Reflet sur l'Okavango
Ella K Parfums (2019)

Mono – that was my first thought regarding Reflet sur l’Okavango. Everything seemed to be coming out of the same speaker, almost flattened together. And that was a bit of a shame in a perfume that takes a lightly honeyed acacia accord and juxtaposes it against pale straw-like greens and woods – bamboo, papyrus, white tea come to my mind. This should be a dancing, singing thing, dappled with shade; instead, there was that word – mono – and my experience of this perfume somehow couldn’t get past it.
But what it needed was time. After a while I noticed how the room I had been sitting in seemed alive with acacia blossom when I re-entered it and I made a mental note that this perfume probably comes across much better to others than to the wearer. However, gradually my perception of it on myself began to change, too – not quite the near headspace-technology experience I had had in my room (which made me leave and re-enter it several times just to replay it), but still a kindly floral kiss.