WHAT THE CRITICS ARE SAYING

The perfumes that speak to us most are often those with inherent contradictions. In the case of Ierofante from Parfums Quartana, the contradiction is that it softly explodes.

You’d expect a fragrance with gasoline and smoky notes to be high-key, projecting with incessant force. Instead, this Art and Olfaction Awards winner exhibits a restrained potency which lasts hours….. A convincing gasoline accord, softer than that of Dior Fahrenheit, is brilliantly paired with styrax resin, a natural material that somehow smells plasticine. There’s another contradiction: Ierofante smells both natural and synthesized; designed and incidental…

I think I would have felt this way even if I didn't know about the creative brief behind the perfume. The opening is so unique because it communicates the idea of flame and gasoline and these heavy, highly textured, typically nauseating smells and completely smooths them over, creating a break in expectations that raises the wearer’s own sense of anticipation.

You’re just smelling the beginning ethers of what you'd associate with these smells, expecting something to explode, something to combust, something to suddenly alight.

Ierofante stays in that perpetual state of explosive tension for most of the wear. The gas burns off, and the initial smoke-tinged notes fade, but a dark vetiver-tinged amber accord remains.

It's not ruggedly handsome or any other descriptor we usually pull for vetivers or smoke perfumes. It's gentle and suave the whole way through... it just happens to be a little combustible.

—Adam Forziati, Fragrantica