keep valiantly insisting on IMAM that I dOnT LiKe FrUiTy PeRfUmEs, but this is the kind of fruit-based perfume that proves I absolutely do- very crisp and green and natural, and however suspiciously I search for it, without the slightest connotation of 99p glittery body spray.
It’s a perfect summer scent and I would FS this in a second if I lived somewhere you can routinely expect to have a summer, but unfortunately, I am British, so I settled for buying a 10ml decant.
Iridescent Sky
Main notes: Metallic notes (aluminium), blueberry, gooseberry, pineapple, smoke, orris, musk, lemonade
I hadn’t paid much attention to the description, so I hadn’t noticed that despite the unconventional notes, this is based more on a traditionally male-marketed cologne structure, which tends not to be my thing. It is however a very shiny, offbeat cologne: smoky and fruity with a very smooth and shiny metallic note. Prin labels the metallic note as aluminium, which feels exactly right to me: bright, polished aluminium, with tart and bright fruit notes from the gooseberry and blueberry, plus a little acidic splash of lemonade.
It’s quite neutral on drydown, and while it’s not for me, I think it would be lovely on anyone looking for a smoky/metallic, slightly futuristic fragrance that’s more evocative of Mirror’s Edge than Mad Max.
Sangre Dulce
Main notes: sangria, rosewater, strawberry, brown sugar, honey, cinnamon, patchouli, blood orange, benzoin, tobacco.
I’m just going to go right in with the perfumer’s description of this as ‘a sweet intoxicated poison avant-garde’, since I think that sums it up perfectly. Prin Lomros is also a film-maker, and this is one of his fragrances inspired by his love of cinema: in this case, trying to evoke the feel of a wild, hallucinatory night after drinking a jug of acid-laced sangria. As a sidenote, a lot of Prin’s fragrances have these slightly stream-of-consciousness descriptions that I really enjoy: despite knowing very little about arthouse cinema and having never personally drank a jug of acid-laced sangria and gone on an absolutely legendary bender, I still find the descriptions are pretty evocative and give you a good idea of what to expect!
Anyway, Sangre Dulce is primarily a very heated floral-gourmand on me. I get a lot of burnt sugar, rose water and spiced, syrupy strawberry, like a very high concept flambeed dessert of some kind (which may or may not have also been laced with acid). With all the fruity and molten sugary notes, it sounds like it could go distressingly sticky, but there’s an earthy, resinous quality that stops it from reminding me too much of cocktail pitchers with dubious names. It’s probably not something I would wear regularly, but I’ve been considering a decant for a while.
Kira Kira
Main notes: Pear, mint, lilies, sake, solar notes, green apple, musk, ambrette seed, ambroxan
Honestly, I find it hard to beat Bloom’s description here of this as “a double helping of neon pear, topped with mint and lilies soaked in sake. It’s bizarre and woody with an anime style of cartoon masculinity”
Like Iridescent Sky, Kira Kira is a unisex fragrance, but leans slightly towards a cologne in structure and balance (and like Iridescent Sky, I absolutely did not read the description before I got excited and bought a sample). It opens with an unusual and very creamy lily-and-pear, and remains very bright and sparkly throughout despite not leaning particularly sweet (Kira Kira is meant to refer to a Japanese term for blinding sunlight). I have no idea what’s behind the listed solar notes, but I can certainly pick up on the mint and ambroxan, which keep the musk very clean with a faint connotation of sun-dried laundry.
Not for me, but a clean, playful and very unusual fragrance. While it would smell great on anyone, it would definitely be a banging choice for anyone specifically looking for an androgynous take on cologne that just chucks in lilies and sunshine and whatever else it feels like.
Lava Rose
Main notes: Lava, dried rose, elemi, tar, burning plastic, mineral accord, volcanic soil, lots of rose notes
Dark, hot and metallic rose. I didn’t both to list all the rose notes, but there’s about half a dozen different kinds, and Prin’s chucked them all into a sauna and locked the door. It’s a very hot fragrance, but not particularly fiery or smoky- the roses might be smouldering around the edges, but the heat is predominately coming from baked stone rather than an open fire. Very dry and mineralic, and surprisingly wearable for a perfume that lists tar and burning plastic among its notes.
Aroon Sawat
Main notes: Sweet and sour golden mango, plum, pomelo, orange flower, passion fruit, white florals, incense, myrrh, rose, amber, sandalwood, mandarin
Another gorgeous love letter to Thailand- in this case, a warm, fruity incense inspired by the sun, architecture and native flora of the perfumer’s homeland. It’s a very gentle, enveloping and sunshiney fragrance with a soft sandalwood-and-amber heart. I find it hard to pick out specific notes because mostly it just gives me the impression of strolling through a fragrant market while completely at peace with the world. There’s a whole bounty of fresh fruits, creamy white flowers and smouldering incense all piled up in the morning sun, and it all blends into one tranquil, drowsy fragrance. This is really nice as a sun-drenched comfy/cosy fragrance that isn’t based around cold weather, chimney smoke and cookies for a change.
Sombre
Main notes: Jasmine, orris butter, nocturnal animals accord, night-blossoming flowers, mud, rose, champagne, sweat/vomit/pus
I already reviewed Sombre on here a year ago, but will recap since I’m reviewing the rest of my Strangers fragrances and this is probably the most infamous..
So, I was unaware of Sombre’s reputation until late in 2019 when I visited Bloom Perfumery and decided to be brave and try Secretions Magnifique (personally hated it, but a solid 10/10 if you’ve ever wanted to be haunted by an invisible naked man with dubious personal hygiene and a lack of regard for personal space). Afterwards, the staff asked if I would like to try something even worse.. then they retrieved it from behind the counter and shoved me outside because there’s a ban on testing it indoors. I still remember the sad little noise that one of the staff made when she returned from her lunch break and accidentally walked through the cloud of lingering death by the shop door, but.. I don’t think it’s that bad.
It does smell like death and decay, yes, and the only reason I would personally buy a bottle of Sombre with my very own money is if I was some kind of international secret agent who needed to misdirect cadaver dogs at a critical moment as I sneaked past with an assassinated arms dealer stowed in my designer luggage.. but it’s not horrific for a perfume that allegedly contains putrescine, and I’m sceptical about the pus/sweat/vomit notes because I don’t get them at all. It basically has the notes that you might find in a normal perfume- sweet, animalic and indolic- but they just come from a slightly horrible place and are amped up to the point of repulsion. With the floral notes, the overall impression to me is that yes, something has died in a ditch nearby, but we’re outside and it hasn’t gone completely putrid.
(Faintly damning praise, I know, but I’d take it over Secretions Magnifique, which smells like being chased by a horrible person who didn’t brush their teeth this morning and is really determined to lick your face anyway)
..Anyway, that’s an awful note to end on, but I swear most of the fragrances I mentioned here are pretty nice and wearable! Anyone else a fan?