The Black Knight is a gothic, intense, sophisticated perfume inspired by the historical character Giovanni Dalle Bande Nere (John of the Black Bands), an Italian mercenary captain of the Renaissance. The perfume tries to depict the atmosphere of a military camp, starting with the smell of wild shrubs, then the smoke of camp fire and the odor of horse tacks. The evolution then delves deeper into the soul of this stern character, revealing the presence of a secret mistress, with a powdery rose rounding up the deep core made of vetiver.
The Black Knight fragrance notes
- artemisia, caraway, honey, bulgarian rose, narcissus, iris butter, beeswax, cedarwood, vetiver, patchouli, oakmoss, leather, patchouli
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Latest Reviews of The Black Knight

I wanted to give this a Thumbs Down, but it is such high quality that I just cannot do it. My personal tastes blind my rating, as I do not get along with prominent Orris Butter.
Great longevity and projection, and high quality materials. If you love orris butter, then this is for you!
2/10 with subjectivity
8/10 without my personal tastes factoring

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The key to this one is definitely less is more. Spraying too much drowns one’s ability to pick up the different stages of this perfume.
Also spraying at a 6-7 inch distance. This stuff is beyond potent. It’s absolutely nuclear. It makes vintage Fahrenheit whimper.
The opening is an artemisia and caraway blast, a bit of a nose tingle but in 10 minutes and for the rest of the 12-14 hours it’s just olfactory orgasm.
After the harsh open you’ll get hit with the leather smoothed with some honey a hint of rose as if the petals are crumbled with leather gloves and then scattered on a some beeswax melted with Iris. The heart of this is where the magic is absolutely beautiful. Patchouli enters in the background before smokey Vetiver and some more leather close out the base for the rest of the long lasting end. This fragrance projects from beginning to end. From loud to soft but never less than an arms length until gone. I’ve had compliments on this fragrance at the 10 hour mark.

Rubber, leather, industrial warehouse floor with barely enough floral and plant-based tinges to render it palatable.
And that is the joy in it. It has monstrous projection and longevity, so be able to tame it, and raise an obscene salute to anyone not willing to tolerate your olfactory aura, or really anything else whilst wearing this.
This is one of my favorite leather scents, as much naughty as defiant. Very thankful a fellow basenoter introduced it to me.
I have felt a distinct lack of control in my world of late, and The Black Knight helps me reign it back in and realize that yes, it is okay to be me. It is okay to get what I want. It is okay to tell the unfiltered truth. It is okay to get fired for telling it.
And for those judging the state of my life, deeply inhale the punk rock beauty of Ms. Bianchi, and re-reference paragraph #3 above.


The Black Knight swaps out the birch tar of the Le Labo for an interesting cuir accord built mostly (as far as I can tell) from that hulking vetiver and some of the bitter, meaty Cellier-esque, Isobutyl quinoline-infused leather that's been popping up quite a bit recently (see Rose et Cuir). It takes some time to dry down into that softening layer of balmy beeswax infinitely more balanced than the sweetness in Patchouli 24, which is more sugary and vanilla extract-like in character so before we settle in for the final, long drawn-out waltz of leather and cream, there's a surprising development or two.
Most notably, past the opening of dusty grumpy old man' vetiver, an animalistic accord emerges, pungent and sticky with honey, and almost honking with the freshly-urinated-upon-hay stink of narcissus. Bianchi's treatment of orris is fascinating to me she can make it high-toned and mineralic, or funky with the low-tide halitosis of ambergris or blow it out into a big, civety floral cloud. Here, the orris is briefly pungent, with disturbing hints of rubber, boot polish, tar, and urine. This pissy-rubbery stage almost never fails to surprise me and I've been wearing these two samples for the past ten days straight. Don't smell your skin too closely and you might miss it entirely.
The Black Knight seems to go on forever, dawdling in that balmy double act of creamed beeswax and hard' leather before eventually dropping all the sweetness, leaving only mineralic dust and the faint whiff of marshy runner's sweat (a drydown it shares with Le Labo Patchouli 24). The Black Knight is a bolshy, mouthing-off-in-all-directions strop of scent that's probably not the easiest thing for a total beginner to carry off. But it's striking as hell, and never less than sexy.