Vetiver Blanc
Sultan Pasha (2016)

Vetiver Blanc by Sultan Pasha is an attar that pairs a humid vetiver root with gardenia and tuberose absolutes to create a soft, creamy jungle island vibe that makes one think of Gaugin-esque beauties and the hummus-rich earth of the rainforest. Don’t be afraid of the white florals here: they bring all of their sultry character but none of their stuffy, ladies-who-lunch associations. Sultan Pasha has a particular talent for turning white florals into blends that men feel comfortable wearing. Like his highly popular Jardin d’Borneo series, Vetiver Blanc is a blend charts an unmistakably green course.

The galbanum and the vetiver lend a smoky, rooty character to the blend, and it is this element that keeps the florals from dissolving into a big white floral mass of sugar and cream. With a whopping 35% dose of real ambergris in the blend, the attar fades out on a long, golden, salty trail that mimics the smell of skin after a long day at the beach.

Released in 2016, VB starts as a muted green but with a heady and a very creamy tuberose, supported by rooty and herbaceous elements, something salty, clary sage, dry cereal and hay-like smell (from Haitian vetiver), green grassy facet of Indian and Haitian vetiver. I speculate that the salty facet is a product of a combination of Haitian vetiver, sandalwood and a heavy dose of ambergris.

After 10 minutes it is a floral party on a humid evening after a rain in a garden somewhere in our Subcontinent - tuberose, gardenia, ylang ylang (creamy facet), karo karounde, sheuli, kamini, ylang ylang, baily, vetiver, salty ambergris - and celery! When inquired, Sultan explained to me that an aged floral is responsible for that celery facet.

Vetiver here is never shouty. It's contemplative nature (gentle amount of rooty and woody facets) is always there to balance the heady nature of the overall floral signature from the start to the end – a very unique experience. I don't get the neroli that many detect. One guess is my nose is busted at the moment, but I do get an astringent quality that is I get from neroli, clary sage (eo and abs), orange blossom, and IIRC, in the top-mid stage of some myrrh absolutes. I also get some facets of buddha wood, costus root, grapes (cognac), and a few more exotic things.

Vetiver Blanc dries down with a creamy gardenia, ambered & honey-laced coumarin (probably from hay and other things), a woody & creamy sandalwood with a gentle woody hum from vetivers, and perhaps guaiac wood. The use of vetiver with gardenia and tuberose is unique, brave and very risky. Vetiver can decimate any composition if not used carefully, especially Indian ones. Sultan successfully displays them here - albeit quite beautifully in a unique way - that tuberose, and gardenia can be sustained for a very long time in a non-linear pattern on skin without getting boring (not denigrating soliflores here). If you like those three and seeking something unique, this is definitely worth sampling. 5/5

For those who are enamoured of Tuberose, those who need neroli and/or orange blossom to pair will be disappointed. This dominates the opening and had me gasping. A mentholated herbal gas, I suspect Vetiver provides a pleasant sliver of
Counterpoint to the creamy gag of the Tuberose. Very quickly this steps back to allow a bloom of gorgeous Gardenia to come forth. For me this gem produces a buttery cloak similar to Tuberose,however carries more of an oxygen gas similar to Jasmine and a slight green bitterness, exotic citrus elegance the Tuberose lacks.
A natural Floral Musk based this and has it dry down like a Gardenia Absolute
Not really my cup of tea, however very nicely balanced.
I sampled this using a wooden toothpick. Later using the pick for tooth a very pleasant Jasmine layered met my palate.

Now this is gorgeous and I like it which is a surprise as I don't like tuberose in a scent but here it's blended well so I don't mind it so much. It does lean towards the feminine spectrum but not crazy so that I did not enjoy it. It's very nice!

It opens up with a very fresh blend of tuberose, gardenia, neroli, vetiver and ambergris and smells floral, fresh and salty. The gardenia is done so it does not overwhelm which is a accomplishment as that note can really take over if not blended properly.

