Bing Ma Yong
Auphorie (2019)

Bing Ma Yong from Auphorie is quite a peculiar olfactory journey that succeeds in portraying the vision it draws inspiration from while pulling from the roots of vintage perfumery aesthetic. If I were to guess, works like Guerlain's Djedi.
It is a dark and mysterious perfume, with vintage bits and an ancient aura around it. Contradictory, the opening is surprisingly bright and joyful. An intricate introduction displaying aldehydes, spices, oranges, and vague floral notes. A cooling breath from the cloves transporting a faint floral accord and a zesty orange breeze. It lasts about 5 minutes before it starts to darken slowly and surely. The orris and vetiver pair together to help suggest a terracotta, dry clay-like accord. The orris feels earthy, rooty, and powdery, while the vetiver only amplifies its rooty facets hinting at the idea of life underneath the earth. The interplay creates this dry clay accord, not wet, as some compositions might unfold, such as Olympic Orchids Salamanca. The powderiness of the orris seems to suggest the dust that collected over the terracotta figures. In the base, the perfume shifts to a dusty, worn leather accord, lots of musks, mostly civet, spicy sandalwood, and the everlasting orris. It ends here and stays like that for many hours. I love this stage. It smells beautifully in the sillage, always throwing out subtle different facets. Sometimes more of the civet, others the spicy sandalwood, powdery orris, or old leather. As bright as the opening is, the darker the final stage feels.
It walks in the footsteps of compositions like Djedi and its more modern interpretation in Sultan Pasha's Thebes. It beautifully portrays the discovery of the first Qin Emperor's Mausoleum and the atmosphere inside its tomb. Climbing the hill, where the air is clear, the flowers bloom and spices permeate the air from the nearby small shops only to unveil the heaviness of a two thousand years' scent, inside the tomb.

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Rich and radiant, Bing Ma Yong is like an underworld version of Amouage Gold Man crossed with Masque's Romanza. So for once with an Auphorie perfume my nose picks up referents but there's no anxiety of influence at play – this is a confident and deeply pleasing creation. Suitable to the back story of a long-buried chamber, the gorgeous heart of this perfume is enclosed in layers of humid and earthy, slightly musty vetiver. This kind of stuff is like catnip to me unleashing an inner goth that is completely at odds with my persona – but I realize not everyone has an equal appreciation of such things. But what of that heart? It's like the gleam of gold in this tantalizingly perfumed dirt. It suggests a completely indulgent accord of a concentrated floral note oomphed up with fatty, animalic musk – like the gorgeously preening rose-hued jasmine that blooms within Gold or the death-by-butter narcissus that floods Romanza.
These associations fade with the wear, as the drydown reveals where we have been heading all along – the darker spectrum of vetiver. All the throat-constricting heavenly muck of it which I absolutely love but which tends to get edited out in too many perfumery uses of the material. Infuse that with Auphorie's very convincing, sweetish vegan musk and we truly are in a catacomb – but a regal one with a serpent of sensuality stirring within.
Two quibbles – 1) Bing Ma Yong's projection is much quieter in the drydown than other Auphorie extraits, 2) which makes me question the steep asking price for what is essentially a vetiver-based offering.