Black Sugar
Aquolina (2013)

The vanilla and raspberry combine to create a cotton candy smell. A tad over-powering, for me. After worn for several hours I can detect a slightly smoky, wood scent. A fun, girly-girl perfume.

Aquolina throws its (figurative) hat into the ring of synthetic oud perfumery with this little number, and comes up with something that smells like Gold Sugar got down with about half of the Montale catalogue. This is not necessarily a bad thing, since hiding underneath Gold Sugar's teenybopper façade is a wicked gourmand drydown, with much better depth and resonance than its price might lead you to expect. Add in the usual eastern florals (sweet roses being the most prominent players) and a decent smack of synthetic oud--and skip the jagged musk and aldehydes that can make Montale's girlier offerings such a terror to behold--and you've got a fun scent for the money.

The price of admission is five minutes of undistilled COTTON CANDY madness (Angel's opening is comparably grim, sober and restrained). This can either be unbearable, or this can be part of the fun; it depends on your personal tolerance for sweetness. If you can shake that off, the rest of the ride is worth it. Because--I kid you not--the end stage is a soft, dreamy drydown of pipe-shop tobacco that lies close to the skin and is sexy as heck.

Don't get me wrong, This is not challenging, not for snobs, and not for purists, but it can be had for less than a 20-spot, and it's good silly fun and will probably get discontinued. Me, I'm buying a can to take on my next vacation. I hope I never get so carried away by pefume that I'm immune to the fun offered by a good cheap thrill.