Description
In the summer of 2013 Comme des Garcons are launching the collection of Blue Invasion which includes three “blue” fragrances— Blue Encens, Blue Cedrat and Blue Santal, in characteristic flacons colored in blue, iridescent from the darkest to the lightest shade. The new perfumes are created to accentuate radical contradiction providing a mixture of luxurious warmth and sea freshness. The olfactory evocation of the fascinating paradox presents the blue color as timeless and very intense in three different ways.
BLUE SANTAL provides frozen and cold Australian sandalwood combined with warm pine notes and tartness originating from juniper berries. The fragrance arrives on the market as 100 ml EDP.
Official notes: Mediterranean pine, juniper berry essence, blue pepper, sandalwood from Australia.
gangsta777 – :
This is actually an unusual and yet beautiful fresh and bright take on sandalwood but at some point i get a bit of a scratchy vibe about this fragrance that i dont like.
grgrynyk – :
There is a very specific smell to the air at our summer house. Whenever we arrive after a long long drive, I step out of the car and inhale deeply of the ancient pine forests of northern Wisconsin. The air is clean, green, cool, woody and full of life. CdG Blue Santal is this scent, bottled. I know it’s hyped up as a sandalwood fragrance, but I hardly smell the sandalwood. I get rows and rows of hundred year old pine trees. I get the juniper bushes that my great grandmother planted in the yard back in the 1920s. I don’t necessarily want to wear this, I like to save that smell for the actual event of BEING THERE. But it’s so cool to find this and know that someone managed to bottle the experience.
rovshan71 – :
I’ve tried several GdG and none of them work for me but this particular one smells like it has dill in it. My kids asked me why I smelled like pickles. It was a very strong smell, so this one’s a no for me. Also, I got no sandalwood whatsoever.
73igor – :
Techno Pine. Over the years the Puig produced Comme releases became a second universe to their original, produced in France, scents and therefor also to the ‘parfums parfums’ series – the three ‘blue’ releases built an exception in that two fold division – they came in a trio, almost in the spirit of some of the ‘Series’ and also since they seem to pick up themes that were experiment with somewhere else by the house, and more so by working with the same perfumers again – Evelyne Boulanger for Blue Encens and respectively Jaisalmer – or Antoine Maisondieu for Blue Santal and Sugi respectively. Similarities between these are apparent, which is not a bad thing at all. Blue Santal sticks out as the most particular one from this blue series – similar to overlooking Seoul in winter from a bath tub made from hinoki wood on the rooftop of a skyscraper – beautifully technicistic, strangely artisanal, definitivly worth trying in cold weather !
Zveroboi.oleg – :
Mentholated pine needles and juniper berries with a woody undercurrent that sort of comes and goes. That’s the majority of this scent according to my nose. The performance and projection is really good on my skin, even with one good spray. I love this particular scent because of how different it smells to run-of-the-mill fragrances.
When I wanna small a little weird and unique in a good way, I can confidently wear this knowing that nobody else around me is wearing this or have even heard of it.
Xeroxkueuj – :
This is the only Comme des Garcons I can stand. All the others are too… weird. I know, that’s the point. But I love sandalwood. And this is a very tantalizing, interesting combination. Sandalwood, pine, juniper and salty notes. Really nice.
gaumustyboast – :
I like it alot. Love the pine mixed with incense and cedar.
7.5/10
by_crOsSa – :
6/10
virgoth13 – :
Such a calm, cool, serene fragrance. I love what Amaranto said about, “the atmosphere the scent evokes.” Amaranto summed up exactly how I feel about this one. <3
ljl185elipseskism – :
A tonne of pine, mixed with an almost paint-like smell on my skin with some noticeable black pepper. This one really, really didn’t agree with my skin chemistry at all, and I was not a fan. Had to scrub this off within ten minutes or so.
fetfrumos3000 – :
Blue Santal has an interesting cold feel over a bed of soapy, non-creamy sandalwoodness. Juniper freshens the whole thing up. When I breathe it in, I feel like I’m in a snowy forest where the wind has died down and pure, evergreen air surrounds me. A little too poetic, perhaps, but I enjoy the atmosphere the scent evokes. One of my favorite sandalwood scents without being a traditional sandalwood fragrance and with a more blunt edge than I associate with some other CdG fragrances.
Projection is somewhat close, though it’s not a skin scent, and longevity is moderate.
