Roses Greedy
Mancera (2012)

Montale Roses Greedy (2012) is your basic mall rose fragrance delivered at triple strength and parading in a niche perfume bottle, full stop. Naturally, I'm going to give more insight than that but if you're here for the synopsis, there it is. Pierre Montale pumps out a gross number of releases every year across his Montale and Mancera lines, with not all of them possibly being winners, as you can imagine, with several feeling almost redundant when compared to similar entries from the sister line. In the case of Roses Greedy, it sort of feels like an unused Montale rose perfume formula since the characteristic "Montale" rose is here, and the "Greedy" name that is typically seen in Montale branding is oddly brought over to Mancera instead. Maybe Montale had one too many rose perfumes and this was brought over to give Mancera fans one extra (and they have quite a few too), but regardless of the reason, it's here. I'm sure fans of fruity bright eye-catching commercial rose perfumes would enjoy this, but the sticker shock for the kind of customer this engenders will keep them away, and connoisseurs won't fall for it, leaving only the hardcore house fans, the morbidly curious, or the discount shoppers not paying retail for Mancera anyway. This style seems to have been perfected and moderated over time by both Pierre Montale himself and other niche perfumers doing the same thing, so this is sort of the Montale Black Aoud (2007) of the pink candy rose genre, if you will. If Barbie had an official niche perfume, this would be it.

Mancera Roses Greedy is very powerful, as you might expect considering the house, and sort of comes across like an early take on the candy rose genre popularized in the niche world with more recent scents like Parfums de Marly Delina (2017), which is something of a gold standard in this segment. Delina defines itself by using sweet fruity top notes and peony with rose, while the older Mancera Roses Greedy comes out of the gate with the sweet and rounded notes first, but doesn't hold them with the rose for the entire dry down. Blackcurrant, peach, and mandarin orange lead the charge but then fade behind a bright powdery rose, softened with coconut. Hedione and dihydromyrcenol give the rose a fresh uplifting feeling with the coconut being the dancing partner until vanilla, ambroxan, and white musk enter to cement things in a warm musky clean. Tiny bits of ozonic sharpness remain into the skin finish, but this is all about the candy rose. I can't help but be reminded again of the Glade Angel Whispers scented candle with perfumes like this, except with Roses Greedy, that aesthetic is dialed to eleven. Just for reference, reviewing this perfume gave me a solid sinus headache, which is something that rarely happens to me with fragrance. Wear time is 12+ hours and sillage is "oh my God" levels of strong, with projection crossing time zones, so this is nothing if not true to form for the brand (either Montale or Mancera to be honest). Best use is pretty much whenever you want attention, because everyone is going to smell the blinding trail of neon pink rose water Kool-Aid you leave behind as you walk, and Roses Greedy can power it's way through all seasons.

I think Roses Greedy is like the perfect token overpriced perfume made for the perfectly vapid arm candy girlfriend of some rich asshole magnate, a guy who confuses big price tags for good taste, and buys his glorified escort this because it smells like "something she would like" without ever asking her, but costs 3 times anything she owns so she'll be impressed. In the same league as Hello Kitty special edition Lamborghinis or bright pink Louis Vuitton luggage, Mancera Roses Greedy has a John Waters trash culture vibe but gentrified up through luxury pricing and branding, until the "it's so bad it's good" appeal is mostly gone. Instead of being an ironically tacky fragrance like Jungle Jezebel by Sarah Baker Parfums (2018), itself an actual homage to the late drag queen Divine (who played in many John Waters films), Mancera Roses Greedy is not presented as self-aware enough of it's own tackiness, like the aforementioned silicone bimbo back at the penthouse of our hypothetical magnate who hasn't realized the Beatles were right when singing "money can't buy me love". Money sure can buy you a bottle of Mancera Roses Greedy though. As an aside, I do have a friend who shares a bottle of this with his wife, and they fully see the humor in this and enjoy it for it's unintentional schlock charm. If bright and sweet laundry musk rose bombs are your thing, or you want to pretend like you're a fashion model on the hood of a car in an 80's hair metal music video, this is for you. Life in plastic, isn't it fantastic? Sample and see for yourself. Neutral

Packed full of a throat scratching synthetic, however it leaves a Jasmine, Rosey, Soapy drydown I find enchanting.
Scents pleasant on my girl and a light brush on myself leaves me feeling freshly.
Light spray though unless you want to present a blinding, White Musk.

Tons of blackcurrant (and probably a tad of saffron) for a lascivious, bright, fruity-coconutty, creamy rose (paired by a yummy-salty balmy jasmine). There is a general sophisticated muskiness throughout. Feminine.

Certainly one of the better fresh rose fragrances I've tried that has unisex appeal, I now understand how Mancera Roses Greedy can be so popular. It's unoffensive, not over-the-top floral nor too alternatively sweet to distract from the namesake note.

There are other minor elements mixed in (I can detect the peach, perhaps the the coconut in the opening, and mainly the musk in the dry down) but the overwhelming experience of Roses Greedy is a fresh bouquet of roses.

I like it very much as I believe it achieves what it sets out to do quite well, and achieves an agreeable, versatile fresh rose scent, though I'd mainly imagine this being used on warm weather days, not dressy enough for the night nor powerful enough for the colder weather.

Performance is okay, like Cedrat Boise, but a little unimpressive given the EDP concentration, though it's at least priced more reasonably than many niche fragrances. Still, it's a bit of a tough sell for the price ($160 for 120ml retail at Luckyscent, but $105 on BeautySpin).

I like it, but wouldn't buy it--for those looking for a fresh rose scent, though, this could be a great reward.

7 out of 10