VC&A Tsar and Ralph Lauren Safari Pour Homme

[Primrose]

Are these scents too similar?

I find they're almost identical and it's hard to tell which one is more floral and has the more leather.

Any discussion on this?

 

[tonysoprano100]

Hi Primerose,

In my opinion VC Tsar and Safari are absolutly different, nothing in common. Apologies for my honesty.

But you know, its only my feelings.

 

[Pollux]

Safari as well as many others released around the same years share a bergamot / green top note found in Eternity for Men. Tsar stands a tad apart from the bunch, though.

 

[Primrose]

Safari as well as many others released around the same years share a bergamot / green top note found in Eternity for Men. Tsar stands a tad apart from the bunch, though.

Can you expand on this? I find the openings of Tsar and Safari very similar, so perhaps that is what I am sensing.

 

[hednic]

Both are quite different. VC&A Tsar is much better IMO.

 

[kxe003]

not similar imo. Tsar is better

 

[shamu1]

I smell no similarities at all.

TSAR - Green woody aromatic fougere

Safari - Leather fougere

Both are damn good fragrances, though. I prefer Tsar.

 

[Pollux]

Can you expand on this? I find the openings of Tsar and Safari very similar, so perhaps that is what I am sensing.

You might check this out in order to test my supposition: look for scents released during the late 1980's and early 1990's...

Safari for meni, 1992
VC&A's Tsar, 1989
CK's Eternity, 1989
PR's XS, 1993

Smell the top notes: according to their pyramids, Safari, Tsar and XS share bergamot in their top notes, in the case of Eternity, it is mandarin (if memory does not fail me). If you want to overindulge in this same note, check O pour Homme (1997), it is precisely the same top note I notice in these four taken to the extreme.

I assume it must be the usual mechanism: a big corporation specialized in essences releases their last aromachemical and then implements sales efforts among the big corporations manufacturing scents for licensed brands. Presto, there you got the rendition of blends revolving around common notes.

Take calone, dehydromircenol and iso e super, as well as esences replicating fruits, ginger, chocolate and caramel, there you got the reason why releases smell so similar.

Anyway, of these four, Safari is the best one, IMHO, for the mid and base notes depart from their common denominator.

 

[pirop]

VC&A's Tsar has been one of my favorites since early '90's. I haven't found any resemblance to Safari though...

 

[Primrose]

I have finally come to the decision that I like both Safari and Tsar, but Tsar is a *little* more floral in the drydown.

 

[koala501]

Hi Primrose,

Are you talking about the original Tsar or Eau de Tsar which, I think was late 90's? Eau de Tsar might have a similar feel with the Bergamot at the top and the oakmoss at the bottom and it's lighter that the original Tsar.

Otherwise it might be the dry down that's similar? They are not alike to my nose but those elements might be toying with you?

 

[Bigsly]

I saw a youtube review in which the review compared Safari to Gucci Nobile.

 

[Primrose]

Hi Primrose,

Are you talking about the original Tsar or Eau de Tsar which, I think was late 90's? Eau de Tsar might have a similar feel with the Bergamot at the top and the oakmoss at the bottom and it's lighter that the original Tsar.

Otherwise it might be the dry down that's similar? They are not alike to my nose but those elements might be toying with you?

Koala, this would be the original Tsar in so far as it's in the new bottle.

 

[Pollux]

I saw a youtube review in which the review compared Safari to Gucci Nobile.

Well, no IMHO. Brooks Brothers for Men does share top and mid notes with Safari, but BB's projection and longevity are far more limited than S'.

 

[Primrose]

Thank you all for the input and the history!

 

[beleriand]

Vintage Safari definitely bears some similarity to vintage Tsar to my nose. I wouldn't have said so at first, but I have a bottle of Safari sitting by my piano and I keep thinking I'm getting a whiff of Tsar.

 

[Diddy]

Never seen this thread before today. A little surprising and I never made the connection between these two. I own Cosmair distribution Safari and 1st Tsar. So, I just smelled them again and I’m still not making a connection. Both outstanding fragrances though! I prefer Safari FWIW.

 

[checkmate]

I’m on the same page as Diddy.

In fact, I find them very different.

There’s nothing “green” about Safari, and Tsar’s backbone is entirely green. Safari strikes me as an aromatic leather with floral undertones whereas Tsar is a soapy fougere through and through.

Both are excellent in vintage form, but Tsar is far more versatile and unfortunately less accessible.

 

[DeathArrow]

In my opinion Tsar is/was a gem while Safari is just average, maybe good. Also, they don't smell the same to me.

 

[_Nicolas_]

I get the feeling this similarity in the OP's mind is based on the artemisia note in Tsar and the eucalyptus (and possible artemisia) note in Safari. Anyway, I think YSL Jazz is more similar to Tsar, but Jazz is breadier-smelling and a simpler and less interesting composition

 

[Hugh V.]