STALKER197911 – :
This is interesting and beautiful. Not enough sillage or longevity for my liking. The sandalwood is very dry, crisp, clean, and short. Not creamy or enveloping like some sandalwood scents. It is fresh and would be very nice on a man, but its not too masculine for a woman. Smells ‘cold’. I can clearly detects sandalwood, pine, juniper, and some salty fresh aquatic. The description from the web above is perfect. There is definitely an interesting contradiction between the traditional warmth of sandalwood vs. the crisp cool freshness this scent evokes. I think it is versatile and ‘safe’ enough that it could be worn in any season at any time of day, yet it is different and interesting at the same time. I really like this but I want more projection and longevity. Too soon it sadly disappears into oblivion, like PLAY GREEN.
sergius – :
It’s hard to know, layered with something ‘wet’ like Durbano’s Jade, or Profumum’s Victix it’s ok. It’s sharp, short and peppery. You have to know how to wear it – and that means wear it on your shirt because it is gone on your body. Jade plus this dry bush sandalwood – maybe.
uggs outletp6 – :
So, Comme des Garcons took some good-old sandalwood and made it “cool” again.
Starts strong: lots of pine, juniper and pepper, that makes this fragrance appear cold and super fresh (even a little harsh). Dry down – clean, warm a little powdery sandalwood.
I love how this blend has fine texture to it. Some pine or sandalwood fragrances feel thick and oily. I know CdG uses synthetics to make their fragrances, but they sure know how to do it right. Also, I know this fragrance claims to be unisex but I would prefer smelling it on a guy.
uapushkin – :
a VERY blue feel to this! the pepper and pine dominate this mix and a very mild santal in the back, barely noticeable, rounds out the mix. a little harsh at times, and often overpowering, but an interesting composition, methinks…
STRETER2 – :
Aptly named. A synthetic, mellow sandalwood juxtaposed with a cool, slightly frozen, ‘blue’ feel. To me this fragrance screams Scandinavia, which is interesting, because juniper berries are quite typical in Scandinavian cuisine, and they (surprise) are also featured in Blue Santal. But this isn’t reminiscent of the flowers and ruins in an Ingmar Bergman film. Blue Santal is clean and hyper modern. It’s something you could wear while sipping on a gin and tonic at an art gallery in Stockholm. Milky, blue skies, warm smiles, friends and family, the sounds of glasses clinging together, and sleek, minimal, interior design. That’s exactly what Blue Santal conjures for me. At first I scoffed at this scent and felt it to be on par with generic, designer fragrance. But today I felt quite differently. Still thinking that sillage and longevity could be major problems here but this ones gonna take a little more time to fully discover. Fun, clean, safe, but maybe just a little too run of the mill.
BoxUseftsot – :
My favourite of the CdG Blue series and definitely one of my favourite sandalwood scents. This is mainly due to how different it is. For the most part we find sandalwood blended with some citrus, petitgrain, some other woods, some vetiver. or maybe some cacao or vanilla. They often tend to steer towards the warmer side of the spectrum. Blue Santal ditches that idea and gives you a very sharp, pointy Australian sandalwood, not at all the creamy variety, which with the spicy pepper note, would still be a somewhat comfortably warm presence, until the juniper and pine are taken into account. This juxtaposition freezes the whole concoction and an almost camphorous accord is borne into the fray. It is quite linear, projects well and has very tenacious staying power, especially on clothes. Being that the smell is fairly linear, a bit on one’s clothes actually doesn’t hurt either! If you wear this very clever sandalwood, I can guarantee you’ll stand out in a crowd and also in a crowd of sandalwood wearers! It’s a freezing, camphorous, angular, shimmering take on the genre which pretty much stands alone among its peers. I love it and wear it regularly, in any weather and for most occasions. Not for everyone, but definitely for me. Love it!
stellmakk – :
I sniffed Blue Santal for the first time in Europe and now I have the pleasure of wearing it.. Blue Santal opens up spicy and woody but fresh at the same time.. The coniferous pine note balances out the warm aspects of the sandalwood and gives Blue Santal a fresh cool opening.. The pepper is noticeable right from the opening and along with the sandalwood the pepper gives that same freshly cut wood vibe that Wonderwood has.. The juniper lends a hint of sweetness to the scent but Blue Santal is all about the sandalwood! This is all fresh woody sandalwood! If you know what australian sandalwood smells like than you will recognize it in Blue Santal.. I find that the sandalwood in this fragrance is quite creamy, and I like that.. I am not sure if that is the sandalwood itself being or perhaps other notes that create that creamy vibe.. What Blue Santal smells like to me is a fresh creamy sap that is bleeding out of an exotic tree in the cold snowy mountains.. Overall Blue Santal is a nice interesting sandalwood scent that definitely can work in the warmer months.. This scent is pretty versatile so I am sure it would work great in the cooler months also.. Blue Santal is not groundbreaking nor is it the best sandalwood fragrance I have ever smelled but it is very nice and very different! The contrast of cool fresh and warm woody is very interesting, and makes this a unique scent.. If you like Wonderwood than I definitely suggest that you try Blue Santal!
