With each fragrance Parfum d’Empire takes us on an imaginary journey through time and allows us to follow the olfactory trails of historical characters and places they visited. Iskander, a perfume introduced in 2006 is a scented portrait of Alexander the Great. It follows the conquerors expeditions step by step when he was on his way from the West to the East.
This hesperidic chypre starts with a huge citrus blast of Amalfi lemon & grapefruit blend. The smell is intensive, pungent and straight in your face. Its tart and citric quality, despite the fact being really strong, is very pleasant thanks to the warm notes mingling in the background. Plus this citrus bomb quickly turns into much lighter kind of thing. Very shortly a cedarwood note appears, it’s woody with a slight sweaty feeling. It is well covered by the softness of orange blossom and gentle sweetness of mandarin orange which makes Iskander a pleasant scent. Citron adds some sourness to it.
After a while the beautiful oakmoss base is reached. It has a great smell. It’s solid, easily noticeable and not overpowering. Oakmoss is light here and it has that dark green color and a smell of a shrub. Iskander provides a suble whisper of chypre with enough mossy molecules to satisfy our needs for the note, at the same time sticking to regulations created by IFRA. The perfume changes with time.
After a few hours only a weak citrus scent can be noticed. The oakmoss base is still present but in much lighter form, muffled by the warm and spicy notes diluted in Parfum d’Empire Iskander. What we have here is some tarragon – with this warm and sunny smell that is not only slightly spicy but it also reminds me of the scent of wheat or hay. Like you were somewhere at the cottage. Coriander is also one of the notes. It gives this spicy and warm feeling to the scent but it has some dry, paper-like properties that really puts some pressure on the aromatic accord if this perfume. Amber might be impossible to notice but I guess it acts as one of the warming notes for Iskander.
In late drydown this fragrance can be considered to be slightly sweet with white floral chords. Neroli is very graceful and it mixes with the sweet smell of orange (juice) over the delicate and transparent musk base. Longevity of Iskander is really great, it can easily accompany you for a whole day without any problems. It has a good sillage, big at the beginning when a citrus bomb explodes but it gets smaller with time. If you’re looking for a citrus scent with a chypre twist Parfum d’Empire Iskander is absolutely worth checking out. The perfume does great in the heat, so it’s a nice spring/summer choice that won’t let you down. I think it’s time for me to get it!
Creator of Iskander is Marc Antoine-Corticchiato, a Parfum d’Empire house founder. The scent is an eau de parfum available in 50 ml and 100 ml flacons of a design characteristic to the line.
