Ladamo
O'Driù (2011)

Though unlisted, Ladamo is mostly about immortelle to me. But though you certainly get that bronzed, curried maple syrup vibe that accompanies immortelle wherever it goes, the mossy dampness of the soil tincture, the watery (almost aquatic) magnolia, the metallic ginger-tobacco combo, and the smoky licorice note build it all out into something far more complex than is suggestible by one material alone. It smells of all the brown, good-smelling things of autumn – root cellars, apple rot, and the hummus of the forest floor – mulched down into one compact but vibrant layer. An amber this may be, but spiritually, Ladamo shares a lot of ground with Comme des Garcons’ Patchouli, and artistically, it is what Foxcroft by Solstice Scents wishes it could be when it grows up and taps into a bigger budget.

The first half of Ladamo is borderline intoxicating to me. Boozy, deep, sweet but also bitter and earthy, it sells me a fantasy of my former Goth self, striding through a forest full of wet, fallen yellow and brown leaves, wearing long leather boots, a riding crop, and way too much eyeliner. But cool, you know? The Gucci ‘hobo chic’ version of that, not the crunchy granola one hastily knocked up by your teenage self in your nearest health food (New Age) store. Alas, as the day goes on, Ladamo loses it stamina and eventually becomes just another old codger shuffling forward on the crutches of that immortelle, because immortelle is always the last to die. Still, worth it for the first half of the ride (if, like me, you've learned to take the vegetal, almost stewed celery aspect of fenugreek in your stride, and treat it like just one more tool in the immortelle toolbox).

Ladamo opens in a lighter way if compared to the bold openings of many other O'Driù scents, with a tasty, aromatic, Mediterranean accord of dry culinary herbs (sage, bay leaves, carrot roots), pine needles, licorice, patchouli, a dense and wet tobacco note, on a camphoraceous base which smells of dusty furniture and old lacets. I also smell a lavender note, quite prominent initially, a pleasant, good-quality, evocative lavender, slightly humid and "old", it reminds me some classic British colognes like English Lavender by Dunhill. The overall spicy-herbal-woody balsamic structure is finally sweetened by vanilla and an interesting note which smells basically like a sort of oily amber note, almost vine-y and boozy, quite dark and rich, slightly fruity. Above all of this, a light and silky floral-anise note (which I detected in several other scents by this house). Complex and dense, but like almost all other O'Driù scents, absolutely compact and consistent, with a really smart and bright "alchemical" work of melting together several notes to create something new and un-dissectable (which does not mean "throw random stuff", just rather having the sensitivity and the talent to know what one's doing). All scents by Pregoni smell at first like nothing else, and you always feel "back in" his world, as he really "invented" these notes. Which he does, in fact, as he actively invents new ways to process them. Anyway, as minutes pass some notes start to vanish and get drier, and the central mimose note – which was almost absent before – emerges better and strongly, with all its earthy, floral and resinous personality, still with herbal and tobacco/licorice notes. A fascinating path which lets you assist to this "coming to life" of this central note from the initial biblical chaos of images and nuances. Really well made. As I said initially this is a bit more "delicate" and different from other scents by Pregoni, also considering the images it triggers – no "obsessions" here, no carnality or provocative animalic stuff, rather here we have a nostalgic, romantic and melancholic scent, which speaks of humid nature, dry flowers, modest and dusty rooms. All a bit ghastly, but most of all nostalgic to me, in a "rural", antique way. One of the most poetic among O'Driù's range, and also one of the most versatile ones – refined, dense, really aromatic, although the drydown is really bold and long-lasting on basically the same accord (but if you like it, I guess it's perfect).

8,5/10

This is one of those fragrances that make Angelo Orazio Pregoni's fragrances completely different and so daring to use.
This fragrance is all about spices, bitter green and earthy/rooty notes.
At the opening I can smell a heavy spicy scent and bitter green notes mixed with it.
The spicy scent is something like mix of curry, black pepper and cumin and it's very strong.
Beside that there is a strong bitter dark herbal smell that all together creating a dark spicy and very different scent.
When I was testing it and walking in home, my mom said what on earth is this smell?! lol
I said it's a fragrance and my mom said you smell like a spice shop and she didn't like it at all!
I also asked other family members and they didn't like it either!
So I'm the only one who likes it! :v
As time goes by the scent changed a little.
The bitter green smell goes to the background and I can smell a strong earthy and rooty smell instead and beside it there are those spices.
It's a very bizzarre and unique scent.
Projection is very good and strong and longevity is around 8-10 hours on my skin.