neptunkazan – :
Smells exactly like a dry bark of sandalwood. Pretty linear fragrance. Not very powerful. In my opinion it is a pretty Ok perfume. Wouldn’t pay 100 bucks for a bottle though.
serj33 – :
Remember back in school when you would sharpen a pencil, and the smell of the pencil lead would just waif up and catch your attention? Well this is Exactly what this smells like for the first 15 minutes, and it just fads out after that. Is that all you got Comme des Garcons??? I am Disappointed.
zzlo1981 – :
a wonderful opening that turns into nothing a couple of minutes later, a very plasticky concoction worth of a drugstore fragance…
nePITKIN – :
absolutey agree with dresdendoll this starts of promising for the first few seconds with sandalwood and pine then takes a wrong turn into hot wood shavings, gin and a very strong pepper note. Black pepper is overpowering when sampling it on my skin and it disagrees with the lactonic and smooth sandalwood note. The ingredients don’t play well together and lack haromny. What I thought would be a like or even a love is a solid dislike.
flexeril online – :
First spray was ‘mmmhhhhh!’ – sandalwood and cedar, yummy woody goodness. But then it takes a left turn and goes wrong. I agree with Cereza, I can smell something… not quite right in this forest. It takes on a little bit of stank quite frankly, almost like civet, and it’s quite sharp – a strange result of the pine? This dies down after a little while but never quite goes away and it mellows out considerably into an acceptable piney woody scent, but one that for me pales in comparison to others such as Tam Dao, Wonderwood, or indeed Fille en Aiguilles. Veers more masculine. Definite miss for me. But if you don’t mind your forest being a touch fecal then try it out.
wmt821speagoessenda – :
I’ve trialed this ‘blue’ collection extensively now and I held off from reviewing them in the autumn until I got my second set of samples to reserve judgement.
I have to say I love them!
Blue Santal is a knockout! It’s a super fresh but very spicy, peppery opening. The freshness is being supplied by a definite juniper note in there and it combines with the pine to lift a scent that could be too peppery and spicy for some…but do be assured it dries down very softly to a beautiful clean skin scent.
The sandalwood is more to the woody/spicy end of the santal spectrum than the sweet creamy end, although that is still there and develops more as it dries down and the pepper moves into the background.
I honestly used to love sandalwood but recently I’ve gone off it a bit, maybe it’s due to a lack of interesting combinations of notes to accompany it who knows?
Anyway this has restored my faith as it truly has that alpine fresh coolness with a warming familiar woodiness and it is WOODY…Blue Santal is awesome!!!
I’m wearing it today and I feel that I smell great. These Comme des garcons have excellent longevity too I got about 8-10 hours yesterday from Blue encens(okay with a very liberal application but still!) and this looks to be performing just as well.
rudan2007 – :
Where I am from we have our own local company that makes all kinds of cosmetic products, they have been in business a LONG time, so one of their oldest products is a pine extract for hair and bath, it basically smells like someone took a shit in a pine forest. That is what BLUE SANTAL smells to me. Feces under the pine tree with cold snow on top of it. There was no sandalwood whatsoever, just this weird unpleasant smell of feces and of course the faint smell of snowy pine forest.
catcorp – :
Had a sniff of all three Commes des Garcons Blue Invasion and this is the one which impressed me the most.
Really looking for a more affordable sandalwood fragrance for spring/summer than say Santal Blush.
After the initial metallically juniper/pine opening I do get a subtle sandalwood but more of a spicy pencil shavings note.Not unpleasant though and I may warm to it.
This is my first impression and I may need to ask the girls at MeccaCosmetica for a sample to give it a proper test drive.
FibheecicsBah – :
a pine,citrus smell.
the worse one of the 3 blue but good perfume.it remembers PINO SILVESTRE more citruses.
tsujimoto – :
This reminds me of Hinoki more than Wonderwood.
