Fragrances ReviewedBilled as Chopard’s first offering in the Middle East, Oud Malaki literally strikes all of the right notes for oriental fragrance lovers.
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Overview
Oud Malaki (which means Royal Oud in Arabic) is a spicy woody oud based men’s fragrance by Swiss designer Chopard billed as their first offering to the Middle East released in 2012.
This was around the time that many of the design houses were releasing fragrances specially catering to lucrative Middle East region, which by far spends and uses more per capita on fragrance than any other region.
The nose behind this concoction is Dominique Ropion and it is available in 50 and 80 ml Eau de Parfum offerings.
Presentation
Chopard Oud Malaki
The bottle on this one is in tune with the rest of the Chopard Malaki line which was based on the design from the Noble line.: being a cylindrical bottle, with vertical grooves and a stopper that looks like a watch band which is a pretty cool design cue in homage to Chopard’s roots as a 160 year old watchmaker. Major bonus points.
The bottle has a firm, solid, premium feel to it with a nice thick-bottomed glass bottle, a weighty and stopper embroidered with the Chopard signature logo, and gold as the theme matching the color of the juice.
Even though it may look inconspicuously like an average perfume bottle, these factors when considered together make for an awesome package.
Score: 9/10
Juice (Scent Composition)
The listed notes on this one are grapefruit (which literally lasts about 20 seconds after application before giving way to the woods), lavender, tobacco, spice, leather, oud, woods, and ambergris.
It literally strikes all of the right notes when it comes to embodying a Middle Eastern fragrance. Even if you don’t care much for oud, you can get down with this one. The tobacco, spice and leather give the oud a bit of a dustier profile vs the infamous barnyard odor that throw many people off.
No barnyard here; just warm, dark, good-smelling juice. There is a bit of an animalic profile to it, though.
The thoughts that are evoked when I smell it: “warm”, “royal” “dark”, “warm”, and “sensual.”
If I were to describe it in Layman’s terms, I would say that it smells like Big Red Chewing gum + Tobacco + oud.
This scent is amazing, mysterious, and intriguing to the senses.
Score: 9/10
Performance
Projection: Oud Malaki is surprisingly a bit on the mild side when it comes to projection which may be good news to many people looking to rock something oudy and oriental without being offensive. 7/10
Longevity: Not the longest lasting oud-based fragrance, but it still holds its own by last up to 10 hours on the skin and wow what a wonderful skin scent it leaves. 8/10Best Season: Fall and Winter
Best Occasion: Casual. This one is pretty office safe if applied sparingly.
Recap and Score
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Is it right for you?
If you are an oriental fragrance nut who loves oud and/or tobacco, then do not let this one pass you up. If you want to try and oud based fragrance and don’t want to be too offensive then give this one a try. It’s a very underrated and overlooked fragrance in my opinion.
What are your thoughts? Have you tried this one? I’d love to hear them down below