Burberry just launched Mr. Burberry, a fragrance described as the 'lover' of 2014's My Burberry. The first thing that came to my mind after smelling Mr. Burberry was: what a dull couple!
Burberry, fashion or fragrance, is not a favorite brand of mine. I'm at saturation point with the scarves and trench coats, but those two categories plus the mainstream Burberry perfumes make tons of money (the most money?) for the house. Mr. Burberry is described as a "woody herbal fragrance" and was developed by perfumer (also not a favorite) Francis Kurkdjian. Burberry's listed notes are grapefruit, tarragon, cardamom, birch leaf, nutmeg, cedar, sandalwood, vetiver and guaiac wood.
Mr. Burberry goes on smelling of aquatic (department store, not orchard) grapefruit, then comes a schmear of the other notes — the usual watery cedar and cardamom, almost-not-there vetiver, squandered guaiac. What these notes produce is a "product" Abercrombie & Fitch could easily market to its high school clientele who adore faded, wiskered, distressed, tight clothes.
In mid-development, Mr. Burberry smells quite like generic women's aquatic-type perfumes; perhaps due to the quality of its ingredients, Mr. Burberry smells stale as it develops. Mr. Burberry is a prosaic spice/wood/citrus "mixture"; as clueless as the faces of many of Burberry's teen fashion models. If Mr. Burberry could speak: "Ummm. This is, like, ummm, COO-uhl! Am-AAA-zing! AWE-sum!" (misspellings intentional).
I hope Miss My Burberry is satisfied with her lover, Mr. Burberry; I'm not.
Mr. Burberry is available in 30 ($55), 50 ($68), 100 ($88) and 150 ($116) ml Eau de Toilette; if you'd like "extra cheese" go online and order it from Burberry.com and request that your bottle be monogrammed.
Mr Kurkdjian isn’t my FAVE!!! perfumer but he has done some interesting things in his own line, and some awfully pretty things. He must have needed an influx of cash to take this one on. Then again, Amyris Homme is so dismally mass appeal (spiky woods, as Denyse at GdM pointed out) that it’s hard to always give him credit.
I rocked coworker’s world by telling him that Burberry is unusually bad when it comes to their perfumes. It’s such a bait-and-switch.
Coumarin, it is, and am amazed at how many people do love the Burberry scents. I don’t think they even register in perfumista land. (Back to attending the crickets! Ha!)
My Burberry (the lady frag) was super-cloying on me when I tried it last year. I’ll go ahead and skip Mr. Burberry – thanks for the warning Kevin!
I am in that perfumista space where Burberry Body (fall/winter) and Burberry Brit Sheer (spring/summer) wear wonderfully on me, and the rest of the house is either cloying or burned vitamins on my skin (really not cute).
Hope you are enjoying the sunshine Kevin! Seattle is having a gorgeous day 🙂
Nebbe…YES…took a LOOOOONG walk at lunchtime today.
The only Burberry scents I ever found even mildly interesting were the Brit special editions, Gold and Red. And as for the last couple of “special” MFK releases, more like the emperor’s new clothes.
I really liked My Burberry (EdP) but the Mister was a disappointment. I didn’t find it horrible but then I suppose tolerable isn’t what Kurkdjian was going for either (one wonders about the budget for his brief). In defense of the brand, I must say I enjoyed the original men’s Burberry, now reformulated to death, and think that women’s Brit and Beat are damn fine, especially in EdP.
Adding that I smelled Brit on a friend of my mine two days ago and that, sadly, it seems to have been tinkered with, too.
Dusan: At this stage I can’t remember what Burberry for Men smelled like (I remember smelling the vintage for a review I was writing long ago). It seems the Burberry women’s perfumes get more love than the men’s scents.
However, London for men got an extreme amount of love. A wonderful scent.
Kevin, I always feel bad that you have to review such things. 🙁 Better luck next time!
noz: as a nose refresher I think I’ll review a couple of old favorites I’ve never gotten around to writing about….
I’d withhold judgment Nozknoz til you smell it yourself… the reviewer in question is dangerously difficult to please, you might find yourself enjoying it if you give it a sniff, pretty much like virtually everything he’s dismissed that I later smelled and realized was no where near as offensive, awful, bland, generic or dull. But maybe that’s just me! LOL! And as for Not liking Francis Kurkdjian… Well, now I am positive I can’t trust any review again by said reviewer!! He’s in my mind one of the best Noses in the business.
Commenter…I do think it’s just you. Truly.
“Dangerously difficult?”
Perhaps “Dangerously” was a trifle Hyperbolic… “Exceedingly” might have been less extroverted of a term!
As you have said before, you do have rather high standards for fragrance, so saying you that you’re difficult to please is nothing that you haven’t admitted yourself! Am I incorrect!?! Please do let me know if I am!
For heaven’s sakes. I just yesterday watched a YouTube review that trashed Mr. Burberry far worse than Kevin did. Here are two quick excerpts from the single review on Basenotes: “By far one of the most irrelevant, pedestrian, nonsense new launches I smelled in a long time” and “So shortly, if it wasn’t clear enough, my opinion is that this is a complete depressing trainwreck on every level – quality, inspiration, identity”.
Here is another from the Basenotes message board: “Poor Mr. Burberry, maybe they should rename him Frankenstein…..because it seems many believe Francis Kurkdjian has created a hideous monster of a scent.”
Plus, see antonpan’s comment below, and Dusan’s above.
So there is no reason to think that Kevin is singularly hard to please — apparently lots of people think Mr. Burberry is garbage.