Maybe it’s the juniper and pine. To my nose the santal doesn’t come across as strong or as dominant as I had expected, and my first impression is of a woody mélange – a composite accord reminiscent of juniper, cedar and sandalwood with a hint of “green” pine.
I confess that I do like it – received a full bottle today and am allowing myself the luxury of really savouring the fragrance, whereas when I first tried it I was on a rush, yet couldn’t stop sniffing my arm all afternoon.
Woody, woodsy and fresh is my first impression of this (if that makes sense).
Usually I can’t stand pine in any form, since it always makes me think of disinfectant.
But in this wonderful fragrance, the pine forms an integral part of the symphony that is Blue Santal, and the cumulative effect of the wood notes is to create a woodsy accord that serves as a tribute to Sandalwood, in the same way that Wonderwood is a tribute to Agarwood/Aloeswood/Oudh.
On my skin the longevity and sillage are slightly greater than Wonderwood, and thus far I have worn this in both formal and casual contexts – I believe it works well in either.
I am fond of Blue Santal, and may soon grow to love it.
omer – :
Its like Wonderwood but much softer, and not so soapy I find.
Its a warm and tender touch, and I love the pepper and juniper side to it. The pine comes slowly. Its like being in a wooden cabin in the northern forests during late autumn ,with a gorgeous view over the dark green pine forests, the mist crawling over the forest floor in the early morning hours, and the fireplace just about to let go of the last trace of smoke.
I like it
_klon_ – :
Two strong facets of this one and I could sum it up by A) A superlight version of Woonderwood B) Odeur 53. The fragrance is quite alright, but the middle-part of the development was nose-burning. I used to adore Odeur 53 and still use it from time to time, but that “ethereal” (could it be shock-full of hedione just as Odeur 53 maybe?) feeling is very emphasized.
aerordHoome – :
This is my favourite of the three CDG Blue scents but on my skin it’s nowhere near as lovely as Tom Ford’s Santal Blush. Again, as with all three Blue scents, I get a burst of pepper which recedes to a comforting sandalwood. The pine lends the blue note, but on my skin the sandalwood stays for the long haul.
I agree with other reviews about the packaging. Those bottles fit so nicely into one’s hand, it’s a shame the design is lacking. Where was Watanabe?!
urukuman – :
i really like blue santal more so with the freshness off the pine its great for the warmer months tho in saying that the pepper notes would prob work in the cooler months tho prob not winter, the pine for me is the most dominant note and then i can smell the sandalwood and the pepper which as a tickle to my nose which gives it another dimention, all in all ive only worn it this summer and the freshness is great i will try it in the autumn and winter and see how it fairs
SelecT – :
179) Chanel manqué
Mon favoris parmi les trois Blue. Un beau santal avec un aspect frais, presque marin/iodé.
Un bon basic facilement portable pour toutes les occasions .
Je lui reprocherais une tenue un peu faible.
gnefomaner – :
An *Humanized* version of Odeur 53? Well, sort of…
The main theme here comes directly from those clean yet austere woody fragrances such as Gucci Rush For Men, Tam Dao and Wonderwood but Blue Santal brings to the table a bunch of juxtapositions that most of the above fragrances lack. The overall vibe is made of the same clean-metallic-woody-incense combo of Odeur 53 but it’s sort of tamed, more human and less abstract. A thick synth sandalwood base a-la Wonderwood serves to add some extra body giving birth, at the same time, to a warm juxtaposition with the metallic incense while peppery nuances recall the austerity of Gucci Rush For Men. This is basically the bone structure of Blue Santal but the fragrance has something more to offer…the CDG’s twist.
The above scenario is successfully enriched by a pine-juniper combo which is absolutely awesome. It strikes with a freezing effect and a plethora of micro-facets generated by the interaction of these two elements with the rest of the composition. They go go from turpentine undertones (originally extracted from pinewood) to gunpowder via immense landscapes, dark-green elements, snow-covered forests and, at the same time, summer-ish spices, gin, frozen glasses and sparkling skies…
I would rank this at the same level of Blue Encens and despite I’ve not appreciated Blue Cedrat as I expected (hoped), I strongly believe this is a pretty solid trio. Another fantastic option to enter the CDG’s world.
Tremendous.
Rating: 7.5/10
Ksen0bite – :
I can’t wait to try this – sounds great.
Update: I’ve tried it – It is ok, but too masculine for me to wear.