David Yurman Limited Edition
David Yurman (2011)

Oud rises to greet you on the top. It mingles with the geranium, saffron, and coriander. There's an almost honey vibe here. Oud remains strong. Rose is the next player. It vibrates, buzzes.

Oh. Yet another oud & rose blend that doesn't thrill but it's "nice". There is a tiny violet flower peeking though the mix. Later the oud relaxes, revealing other slightly soft notes; saffron & geranium still exist, still play here. Notes here overall, are well-blended. If the top notes lasted and stayed strong I'd be a bit more excited.

Jasmine note increases with time. It becomes pretty actually. A hint of musk and patchouli reveal themselves, too. Slight vanilla in here. A nicely done yet safe, perfume. Kind of floral-fruity at times, with its raspberry. I have enjoyed better "rose & oud" scents.

Dark exotic rose
Making gravity sexy
In that Yurman way.

Noir de Noir meets Tuscan Leather and viola! There's a lot of talk whether a man could pull this fragrance off. I am and I will. This is exquisite. I'm getting a few more of these bad boys while the getting is good! I'm going to need surgery to have my nose excavated from my wrist after this!

Stardate 20170227:

A Tuscan Leather clone that can stand on its own. I think this is better done than the original and its clones (La Yuq, AdP Leather, PdM).
It has a nice development that the others lack. Had this used better quality ingredients it could have been the best of the pack.
Starts with rose and greens. Then fruits appear followed by the TL type drydown. I wish the development took longer than the quick 30mins but for price I am not complaining.

At $40 this is a no brainer.

I've had to re-test this fragrance several times, because in the very short time it takes for my mind to wander off, the scent performs such a 180 on my skin that I keep wondering what perfume I actually have on.

The second part is so completely removed from the first that it's like wearing two different perfumes. If you're not sniffing your arm like a hawk and focusing intensely, you might miss the transition completely and wonder what the hell just happened to the dark rose fragrance you originally put on. Because what I end up with is a smooth, boot-polish leather that feels texturally very close to Tuscan Leather.

And I know I didn't start out with Tuscan Leather. David Yurman Limited Edition starts off on a beautifully rose note, roughly hewn and set in a dry smoky haze of oud and spices. It feels slightly green and herbal. That rose is really excellent quality. I can tell that the oud is the standard synthetic variant out of either Firmenich or Givaudan, but the rose smells like a really high quality Taif rose oil. It is bright, sharp, and lemony – almost harsh at first, but then loosening out into something sweeter.

Quite quickly. I lose the moist, fleshy parts of the rose, but what remains of the rose oil are the germanium-green and lemony-sharp facets, leaving their high-pitched, oily traces on all the other notes.



The base – which comes on very fast and surprised me every time – is a dusty vetiver leather with a fruity, boot-polish note lent by the raspberry. The combination comes off as dry and slightly musky and is very close to the way Tuscan Leather smells in its far drydown.

The raspberry note doesn't smell like a fresh raspberry, but adds this strange, solvent-like tone to the leather. I have noticed this plasticky, boot-polish like effect of the raspberry note in two fragrances thus far: Tuscan Leather and Impossible Iris (Ramon Monegal). It is very appealing, because it adds a modern edge to the musky, sawdusty leather accord.

I like this perfume very much, and I'm given to understand that it's not that expensive either. It is extrait-strength, so it is long-lasting. Unusually for an extrait, it projects quite powerfully too.

Many quote this as a great rose-oud-leather fragrance for men, and I agree. In fact, it's a creditable alternative to Portrait of a Lady or Tuscan Leather if you're on a budget. It might also do the trick for fans of Atelier Cologne's Oud Sapphir. I'm not saying it rivals their quality, but for the price, it gives you a smoky, oudy rose over leather that lasts all day. For most, that will do the job.

David Yurman Limited Edition is a powerful rose/oud combination enhanced by suede and lightened in part by raspberry and vanilla. The opening is almost harsh--the oud factors in strongly throughout the life of the fragrance but the sweeter notes come out more in the dry down, as is typically the case. Saffron and coriander help shape the fragrance herbally without taking much of the attention away from the oud, the centerpiece.

This reminds me of Rose d'Arabie from the Armani Prive line, though DYLE is more acerbic and oud-heavy than rose-heavy. DYLE's sprayer is a jet stream, though, so it requires a delicate and deliberate application as distribution is limited.

DYLE is an extrait, so particularly with its note arrangement, it's unsurprising that it's powerful in terms of both projection and longevity. Also unsurprising is that this should likely be reserved exclusively for colder weather---it's difficult to predict how cloying it might be in warm weather. At $31 for a 75ml tester on FragranceNet, this is an unusual bargain that should be tried. Strong and a steal of a deal, I like but don't love it, as it's still a little too harsh for me to fully warm up to, but it has a rightful place in my collection.

8 out of 10