L'Eau Trois
Diptyque (1975)

Most of the older Diptyques smell like ancient medicinal salves made out of crushing various barks, spices, and unguents down into a fiery yellow paste and applied to an open wound (Eau Lente, L’ Eau). L’ Eau Trois flips the trope a little, taking it outside to the sunburnt hillsides of Greece or Southern France where the healer combs up tufts of wild rosemary, pine needles, and mastic from the maquis, and uses his cocaine fingernail to dig out sticky yellow globules of myrrh and pine sap from ancient, shrubby trees bent over with age and wind, before singeing it all over a fire so that greenery takes on a burnt, bitter flavor, and mashing it all down to a paste in a pestle and mortar.

Smoky, wild, and herbaceous, L’Eau Trois this is myrrh at its most confrontational. It smells of incense, yes, but also of bitter greenery that will either kill you or cure you if ingested. Less like a perfume than something born of the bowels of the earth.

My absolute favorite from Diptyque.

This is an olibanum resinoid overdose with a healthy helping of myrrh, and the smell of not only pine sap but of pine needles both fresh and the desiccated fallen ones on the forest floor. My nose detects the rosemary, myrtle and caraway that add dimension; all great complements to the olibanum and myrrh.

It is the olfactory embodiment of crepuscule in the woods, solemn, sacred, and divine. A stirring creation.

Many speculate of the name of this fragrance, that means "Water Three" in English. There's no real mystery here, though: it is simply the third fragrance that Diptyque issued. I tried it ~2yrs ago on the skin after a visit in a Diptyque store in Paris, and remained so impressed that I kept it on my wishlist for all that time, even if my precise memory faded out a bit. So, when I spotted a great deal and ordered it recently, it was a half blind buy and I was a bit nervous.

Opens with a blast of spiced aromatic/balsamic notes (an impression of rosemary/oregano given by myrrh and spices I guess). Then the spices tone down a bit to leave the front stage for the myrrh to shine, but are still very present (probably caraway and/or cumin, possibly some cloves and/or allspice), and at that stage, it vaguely reminds me of Goutal Ambre Fetiche.
The myrrh will dance during the whole drydown, back and forth, with a very dry dusty (non-smoky) olibanum resinoids note (with a blackpepper facet, but not a sharp blackpepper like in Bois d'Encens) and the ladbanum that will envelop the whole creation with its resinous greeness. While I have an issue with SL Ambre Sultan's bay leaf note, I love it in Guerlain Bois Mysterieux. Same for the oregano/rosemary note, that I struggle with in Amouage Interlude, but love in PM Or Black. Here, it's all an interplay, perfectly tailored, and I love it! Performance is nothing exceptional, nor nothing to complain about, as expected for an EDT.

Like a previous reviewer stated, the quest for the perfect incense will never end. That said, for me, it might have with this one (and Tauer Incense Extreme). On par with Trudon Mortel in terms of style and quality (but Diptyque has slightly better performance).
To note that this one has been issued ~30 years before the trend of incense-centered fragrance was started by CdG...
Whaaaat a journey! Masterpiece by Serge Kalouguine.

Highly recommended (but liking aromatics and spices is a must to enjoy this one).
Colder days, 25+, unisex

A balsamic pomander at take-off paves the way to a frankincense flavoured with rosemary and cistus, very pleasant.

Cool, herbal opening with oregano, myrtle, pine, rosemary and camphor. In the past when I've worn this, the slightly too herbal opening would transition to a lovely, holy grail pine straw and sap scent with a quietly smoky resinous base. L'Eau Trois made it on to my wishlist as the perfect scent of sun heating pinestraw on a hot summer day - a nostalgic trip to my childhood in Georgia.

Trying it again after a long haitus, I've found that there's much more of a metallic note and the oregano is dominant. It's not wearably herbal, just reminiscent of pizza sauce. I've changed medications and diets, so maybe L'Eau Trois no longer favors my skin chemistry. Such a shame, but perhaps it's a good thing to no longer pine after a discontinued gem.

A beautiful, strange smell but totally unwearable as a personal fragrance. I was entranced with it when I smelled it at the SF Diptyque and bought a bottle but now spray it around the room trying to use it up. Extremely dusty, musty and gray ashy thing similar to a Versailles Pour Homme stripped of its Frenchness. Problem is that it doesn't project or have substantial enough base notes to go anywhere. It lingers close to the skin and lasts a surprising while, but at length it is just too creepy to live with on the body.