Fiore della Notte / Night Blossom
AbdesSalaam Attar Profumo

The first thing that immediately struck me when I smelled this perfume upon applying it to my wrist was, most unexpectedly, not the blossom or flower part of "Night Blossom," but rather the smell of night.

It conjured up a place-memory, but one I had trouble placing until a few more wears when I finally pieced it together, given it came from an altogether unforeseen angle compared to what I had anticipated: humid summer nights on trip visiting my father's childhood home in a rural part of Kyoto, the old capital of Japan. Though my father had inherited it from his father, he struck out alone to the United States early in life, leaving his sister to continue to maintain the house exactly as it was---which meant no modern conveniences like air conditioning, and all the Meiji-era wood furniture was still in place.

The dark lacquered wood and antiquated cabinets and straw tatami mixed with the tepid night air of a Japanese summer created a certain smell that accompanied the cicada song, a mix of humidity and wet reeds-rooty earth-lacquer wood, and this was where the opening of Night Blossom brought me---if not the exact literal same, then at least certainly similar in spirit enough for me to think of this memory.

For the first three wears, this is where the scent stayed on me...with no signs of tuberose or floral! I was very puzzled---it was still an absolutely lovely scent, an incredibly atmospheric experience, but very different from what the perfume description led me to believe.

Eventually I tried putting it on my heart and sternum, thinking the warmer temperature there might help (I have a low body temperature from a rare form of genetic tachycardia that leads to poor blood circulation---not always great for wearing perfume!) and the difference was immediately noticeable.

The night air impression was still there upon the opening, but in sharper focus than before---a honeyed note showed up to combine with the earthy-lacquer notes in an effect that surprisingly reminded me of a delicate Japanese whisky. (Nikka Taketsuru, if I had to be specific---one of my favorites on the rare occasion that I drink.)

Then surely enough, a voluptuous white floral bloomed. Tuberose, with none of the cleanly ambroxan haziness that seems to often accompany it in modern niche perfumery. I confess to enjoy some of those as well, if I'm in the specific mood for it anyhow, but Night Blossom is in a category all its own.

An animalic wet boozy tuberose, but unmistakably tuberose, the creamy white floral draped over softening the earthy-root air, with the effect of a particularly fragrant flower asserting its musky floral presence through the nighttime air.

And this might just be me, but I still smell the Japanese whisky on this wear. Tuberose, night air, and Japanese whisky, who would've thought? It's gorgeous.

Of the mignons I most recently sampled, after "Venezia, Giardini Segreti" this is the one I unexpectedly found myself reaching the most for. I normally go for more subdued florals, and so a tuberose-centric perfume was not one I was expecting to work its way into my favorites, and yet "Night Blossom / Fiore della Notte" completely blew me off my feet. I don't own anything like this and this filled a missing hole I didn't know that I had!

Full-heartedly recommend and next on my full bottle list as well!

Just awesome and totally unique. Tuberose like no other tuberose. No sweetness or indolic notes, just earthy, rooty, dirty floral infused with dry woods, incense, patchouli, and balsamic resins. Addictively good.

Wow, wow, wow, I crave for this type of dark sinister smoky floral concoctions. Yes Iodine, this is a black baleful flower blooming up in the depth of the darkest forest. La Via del Profumo Fiore della Notte/Night Blossom is a wild, earthy, dry spicy, incensey, musty-misty, almost mineral tuberose which appears like a ghost in the appalling dark, as absolutely deprived of its usual somewhat creamy syrupy undertone. Nothing mellow or creamy in here indeed, just a thick fog just barely floral and basically earthy, deeply smoky and peppery-incensey. I detect rooty humid patchouli for sure, than black pepper and vaguely liturgical steam surrounding pale citrus and boisterous rooty tuberose in order to provide an intensely dark vegetal aroma (a sort of floral and less incensey Durbano Black Turmaline) due to be exhibited along the darkest of the gloomy suburban parties of the immense suburbia. The tuberose, in connection with smoke, resins and probably hints of soft leather elicits a sort of blackberry-like misty undertone. Deep oakmoss, probably a touch of ambergris and dry woods close the dry down round of this wonderful creation. Great longevity on my skin.

A black velvet flower, blooming in the deep of a dark, musty, cool forest. Being patchouli and tuberose two of my favourite notes, I was curious to smell how AbdesSalaam Attar treated them. The fragrance is at the same time quite simple and deeply mysterious, with the bolder, more carnal and slightly disturbing facets of tuberose lying on a dark, rich, intensely vegetal smelling base of moss, typical AbdesSalaam's resins and patchouli.
The website suggest to avoid wearing this fragrance at work, due to its power to stimulate a hormonal response: I've worn it in a classroom packed with- mostly male- teenagers and got through safely, anyway!