Potion Royal Black
Dsquared2 (2013)

synthetic as Hell...but I love everything about it. Its fundamentally, a dense, smokey, rose scent. Very dark..

This is my signature scent. It is one of the real powerhouses of this era. It really has everything I look for in a fragrance.

Masculine, deep, dark, unique, sexy, seductive.

Sweet yet fresh, manly yet sensual...

Scent: Out of this word (10/10)
Longevity: Excellent (9/10)
Sillage: Above average (8/10)

You can count me as a fan of this house because they usually create solid fragrances with good quality and really good prices. they are around $45-$50 in my country which I believe is a great price for what your getting.

Even though I'm not a fan of rose, I like this one.
This fragrance opens up with semi sweet musky and semi fresh blast of rose along with lots of black pepper and easy to detect leather note. leather here is completely modern, mellow smoky and very pleasing while it's sweetened by musk and softened by rose.

As time passes, rose is right there almost without any changes, black pepper settles down quite a bit and leather gets smoother while incense joins in and dominates completely over the scent. incense in this fragrance isn't ashy or smoky that much. it's more toward bitter herbal and kind of aromatic side while there is a little bit of leather besides it to add mellow smoky aura.
The mid as I described is a dry, bitter, aromatic and slightly smoky scent with warm and semi sweet musk and good support of rose to mellow things down.

In the base almost all notes are going in the background. the base is a warm, mellow sweet musky/vanilla scent with familiar cinnamon aura of the original potion along with some rose and some leather both waaaaaay in the background.
Projection is average and longevity is around 6-7 hours on my skin. a good fragrance for fall if you like these type of scents.

Im a sucker for dark manly rose scents. I own Club De Nuit Intense by Armaf which is basically NOIR DE NOIR minus $250+, David Yurman's Limited Edition, Aramis Calligraphy Rose, Shade's Wood and now DSquared's Potion Royal Black. Owning these scents gives you an idea of the versatility of rose notes in fragrances. They are undeniably rosy but they aren't anywhere near copies of each other as far as fragrances go. Each has a very unique take on Rose and Potion is one of my favorites. What makes this different from the others is the Incense, Leather and Rose combo. These notes combine to create a very sensual fragrance. It's also very niche in terms of the smell, blend, and performance.

As has been mentioned it is very easy to see this scent selling for 5x its asking price and it would probably sell more if that were the case than it does as an affordable designer scent. There are some synthetics used but so what? WIth IFRA rules in play even Niche brands are producing SYNTHETIC scents. The bottom line is the smell and this smells amazing.

Scents like this is what frugal frag heads live to find. Something which should be far more exclusive being sold at an accessible price. And because the availability is so scarce chances are no one will smell like you. I collect fragrances because of gem finds like this.

This will certainly be one of my night out scents as it gets colder which is when this scent, I believe, would fit best. Its a warm, dense, sweet, but masculine take on Rose. I get consistently over 10 hours (i spray on my Tshirts) with great sillage for the first 4 hours. On clothes this will last forever. So give a couple sprays between your chest and your Tshirt and you will be giving off whiffs of this forever...lol...

Simply put...A wow factor Fragrance.

If u don't like rose scents this may be one which changes your mind. Its undeniably beautiful.

10/10- This scent is everything I want in a fragrance and is a unicorn compared to the hosts of generic designer scents which all smell the same these days. It gets a 10 because it measures up to the best from the Designer world past and present.

On my journey for the perfect men's rose fragrance (under $60.00) I acquired a sample of Potion Royal Black.

At first I was in love, I almost went and bought a bottle immediately. After spending some more time with it, I realized this fragrance isn't for me. Royal Black opens with a beautiful modern rose note, similar to that in 24 Platinum, and Rose 31, that same sweet, almost more synthetic smelling rose. (because real rose actually smells a bit dirty, and these don't) It quickly transforms into a heavy, and I do mean heavy, smokey, very smokey, almost rubbery smelling incense and leather combo. Smells like something from the Smell Bent brand to be honest. It has a lot of leather, but the leather isn't my style as it's rather animallic. Eventually, and I mean hours and hours later, it evolves back into a rose top note with a vanilla undertone, I also get some coriander.

If you're looking for a bold rose fragrance, that's undeniably masculine, and won't break the bank.. this could be a good option.. just make sure you love smokey, leather fragrances. I think it's the combination of smoking incense and animallic leather that turns this off for me. 24 Platinum is my favorite rose fragrance in the under $60.00 price range right now.

rose, tobacco and leather , the drydown is a barrage of synthetics, alas!