Casamorati Lira
Xerjoff (2011)

I love this, but then my all-time favourite perfume & signature scent is L'de Lolita by Lolita Lempicka. I've been searching for a replacement signature scent and this may very well be it.
When first applied it's almost identical. Lots of vanilla cake with sparkly orange on top. Once dry it changes a bit & is no longer identical. Very similar but not identical. Almost a bit like a slightly more grown up version of L'de Lolita. Lira is less sweet & less vanilla when dry, and more musk than L'de L.
I think I need to try this layered with Montale's Vanilla Absolu or Vanilla Cake 🤔

Very sweet, gourmand, loud, and a bit powdery in the dry-down. The overall composition is a bit mundane and very much not my cup of tea, unfortunately.

Might as well wear a 10$ drugstore vanilla-bergamot gourmand. My first and last dive into Xerjoff. It's nice but it's just ethylvannilin and bergamot, forget the other notes, I got mislead to. This could also be mistaken for a vial you add to cake batter.

There is a thread on here somewhere about a drugstore competitor, it's 30$ though, not 10$: Laurence Dumont - Tendre Madeleine. Didn't try that one myself but you're welcome.

Imagine you and your soulmate are wrapped in a cozy blanket at a beach one night. The evening breeze is slightly chilly so you start to dig your toes under the sand. You and your love stop and both gaze up at the same time at the clear winter night sky and see stars wink at you... Absolutely delicious. An nice scent for lovers of gourmand and spicy warm scents. It would be also the perfect scent to spray before you go to bed as i find it very calming, warm and cuddly.

The freshness of bitter orange and bergamot precedes a heart of sparkling cinnamon immediately followed by that salty note of the everlasting flower, turning this perfume into a flirty caramel musk, transports you to an enchanted ocean surrounded by mermaids and dolphins. Totally if you're a fan of cinnamony fragrance like Organza, Dolce Vita, this is a lighter whipped-cream vanilla semi-gourmand take on cinnamon that you will probably love. The only thing i regret is that price as for a gourmand scent it's too expensive.

It smells good; with those notes, what wouldn't? But then, my €11.00 vanilla and lime fragrance from the supermarket smells good as well. This might be the most simple and disappointing fragrance from the house. It opens with a lot of citrus and a light, sunny but uninteresting vanilla comes in, with the lightest caramel. Only the (light as well) lavender tries to keep it interesting.

Almond, salted caramel, cinnamon, vanilla, musks. There's a bit of fruit in there too, although I can't quite place it. Smooth in texture, sweet without being cloying or sugary. Pretty linear, once the initial caramel blast has settled. Definitely feminine in character.
Projection moderate, but sillage is good. I wasn't disappointed with the longevity - it was still alive at the 10 hour mark.
It's clearly high-quality and expertly blended and the sweetness is well-managed enough that despite my being pretty picky with gourmands, I enjoy this very much and find it quite compelling, as well as luxurious. It's expensive, but it's not out of its league in that regard, not at all. For me, the only thing it's really missing is a quirk, a bit of character. Hence, probably not FB-worthy but there'll be a decent-sized decant (also, bleugh, I really don't like those fussy Casamorati bottles).

An interesting perfume but not a masterpiece. Xerjoff could do better in the "sweet section" of its products.

The opening is ok but after half an hour it becomes too powedery and too sweet. Sometimes the powder feeling sits on the first place, sometimes the overwhelming sweetnes replace it and gives me a cheap sweet floral smell.

Xerjoff Lira is immediately sweet and caramel-dominant from the opening onward, making it delicious and almost alluring at the same time throughout its life.

The caramel is colored by various citruses, florals, and spices, which add character and depth. The citrus remains pretty strong throughout, which creates a similar result to Unknown Pleasures by Kerosene, predominantly a caramel/lemon pairing. Lira seems a little more complicated but it's difficult not to make the comparison. Lira pivots more to vanilla and musk, as well, in the dry down, features absent from UP.

Lira boasts a strong projection and longevity, as well---a pleasing performer.

Lira retails for $290 for 100ml, $105 for 30ml at Luckyscent but I recall the 100ml size being available at Notino for under $200, though their website is currently down for maintenance.

Certainly this is one I'd consider buying if it weren't so similar to Unknown Pleasures, though I certainly need to try both side by side.

8 out of 10

Stardate 20170427:

Xerjoff has been a house that I always wanted to like. The bottles are great and I like their names. Unfortunately, all the Xerjoffs I have tried have been meh.
Lira is no different. Smells like my favourite chocolate Ganache cake that I used to get from Mangia Bakery in midtown Manhattan. And like the cake, Lira disappears quickly.
I would save the money and get the cake.

A November day in north Italy, fog hanging over the lake of iseo. All you see is facettes of grey. And then a small golden spot... A small chocolate shop with handmade pralines...champagne orange truffles....

I was there this November day. This is what Lira smells like