Eau d'Italie is the debut fragrance release from the Eau d'Italie brand, the brainchild of the Sersale family, owners of the Positano hotel Le Sirenuse. Eau d'Italie was created by nose Bertrand Duchaufour, and the notes include citrus, magnolia, musk, incense, cedar, honey, and blackcurrant.

Eau d'Italie opens with bergamot and other citrus notes. There is light honeyed cedar, and hints of resins and incense. The floral notes are extremely subtle, as is the blackcurrant. It is a sheer, unisex scent, with a musky dry down.

Earlier this year I posted a blurb about this scent from the London Independent (3/5), who described it as...

...glorious: local ingredients such as bergamot, magnolia and cedar circulate around a central accord of sun-baked "clay" and it's this mineral heart which makes Eau D'Italie so pleasantly abstract and fresh.

I will second "pleasantly abstract and fresh", and it does in fact smell rather like clay: clay with cedar and musk. But I am not sure I would go so far as "glorious". I have tried it 3 times now, and while I don't dislike it, I find it perhaps too abstract for my taste. It is not bland exactly, but nor does it have as much personality as I had expected.

I can't decide if this is nicer than I think it is, and if perhaps I am just disappointed because it doesn't smell anything like I thought it would. I am going to set my sample aside and try this again later in the summer. I will say that the lasting power is excellent.

A 100 ml bottle of Eau de Toilette is $98; it is also available as a 200 ml Eau de Cologne splash for $78. For buying information, see the listing for Eau d'Italie under Perfume Houses.

Possibly of interest