The neroli note really lends a beautiful floral tinge to the overall freshness. After a hour or so when the tuberose/gardenia have calmed down the vetiver becomes more apparent and it's blended seamlessly with ambergris. You get that salty aspect with the vetiver and then the neroli just adds that gorgeous hue to the blend. And that's what you are left with to my nose in the drydown, a lovely salty ambergris vetiver that is made more beautiful with a shimmer of neroli when you can smell a waft of it drifting towards your nose.

Vetiver Blanc is one of the very greatest tuberose fragrances on the market, period. It doesn't lose any of the overt power of the tuberose but it at the same time refuses to directly force any wearer to take heed of the most challenging aspects of the tuberose itself. Don't get me wrong, there are the medical, mentholated, slightly rubbery qualities at play in the opening of this fragrance, but they become secondary qualities only found when inhaling incredibly deep after the first 15-20 minutes. As they are calming down, the immaculately blended, slightly earthy and warm vetiver begins to join in the dance, boosted by the sandalwood/gardenia combo at the base. The fragrance at this stage recalls the character of a refined, and yet down to earth character befitting a humble saint or God manifest found deep within the woods, (perhaps Frigg is a good example here - her devotion to familial life, her nurturing, patient, and devoted nature.) As it dries down into the main part of the fragrance, the tuberose is given charge to be a little more heady and maintain it's crisp, clean character while still being intensely floral and maintaining the creamy character coming from the gardenia/sandalwood basenotes. It's almost as if the tuberose starts with a bang, quiets down enough for other notes to take center stage while the tuberose commits an extravagant slight of hand behind the scenes - almost as if the wearer has been distracted enough by the majestic notes at play that the tuberose has a way of sneaking in the qualities that have garnered the cult status the note has without the wearer having to trouble themselves of relating to the more challenging characteristics. The tuberose is such a wonderful note utilized here, as it seems to take and invert the composite image represented in popular tuberose-based fragrance while still keeping the 'essence' of tuberose in tact - it could be the character of notes surrounding it which keeps the rubbery/peppery/violent character subdued and yet keeps the white floral character from faltering into a vague/abstract sweet/femme effect that dominates a lot of the more boring fragrances that boast tuberose as their core element - there is a majestic tension that is at the center of the note, holding together all that is and is not in a powerful essence that simply calls all to come and behold its majesty time and again.

The galbanum is underneath here as a clean green element giving the vetiver a boost in its reedy character which moves subtly about the middle of this opening, drawing the florals through a musky, semi-salty-semi-sweet and rosy while slightly smoky quality to the smooth earthy, damp and apothecial vetiver which while maintaining the quality that many mainstream houses use as a note synonymous with cleanliness, here that 'effect' is one transmogrified through a secret union with the ambergris and the sweet element of gardenia, and the headiness from the tuberose to create a strong heavenly effect, which is made all the more erotic by the very fact that, while these might culminate in a angelic choir, there is a distorted bass which provides the melody which the choir builds off of - that bass is the very self-same 'dirty' quality of the vetiver (which at times comes across nutty, and other times it seems like a 'ancient' quality - one which seeks to 'cover' the truth from the uninitiated) as well as the more mature elements of the tuberose, the 'sparkling' quality of the ambergris (which seems to read often asif seawater of a purified religious-ceremonial sort has somehow made it to land where these exotic floral and vegetal organisms have taken root) as well as a honeyed like quality that seems to stem from the gaiacwood, and a thick sensual musk which all combine together to create a dance like that of an exotic, tropical island of mystical lore, accessible only by dream, and one which leaves the individual who encounters it, heartbroken to have to return to the world from whence they came. Simply an immaculate tuberose-vetiver fragrance, which showcases Sultan Pasha's wonderful sandalwood-ambergris-gardenia mix in one of its strongest roles to date.

Vetiver Blanc is a genius combination of two star performers, with a supporting cast of legendary proportions - if you are a lover of tuberose or vetiver, or a fan of white florals or aromatic woody masculines you are greatly missing out if you do not have a bottle of Vetiver Blanc.

10/10
LONG LIVE SULTAN PASHA!

YT: Jess AndWeSH

Astonishing Vetiver attar by the genius Sultan Pasha. Imagine the heavenly drydown of Guerlain's Vetiver amplified 50x alongside an ample dose of ambergris. Beautiful work.