Jasmin Full
Montale (2006)

I have owned and worn several jasmine centered fragrances in my lifetime. Someone suggested I try Montale Jasmine Full in an attempt to expand my small repertoire.

For context, I love Amouage Portrayal Woman. And I used to love Creed Jasmine Imperatrice Eugene.

I sampled Jasmine Full along with three other jasmine-centric perfumes. Maybe my tastes have changed, perhaps my chemistry is off. But I found this fragrance off-putting and nauseating.

Jasmin Full performs as a full-on, strong, persistent and strong, slightly sour jasmine soliflore. The opening notes are white floral all the way. Something sour emerges during the immediate application, which I imagine is indolic jasmine and something from the orange blossom note.

This fragrance is a no-go in my opinion.

Jasmin Full by Montale (2006) is as it sounds; you get a full jasmine experience start to finish, and it's difficult to elaborate further on such a simple single-subject perfume, so this review may be particularly short. Jasmin Full is from the early days of Montale worldwide distribution, releasing the same year as the legendary Montale Black Aoud (2006), and is a big counterpoint to it scent-wise. I feel like it was most-likely meant to be a comparable to Olene by Diptyque (1988), with its clean jasmine white tea profile, although Jasmin Full is far thicker in the usual Montale manner.

The opening is full-blast jasmine white tea out of the gate, a bit of A La Nuit by Serge Lutens (2000) exists in the heart, with a honeysuckle benzoin mixture, but Jasmin Full doesn't go into cloves like the Lutens does, nor has much of a base besides a white musk mixed with orange blossom. Both incredibly light but somehow also thick and lasting, Jasmin Full solves all the performance woes one might have with something like Olene without moving into hugely indolic jasmine notes like Lust by Lush (2010) or playing with woody notes like some other options in this small category.

Performance is good for a jasmine perfume, but not on the standard of the usual Montale rose oud fare. If you're looking for a longer-lasting reference jasmine fragrance, that is basically the purpose of Jasmin Full, in much the same way of the later Montale Full Incense (2011) is a good reference for Somali incense. That's really it, and as I mentioned before, there isn't much to say about a jasmine scent that smells accurately of jasmine and lasts a long time. If this is your sort of thing (like it is for me), then pick it up, as it has far better prices than most things in this particular class of fragrance. Thumbs up

An ice water bucket to the senses-- this jasmine will wake you up before you're ready. It's lovely and loud and so jasminey that it's almost medicinal. Fruity and grapey and heady without being particularly creamy. The accents of orange flower raise the pitch and thin it out a bit. A licorice note provides structure after a few minutes. Love and Tears, Jasmin et Cigarette, Jasmin Rouge, and even Alien pale by comparison. The perfect jasmine for jasmine lovers. Layer it over aoud for drama.

An amazing opening. Just the heavenly dreamy narcotic sensuality of white flowers at their peak. Timeless joyous earthy beauty. Not particularly complex as far as it's non-floral notes go, there is a nice three dimensional variation among the floral notes of jasmine, orange blossom and honeysucke. As Jasmine Full dries down it quiets down to an extent I find a little depressing. I find myself wanting to bring it back to life applying more and more to recapture the ecstasy of it's opening...applying it again and yet again in increasingly larger doses. I hope I'm not developing a problem......
Thanks to Teardrop for her well placed enthusiam for this fragrance.

Update: January 13, 2012

My original review of this fragrance as based on my first purchased sample of same.
I have tested two additional samples from different purveyors since and with each new sample I find whatever enthusiam I had for Jasmine Full intitially to be on a serious downslide. For one thing all three samples while close enought in general character smelled significantly different in strength of individual notes, sample 2 for example was especially unpleasantly powdery sweet. Really pretty bad. One of the samples was of a much darker amber color than the other two. But worst of all I couldn't find much Jasmine in either of the new samples. Because I didn't have the foresight to save any of the original sample these tests of mine are probably even more "unscientific" than they sound. Suffice it to say that I would be be very wary about making a purchase here.

I absolutely adore this beautiful, clear, luminous jasmine, that soars & sings on my skin! It was love at first sniff for me, & wins hands down over every other jasmine that l've tried, including A La Nuit. l bought a full bottle, & this is what l wear in summer when l want to feel downright sexy. The first twenty minutes or so feels like delicate buds opening on a fresh bouquet of blooms, then there's wafts of honeysuckle, orange blossom & an almost minty quality, but the jasmine stays true to the real blossoms throughout. lt actually seems to become fresher & airier as the hours go by, like the dawn that follows a sultry night. The sillage & longevity are awesome. This will always be one of my very favorite fragrances. lf you love jasmine, you have to try this.

Montale lists jasmine, honeysuckle and orange blossom as the notes. I get mostly orange blossom and jasmine. I think it is a pleasant feminine..