Rhinoceros
Zoologist (2014)

This original iteration of Rhinoceros, by Paul Kiler, is a masterwork. It’s so assertive, so leather, so butch and yet so subtle over time. Really something to behold. It’s hard to believe this one has been discontinued in favor of Prin’s fourth or fifth take on Turkish Leather. The new one is nice. Maybe even wonderful if you don’t know this version. Superior.

Traditional masculine opening amplified to the point of being dark mixed in with various aromatics and sweetish rum giving a medical vibe to it, under this the beast is present a heavy dark rough leather which edges are cut by the aforementioned rum and a tobacco note, just cause its being tamed doesn’t subtract that this is a huge leather the kind to hit you in the face unapologetically, overtime the leather slowly calms down and hints of amber and musk come out amongst the empty fumes of a rum bottle.

This scent oozes masculinity, only “challenging” to those who become lost to current push of faceless fresh and clean scents and sugar bombs.

A beautiful mix of a big big lot of things, which opens with a lot of vegetal fragrances, along with spices and leather. The base notes are some sweet incense which I are originally gourmand.

Opens with a powerful herbal blast, like some kind of extreme essential oil blend, with an aura of turpentine or some other volatile liquid. The leather emerges, hard and slightly smoky at first, growing stronger, richer and muskier over time with a waxing vetiver note. It reminds me of the leather note in Shalimar. Remarkable.

Sprayed from an atomizer onto skin, Rhinoceros opens with a powerfully acrid aroma. To me, Rhinoceros' opening is somewhat reminiscent of Les Liquides Imaginaires Peau de Bête. Thankfully, the piercingly astringent funk lasts only a minute or two, and I begin to perceive wormwood, sage, and conifer needles, the bitter and aromatic vegetation described in the perfumer's notes. In about a half hour, the medicinal bitterness is still present, but it is now mixed with a potent vetiver, along with what I perceive to be frankincense, of a dry, smoky, and slightly sour variety. Does any of this smell like leather to me? Not really. Meanwhile some reviewers of Rhinoceros celebrate its opening notes of pure, raw leather. Perhaps the perfumers are suggesting a new idea of leather to me, the scent of a dusty rhinoceros washed with mentholated and volatile chemical spirits and rubbed down with herbs.

An hour later, Rhinoceros has changed dramatically and begins to evoke a specific dreamscape with almost cinematic clarity. In this phase, Rhinoceros is extremely beautiful, and I would wear it for this experience alone. I am visiting a very old house in New Orleans on a very hot day, as a thunderstorm impends.There is petrichor in the air. Inside, the cypress floorboards creak as I open a cedar-lined armoire containing old linens layered with bundles of vetiver roots. Everything is dry and scrupulously clean, with no mold or sourness, but I can smell old ashes in the grate, the dust of ages, and traces of cigars and pipes smoked long ago. I sniff the decanters of whiskey on a polished wood table, getting both the syrupy sweetness of bourbon and the peaty scent of an Islay single malt. And, yes, it is just possible that I am beginning to smell the crumbling leather bindings in the library.

Zoologist are interesting. They have a USP. Spray this and as your nostrils are taking it in, out of the swirling vapours you will be deafened by the charge of a rhino coming right at you up close and personal leaving no detail of his hygiene to your imagination. You yell in fright sitting up in bed waking from your horrible dream... but then was it a dream you muse as you sit sniffing what is probably the best dry leather smell I have experienced. Strong. This is doing exactly what it set out to do. Maybe you are a game hunter and its the smell of the rhino hide of the beast that charged you and the tanning process is not over yet either.
It's not something that I find pleasant but its interesting deadly accurate. No poetic license here or efforts to sanitise it . Where could you wear it? Who would you wear it for? A Hell's angel? It's fancy dress. A masterpiece and what an entree. I will keep my sample and show it for fun to fellow enthusiasts but thats it.
Note: Camel is the same thing dialed right down with some extra depth at which it fails so its much less interesting unless you enjoy smelling of a better tanned more expensive leather coat.
Fragrance: 8/10-- but not for me
Projection: 8/10
Longevity: 8/10