You have a long history of complaining here when reviewers don’t like fragrances that you like. It’s one thing to comment on a negative review and say “I really liked this” or “I disagree, I thought this was a great fragrance” or something to that effect — many people do that, and we welcome other points of view. But you generally don’t just say “I really liked this”, you also complain about the reviewer in a personal way (not just Kevin, you’ve also done it to me many times).
I frankly don’t understand why you keep reading reviews here at all, but our comment policy is very clear about personal attacks on the authors. The next time you leave a comment that says a single word about whomever reviewed the fragrance, I will delete your comment.
Well said!
I didn’t complain. I actually stated that, by his own admission that the reviewer in question is notoriously difficult to please, he makes no bones about it, and actually I was being diplomatic by saying maybe someone should smell something on their own before taking someone else’s criticism to heart.
Is it that you’re saying to disagree with either you or the said reviewer is being difficult and that we shouldn’t form our opinions and listen to you two blindly, without question!?!? All I said is that said reviewer has had a long history of being difficult to please, as well yourself!
So just because you all including the Basenotes reviews think it’s trash, we Ought to as well…!?!? That’s what it Sounds like! I didn’t insult or trash anyone’s review, I simply said, make your own conclusion to Nozknowz. It would seem that other opinions are not welcome once either of you have deigned your thoughts on something to the perfume world!
I even admitted that I was being perhaps slightly churlish by saying “Dangerously” Difficult, yet now who is it that is being a bit over the top by saying I was complaining when I did nothing of the sort, unless you choose to think that me saying something about someone that they have clearly said multiple times, I.e. Being difficult to impress! So what is it, if our views clash with either of yours we are complaining!?!? Or do we have the freedom to feel differently from the “Cool Kids”/ “True” Perfumistas!?!??
Our blog readers constantly disagree with all reviewers all the time. They like what we hate or hate what we love and they say so in a polite way; this give and take is part of the fun of Now Smell This. You, on the other hand, have called Robin a snob and say that I am “dangerously/exceedingly/notoriously difficult to please.” You attack the reviewer if they disagree with you: “…pretty much like virtually everything he’s (me) dismissed that I later smelled and realized was no where near as offensive, awful, bland, generic or dull…I am positive I can’t trust any review again by said reviewer!!” You were in no way being “diplomatic”; you were being rude. I have the right to my opinion on any fragrance and on any perfumer. I don’t love everything or worship anyone. Get it?
Don’t read my reviews; you’ll be a happier person.
I did not include the comments from Basenotes because readers ought to agree with them. I assume ALL readers make up their own minds. I included them to show that Kevin does not have some strange, outlying opinion, as you implied.
Read the reviews here…there are generally plenty of people on any given review who have a different viewpoint from the author, but you are the ONLY person I ever find myself having this discussion with. I can’t even remember the last time I deleted a comment for rudeness, so this is not a widespread problem.
I meant what I said — you are WELCOME to comment to say you think a fragrance is great, even if the reviewer said it was not. Or vice versa. Stop saying anything at all about the reviewers, or about the opinions of other readers (you’ve chastised other readers for their opinions too, more than once). Or, stop commenting here. It is up to you.
Unfortunately, Mr. Burberry is extremely bad. A clone of Kurkdjian’s Givenchy Gentlemen Only with a worse quality of everything. Maybe the worse designer scent that costs $50+ I’ve smelled in years.
Antonpan…certainly one of 2016’s worst designer fragrances so far…we still have 9 months to go! Ha!
For some reason I was looking forward to this (despite never thinking much of other Burberry fragrances, at least on the mens side). I guess I thought the bottle was cute or something.
So disappointing and generic, I remember the grapefruit but within a couple of hours it had pretty much disappeared.
Butch…hey, bottle love can make us dream/hope the scent inside is good!
Honestly don’t know what the fuss is about with Kurkdjian and this fragrance. This is just lavender and more lavender… sadly so is the case with limited ‘Harrods’ edition of Acqua di parma Sandalo! Both these are similar fragrances full of lavender which any high street perfume can get you.
I’m no Professional when it comes to judging Men’s Cologne but I do consider myself extremely Picky and take the advice of others when they comment on the scent I am wearing or No comment at all, That being said When I smelled Mr Burberry It was quite Curious so I had to buy it and let me tell you I have had more compliments on this Cologne that I could of ever expected, Woman love this smell, Everywhere I went Woman loved this smell and this was in NYC in High End Places So I think I will continue to wear this Cologne from time to time I will have to disagree with all the Naysayers and Negative Comments about this product I like it, Woman Like It and that’s good enough for me ! Mr Burberry is a Great Product and I highly recommend it for all men to at least try.
You have brought such a Smile to my face it isn’t even funny! Glad to hear I am not the only one who isn’t swimming against the populist tide! 😀
You have brought such a Smile to my face it isn’t even funny! Glad to hear I am not the only one who is swimming against the populist tide! 😀
Amazing! I was looking for a new perfume and tried this out at a duty free store last year. I was in two minds and then picked it along with 2 others. As you just said, ladies do love it. I am nowhere any expert in this field. Just go by what I like. Am surprised that there are so much of negative expert reviews but still probably this was a good buy for me. My wife likes it so much that she sneaks into my wardrobe to wear this when I am not around! I think the regular noses have evolved and are looking for something more adventurous! Cheers
Just to add.. For the first time I ordered the Mr. Burberry for the second successive time!! Two of my friends also liked it and added it to their regular use collection to tease the excellent noses :). Cheers Mr. Burberry.