Aoud Vanille
Mancera (2015)

This one is heaven! Its definitely a sweet gourmand scent, but a grown up one. You don't smell like a cupcake.

Initially i get a lush combination of rich buttery wood notes (quite oak or teak like to my nose) slathered in creamy caramelly vanilla, and a hefty dollop of cardamom on top. The cardamom is definitely very noticeable but not so in your face that it takes over. My OH really likes cardamom but even he said this fragrance is really nice.

On drydown the cardamom mellows & fades/blends into the overall warm woody oud notes. The vanilla remains on the forefront of the fragrance but matures & almost intensifies when the wood & spice notes mellow & blend together. The result is a warm super cozy vanilla with rich golden caramel hints to it, resting on lush Creamy wood notes.

Its a very sexy, sultry grown up vanilla. Absolutely lush!

Hands down my best blind buy!

The opening is a blast of burnt vanilla, medicinal oud, and pepper. The wIfe said it smelled smokey. It's there but I don't get too much of that. In the drydown, as the name implies, this is a vanilla and oud focused scent, with vanilla being 60% of that combo. That focus on the vanilla makes this pleasant to wear and smell.

Aoud Vanille feels like a cooler weather scent that could be good for date nights. Unisex for sure.

Performance is really good with noticeable projection and all-day longevity.

A pleasant vanilla with added floral, sandalwood & oud notes.

Nothing amazing and in a way quite generic although still smells decent.

Longevity & sillage are both good.

If you own Montale/Mancera fragrances, you know all about this awful opening: pure alcohol for the first few minutes. The oud is synthetic and like all of their other oud scents: no difference there. The vanilla is also very heavy, synthetic and smells cheap. The balance between the two is better than expected: the spice and oud keeps the vanilla from being cloyingly sweet, as does the woody base.

Projection is pretty strong, don't overapply. Longevity is 4-5 hours, average for the line. The drydown mellows everything out: it becomes much better during the second phase. The vanilla and oud mellow out to a much more pleasant combination, sweet and sensual. It just takes too long for it to get to that point for me to recommend, and the opening is so strong and powerfully abrasive the much improved yet very linear second stage of the scent still inclines me to give this a thumbs down.

5/10

This is an ok oud scent. It's not groundbreaking or anything special, and the oud in this is so mainstream/Westernized that it seems almost muted. In fact I don't even get any chocolate type aroma that I usually get with ouds. It just smells sort of muted. On the drydown the vanilla starts to become more apparent. But instead of smelling like natural or boozy vanilla as in for example Replica's Jazz Club, this oddly smells almost exactly like the Pakistani ice cream known as kulfi on my skin. It's uncannily similar. Sillage is moderate while longevity is pretty good (but it's no beast). It's a nice scent but not something I would buy a full bottle of to be honest.

4/5

Just received this today after a blind buy and I must say I'm enjoying this fragrance. Wood and vanilla is all I get (initial reaction) and that's good because that is what I was expecting. Will definitely keep trying. Plus, strong juice.

It layers great with Jo Malone's Oud & Bergamot

Update: so today's my second day wearing this and I'm enjoying it more and more. Got two compliments today...so that's cool