I don't see any similarities either.

Tsar is like a pungent, dark green bar of soap, with a little bit of sweet pine in there. Heavy and cold weather appropriate. Smells very 80s to me.

Safari...it feels very much like a bridge between the late 80s and early 90s, but with one foot more solidly in the older decade. I get a cleaner version of Red for Men by Giorgio Beverly Hills almost. At least in the middle.

Interesting. All three share rose, carnation and jasmine at the middle. But Tsar has cinnamon at the top, Safari has it in the middle. There's some more note similarities that I'm surprised to see.

I have both and don't like either too much. But of the two, I slightly prefer Tsar as it gives off a more nostalgic vibe, and the soapiness at the end kind of makes up for the pungent beginning. Safari on the other hand is the reverse, as it starts out good, but then gets pungent and overbearing at the middle. It calms down a bit at the end, but my reformulated bottle has it as a barely-there skin scent by that time.

 

[Hugh V.]

I've been forcing myself to wear my recently acquired RL Safari (via Marshalls) despite my initial bad experiences with this bottle. I've noticed that if I go heavy on the sprays, it becomes more that original scent that I remember. Maybe the bottle needed to "breathe" a little, or maybe it's the extra sprays making it more concentrated on my skin. Either way, for the $19.99 price tag, this ended up being well-worth it in the long run.

I'm still thinking that Cartier's Pasha might still be the better take on this style, but it's been a while since I sampled that one.

 

[_Nicolas_]

Maybe the bottle needed to "breathe" a little, or maybe it's the extra sprays making it more concentrated on my skin. Either way, for the $19.99 price tag, this ended up being well-worth it in the long run.

I'm not usually a heavy sprayer, about 6-8 with most fragrances, but with my recent formulation of Safari I'll typically do around 20 sprays! This lasts me all day without feeling oppressive, which I find to be the case with vintage Safari. Vintage is very easy to overspray and can start to grate on me after a few hours, but this stays airy and pleasant, so in some ways I prefer it! I concur that it improves with age, mine is already much better than it was when I bought it in 2021!

 

[rum]

I'm not usually a heavy sprayer, about 6-8 with most fragrances, but with my recent formulation of Safari I'll typically do around 20 sprays! This lasts me all day without feeling oppressive, which I find to be the case with vintage Safari. Vintage is very easy to overspray and can start to grate on me after a few hours, but this stays airy and pleasant, so in some ways I prefer it! I concur that it improves with age, mine is already much better than it was when I bought it in 2021!

Some interesting comments here, @_Nicolas_ . I haven't tried the current stuff properly to realistically form an opinion. How old would you say is your current bottle is?
Is your vintage bottle made by Cosmair? I ask because not all sellers of vintage scents label their sales correctly - and this has been quite common for Safari from experience.
My vintage Cosmair bottle has some funny top notes, but I think this could be because it hasn't been sprayed much. Second wearing was better than the first.

 

[_Nicolas_]

@rum I'm pretty sure my vintage bottle was a 75ml Cosmair version, but it's about 6 years ago since I finished it so I'm not 100% certain. I'm just going from memory really, but I prefer recent formulations because they seem so hard to overspray and less oppressive. I've had my current bottle since 2021, not sure how old it is exactly, but based on the fact that it's from AllBeauty and judging by their volume of sales I'm guessing not much longer than that. I had a recently produced 75ml before my current 125ml and found the same thing was true for that one, after about a year there was definitely a richness and depth to it that wasn't there initially and now it's even better!

 

[Ken_Russell]

From a personal viewpoint alone, always perceived-apart from a slight similarity, more of style and of a certain mood typical for a certain fragrance age through the mid and base of each-Tsar to be more of a green, dark, mossy resinous fragrance, while Safari for some reason quite richer and sweeter, also on the warmer spicy side.

 

[yourthemannowdog]

there was a reformulation during Cosmair days when there removed the metal neck from the bottles of safari the later batches where watered down a bit

 

[Hugh V.]

I still don't get the comparisons.

I am wearing Tsar today though, despite previously feeling it was too heavy, spicy, cloying, cheap-smelling, etc. It definitely has a lot of character, which I can appreciate. "Green, dark, mossy resinous" I pick up. It's got this "mysterious stranger" vibe to it. It's intriguing. I may be way off, but it's like a far better version of Jaguar for Men. Very much of its era, but it doesn't have the heavy baggage that some of the "dirty" powerhouses of the 80s have. It has a Speed Stick Irish Spring vibe to it. That dewey smell when you put on a lot of deodorant.

Safari is somewhat of an oddity to me, as I never experience it when it was released, but now I can't disassociate it from the early 90s.