Bold health-and-nature GourmandIn the beginning the impression is rich earth, nature and ginger. Soon I get a note of carrots, including the aroma of the roots when they just have been pulled out. A gentle magnolia adds a softer note, until in the drydown licorice with a bit of sandalwood and tobacco give it a richer and darker turn again. The base is a juniper berry note that fits in very well. It is like a mixture of earth, nature and a health food shop, a gourmand without chocolate, vanilla and other less dietitian-approved menus. Beautifully blended, good silage and projection, and a superb longevity of over eleven hours. Bold, original and creative, just right for that country weekend in cooler climes.

"Holy cow!"is precisely what I said this morning, when applying Ladamo for the first time (to the sides of my neck and the insides of my elbow) -- I absolutely could not stop smelling myself on the commute to work, finding any excuse to bury my chin in my neck or raise my arms around my face, every possible discrete measure to get just one more whiff. "Holy cow!" is exactly what my coworker said immediately after smelling it. Miraculously, "Holy cow!" is also what my roommate said when I messaged him that he must experience this right away, and apparently even my dog went bonkers as soon as he picked up the scent... This fantastic fragrance is extremely exciting, and unique to say the least. It's delicious. It's a completely tantalizing mix of juniper and sandalwood at the base (on my skin) with ginger and cardamon and fenugreek (to my nose) sparkling around in the air. It's amazingly simple, wonderfully direct and inviting, and feels completely organic but also absolutely masculine.

Even before this fragrance gets anywhere near my skin, l get whacked in the head by an enormous stick of celery. Seriously, l have never experienced such huge projection just wafting from a vial! The noxious cloud is almost visible in the air. And just a couple of dabs is all that's needed, this is really potent stuff. Along with the celery, the overall impression at first is bitter, dark & green, with perhaps some woods, a little tobacco, & a very faint sour fruit which must be the juniper berries. A little later, l get cardamom & galbanum; two notes l am not a big fan of. Then over the next hour, the immortelle becomes more & more dominant. For the rest of the duration, l get random whiffs of other, strange-but-familiar notes, but when l sniff up close, all l smell is immortelle. lt all lasts a phenomenal seventeen hours on me, only disappearing when l go for a shower the next morning.
l enjoy immortelle in other compositions, & Sables in particular, but this one has too many other notes that just don't agree with me. l respect it for being incredibly powerful, complex & tenacious, but l cannot imagine myself ever wanting to wear it.

The first agrestic blast under my nose is articulated by aromatic leaves, sour citrus, licorice, black peper and kurcuma with a background made of earthy patchouli and tobacco. Really pungent and scorbutic, it smells a bit like a sort of Les Nombres D'Or Cuir Mona di Orio without the leather and the smoky barbecue effect. Yes i detect the burnt sugar effect but with a lot of bitterness in its aftertaste. Something vaguely minty and botanic strikes my nose and probably is the anisy fenugreek (surrounded by the kurcuma) the responsible of this feel. In this phase i'm encompassed by a valzer of diverse olfactory impunts and smell a stark woody feel around but is the peppery licorice/ginger(kurcuma) earthy(patchouli-carrot)/spicy vibe to be starring and dominant. Throughout the development i detect this sort of rustic earthy-burnt-peppery-aromatic-herbal vibe produced by an association of piquant aromatic spices, fenugreek-licorice (i don't know if the latter is effectively present), carrot, patchouli and ginger-juniper over a sandalwood foundation and effectively the faint floral whiff is a white drop in a dark turbulent ocean. The dry down is still rustic but slightly tamed by a softer mossy galbanum keeping steady the woodsy bucolic darkness in the air. Masculine and powerful in my opinion Ladamo is a less refined kind of scent compared with the other O'driu' masterworks and is a far more naturalistic and countrified affair for a diffident, conservative kind of solitary man of the farms. I'm a bit more delicate and urban my friends :-).

OK, well I guess there is at least one scent from the wonderful house of O'driu that I dislike... and I have found it in Ladamo, regrettably.

