McGregor
Fabergé (1983)

Praising the modest and reliable drugstore cologne is so transgressive when amongst the fragrance enthusiast's milieu of navel-gazing connoisseurs who kneel to luxury exclusive lines from designers like Celine or fetishize small-batch artisanal brands. McGregor isn't even mind-blowing, but it's just so damn good. It is soapy, musky, vaguely leathery, and a refreshing palate cleanser from haute parfumerie.

It's cut from a similar cloth as other woody, spicy chypres of the period, but while several others have been captured by dubious hype and therefore jacked-up in price, McGregor remains relatively affordable. There's a delightful lime and lavender opening, it is herbaceous and spicy in the heart, and has that mellow masculine woody base that has this melancholic feel of nostalgia.

McGregor by Fabergé (1983) is a fragrance released right on the eve of McGregor Corporation's takeover of the once-mighty Fabergé Cosmetics. Once owned, they dumped a lot of the ancilliary products Fabergé had released (including the infamous Farah Fawcett lines) in favor of pumping out products for McGregor's own menagerie of labels, like Botany 500. Some collectors see the release of McGregor as the beginning of the end, as Fabergé was forced to make so much of it and advertise it so hard, it languished on shelves for years after release, still being reasonable in price compared to many other discontinued Fabergé products to this day. Some of this also may be because of how much is out there still. One thing is for sure, there isn't anything particularly unique or special about McGregor, and absolutely no relation to the MacGregor line of sporting goods and golf shoes, which I found a bit disappointing. What McGregor cologne lacks in uniqueness however, it more than makes up for with bulletproof construction, and performance that won't make you wish you carried the bottle to work with you so that you can re-apply (a problem with a number of period drugstore fragrances).

The scent sits in a sort of Venn-Diagram between several other soapy leathery chypre fragrances released in and around the same time. I mostly recall fragrances like Avon Cordovan (1982), Sung Homme by Alfred Sung (1988), Preferred Stock by Coty (1990), and Giorgio Beverly Hills Red for Men (1991). The closest kissing cousin is the Avon scent, and both it as well as McGregor share a core of aldehydes, carnation, oakmoss, and leather. The fluffy white musks and focus on pine define the Sung, while Preferred Stock leans more into vetiver smoke and leather, while the Giorgio is both the soapiest of the lot, and most complex with a castoreum contrast laid against that soap. MacGregor somehow smells "older" than the rest, despite being a year newer than the Avon, and maybe this is due to the choice of both lime and anise giving it a bit more old-school barbershop edge. All told, this is a handsome-smelling fragrance, even if not particularly memorable, but I somehow think the kind of guy using it back in the 80's wasn't concerned with leaving an impression on anyone. Expect about eight hours of medium projection from McGregor, and its best use is in fall through spring if outside.

If you're a fan of clean full-bodied drugstore scents, and especially ones from the 80's that often crossed the streams between chypre, fougère, animalic musk, and modern abstract cleanliness without a single drop of reverence for the presumed "natural order", then McGregor may be right up your alley. These sort of toss-ups between soapy musky notes, arboreal notes, and floral leather dandiness were once downright plebian with how common they once were, hence so many competitors for old McGregor like I mentioned earlier. If you have a good number of those, owning this too may seem redundant, but also if this is one of your favorite styles, and you're particularly fond of the "blue collar cologne guy" vibe from the late 70's through early 80's, you can get your Groove on with McGregor, especially as it's one of the easier-to-find of the old Fabergé masculines aside from Brut by Fabergé (1964). Once Meshulam Riklis sold Fabergé to Unilever, and it went from Lever Fabergé to Elida-Fabergé to eventual bust, meaning ol' McGregor boy would go bust along with it. Overall a solid 80's fragrance, but don't expect it to change your life or make you fall in love. Thumbs up

Anyone who misses McGregor should try Sung Homme. I have compared them on opposite hands several times and the progressions are virtually identical, although Sung Homme lasts a bit longer.

Camp Beverly Hills for Men is also very similar, but also discontinued.

Mostly out of curiosity, and because of its wonderful back story (see above), I bought McGregor, thinking if nothing else, at the end of the transaction I'd have a bottle on my shelf called “McGregor” and that was about the level of winning to which I aspired. Calling it a sheepish chypre is surely me succumbing to a clannish urge to indulge in Scottish stereotype (Hey McLeod, get off of my ewe etc.) but there really is a subtlety to this scent for which the knowledge that you're smelling an early 80s release by Faberge in no way prepares you: the lime and sage notes dominate, but in harmony with a restrained patchouli darting in and out over top of a steady bass line of vetiver. Elsewhere, I've seen McGregor referred to as “harsh” but that's the name and the company getting in the way of the scent: this isn't Danny Boyle's Trainspotting sequel (Begbie about to head butt), it's the James Bond of Sean Connery in grey flannel, eyebrow cocked.

A very nice masculine chypre - not outstanding like a Cabochard or a Quorum, but very very nice - gentle, soft. This has become my every day chypre, with the aforementioned other two as my "special event" chypres.

Thanks to Faberge for creating a decent, gentle, not over the top, chypre at a decent price.

What a nice surprise! A blind buy reminiscent of Polo Crest (even the bottle is similar) and Chevignon, with an herbaceous opening of lime and sage, mixed with patchouli and vetiver, and although I'm not discerning enough to identify it exactly, maybe a hint of anise in the base somewhere? With Polo Crest nearly impossible to find and Chevignon becoming more so, this will become my fall back replacement. Available at less than a 1/4 of what either of the former go for on eBay, I'd say it's a safe buy.