Ladamo opens with the faintest hint of brief ginger root... and then it turns to full out celery seed (which must actually be fenugreek based on the listed notes). Unfortunately on my skin the celery takes over in full force to the extent that it overpowers everything else. It is all I can smell from there on out. It is quite powerful on me, showing unbelievable projection, strength and longevity. Here, that is not a good thing as I detest celery with a passion. I feel like I am a walking celery stalk wearing Ladamo.

Looking at the pyramid for the scent above, in theory the notes are ones I enjoy. That, coupled with my prior extreme delight with everything else I have tried from O'driu led to me having high expectations going in... Unfortunately, whether by design, skin interaction or my over-sensitivity to the celery seed note I just can't like Ladamo at all. It is really a shame, because unlike all the other scents from the house that I love, this one was just within my price range, and I really want to support houses like O'driu that are so individualistic and unique. Alas, my money will not be going to support *this* one. I guess I will either have to save up for the more expensive offerings, and/or hope Leva fares better as it is equally priced with Ladamo. 2 out of 5 stars for Ladamo. Oh well, not every release can be a winner...

The juice is an olive-gold colour.
On paper, it pops with fenugreek/curry, herbal-green, and minty-refreshing notes.
On my skin, it reveals a deeper, dirtier, darker, earthier character. The reference to "earth and roots" is exactly right. The scent is complex, even in its early stages. It certainly seems masculine to me, given its dark, sweaty tones. Then... amazingly it opens up and brightens! I find a very cheery, minty sort of note (perhaps juniper and crisp gingerroot). It also gets quite woody. I really appreciate the bright note amid the dark earth, moss and woods -- this is a genius touch of design.
As the scent progresses, it develops a very mossy-lichen note. At times, this strongly suggests celery leaves (but not always). At other times, the anise sort of note takes prominence. A bit of a shape-shifter, this.
Of the scents I've tried to date, I like this one best. It is powerful and challenging, but I love green scents and this certainly has that aspect. As has been noted it is extremely powerful -- one or two little dots more than suffice.
Postscript -- I swear that the next day, after a long bath and a new scent, I could still catch the ghostly presence of this scent. Incredibly powerful and long duration.

LADAMO

Wow! Bosky, bosky, bosky.

The first man. The genesis of man. Don't expect the smooth chested, lithe hipped, Adam of renaissance art. This Adam is the man, a he man. Grrrrrrr. This Adam walks on bare feet in a really bosky terrain. He is a hunter gatherer. In fact, to me this fragrance is more suggestive of a terrain than of a man.

Dense to begin, opening and drying over time. Black liquorice, a pronounced dry dusty immortelle, fenugreek, ginger, galbanum. A dry bushy terrain. Then wood and tobacco, dried grass, rich and dry.

On paper in particular the deep drydown of Ladamo lasts a very long time, with a persistent asafoetida note in the end.

Based on first impressions this reads as an immortelle driven fragrance. But if you take time, try on paper and skin, consider the concept, the notes, you will discover much more. But actually I don't think that the importance of these O'Driu fragrances is in the breakdown of their notes. It is in the emotional reaction to the whole experience.

LADAMO (L'Adamo) stays for Adam and together with LEVA (L'Eva / Eve) form the Genesi line. One masculine and one feminine that I suppose should work as sort of signature of the house...

LADAMO strikes as a more complex/richer version of Huitieme Art's Fareb as it basically opens with the same rooty immortelle/ginger accord. Anyone who's usually not into helichrysum should carefully avoid this composition as this is what it's all about. The immortelle note is devoided of most of the burnt-sugary feel and emphasized on its fenugreek and woody-liqorice aspect while a light mimosa note provides a little refinement that's not enough to tame this insanely powerful composition. Where Fareb introduces leather, LADAMO pushes on spices (mainly cardamom) and juniper to add even more body. The fragrance stays pretty linear for hours and hours to finally "evolve" into a galbanum driven drydown.

Definitely masculine, full-bodied and with a strong herbal quality. LADAMO It's pervaded by a rough edge as opposed to sophistication and refinement and in this context it shares the same old apothekary quality of ancient houses such as Santa Maria Novella. For other aspects (the use of spices and the overall oriental feel), it may bring to mind of an uncompromising version of some early Diptyques. A fragrance that sounds like a statement, a statement that speaks of great quality ingredients, a couple of accords, no frills.

Do I like it? It smells good and I'm a sucker for immortelle but at these prices I expect a little more than a straight forward helichrysum...