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sergey_dom – :
Bought this on sale last spring as the weather was heating up and just didn’t “get it”. Pomegranate came across rather more like grapefruit which usually turns to the dreaded “kitty pee” on my skin, and yes, it did this time, too.
But I’ve learned not to give up on a fragrance until I’ve tried it both hot and cold weather since many seem to “prefer” one or the other & even come across as completely different scents, polar opposites in fact.
So, having worn Skin on Skin, Amour Nocturne and Deliria in the past week I cautiously reached for Haute Voltige on a gray, chilly & rainy day and VOILA! Now comes full on pomegranate and right behind follows a gorgeous wintery fir. Not a hint of grapefruit and not a whiff of “KP”.
Pomegranate is the only fruit here and it’s a genuine pomegranate, like opening a bottle of ice cold POM brand pomegranate juice. And then comes the fir –a crisp,piney green, definitely NOT cedar, a note I love but don’t find here at all. Next my nose picks up the tang of juniper berries, as if you’ve crushed some in your hands, not just poured a generous helping of gin. A bit of pepper spices up the undercurrent of some vague blend of woody notes that bind to a nice base of oakmoss (my Precious!) that gives the whole blend substance.
Cold temperatures really make HV glimmer and shine like no mere fruity fragrance. I drove and walked around doing last minute errands, both ordinary and holiday, all day long (so 6-8 hour longevity) and Haute Voltige shimmered on my skin and clothes in a way that reminded me of Guerlain’s Winter Delice or Clinique’s Wrappings. Yes, this is definitely a cold weather fragrance and I’m very happy I held on to it long enough to make this discovery.
Discontinued but 4.2oz bottles are still available online at a fraction of the original price. If you’re looking for a cold weather fragrance HV might just fit the bill.
ВИКТОР000 – :
This is such a strange beast. LLB_addict is right, the opening is really beautiful. But after that, when I wore it at home to test it, it became a fruity bubblegum drowned in a dirty ashtray. Today I wore it to work, just to give it one last chance, and it surprised me. No ash, just a nice fruity scent. I just might keep it.
Hoiseeenlance – :
Apparently I love pomegranate and black pepper because the opening for this is AMAZING! And it’s even winter so should be even better in spring :o) I believe this is the only pomegranate forward fragrance I own! I know I have some with it buried in others, but never number 1 noticed note :o)
Oldboi – :
I have only recently become interested in the L’Artisan Explosions d’Émotions range, partly due to their sudden decrease in price in response to the brand’s bottle redesigns and subsequent discontinuations. I had read many reviews on all six fragrances here on Fragrantica, and the general consensus was that they were risky blind buys.
Haute Voltige was one fragrance I found rather tempting as a blind purchase, but I did refrain from doing so as reviews were less than promising. Luckily I managed to test Haute Voltige at one of my local department stores as they still had a tester on display.
The initial blast was super fruity, tart and fizzy. I actually mistook the dominant pomegranate note for a tomato leaf accord at first, but later realised my error when the sweetness came into effect. Haute Voltige is a very unique fragrance but also a very pleasing one.
After the powerful, fruity top notes begin to fade, Haute Voltige softens into a somewhat powdery blend of balsam fir, oakmoss and juniper berries which is rather sensual on the skin, and my partner tends to agree.
Pomegranate can be a tricky note for me to wear at times, especially juicy pomegranate fragrances like Jo Malone’s Pomegranate Noir. Thankfully Haute Voltige is a tad more subdued and has a similar powdery, oakmoss-y drydown to my signature fragrance Annick Goutal’s Passion EDP. I would go so far to say that Haute Voltige is one of my favourite L’Artisan Parfumeur scents.
Longevity is superb and the sillage is strong yet not too overpowering. It’s a shame that this fragrance in particular has been discontinued whilst two other scents in the Explosions d’Émotions range have been promoted to their permanent line-up.
123zzz123 – :
This smells Christmas-y. I like the smell a lot, but it is not my style, as far as something to wear on my body. The peony meshes very well with the pomegranate and pepper to make a “Christmas berries” (the kind you might see with cardinals and conifer sprigs on a generic holiday card) scent.
The juniper berries are mitigated by the pomegranate/peony/pepper accord, and the fir. The juniper berries are definitely present, but without the cat pee smell I was dreading.
ЛёКа – :
Smells very sweet on my for some reason. Not a very complex scent.
jht973speagoessenda – :
Adding to my previous review:
I just realized what is probably happening here, and I noticed that only because I sprayed the Haute Voltige in the morning and decided not to wash it off until it goes away on its own…. If you have patience to wait, and you survive the masculine phase, the base is rewarding as it’s becoming more aromatic and a bit sweet…. To me it brings the memory of Enchanted Forest. Bernard Duchafour thought to use some of his previous success with the Vagabond ? No black currant but the juniper berries, pomegranate and balsam fir create quite a similar effect.
I think many negative reviews came from people who didn’t wait for the drydown .
Longevity is good, silage low.
pwz319speagoessenda – :
I love Bertrandt Duchafour’s creations in general, as I find him original and inspired in his blends. But I bought this blindly, thinking I would love it ( love balsam fir and juniper berries…and I am disappointed. Not because I can’t smell those notes, because they are here, nice and clear…. It is because to me it smells very manly, and only the drydown becomes softer, unisex, a little sweet. In general I enjoy unisex fragrances but the opening here has cedar too, which is a very manly note…. Or so it seems.
I smell nothing metallic and the pomegranate shows only on clothes, not on my skin.
To be fair and square it smells like someone getting drunk with gin ( think spicy and aromatic British gin like Beefeater ) and perhaps dry martinis with a splash of pomegranate in an evergreen forest by a bonfire at the beginning of winter. And the snow started falling…
making the rustic wood cabin much more inviting than it was before.
Nowhere do I see the explosion of joy . It’s rather melancholic. It’s cold, trying hard to warm up. On clothes the juniper and balsam fir shine. On skin I get the woody cedar that I don’t like.
It isn’t as bad as others describe it. It just misses the effervescence one expects reading the description and the notes. In other words, I find it lovely but manly… Quite classy, with obvious high quality ingredients like all L’Artisan(s) but lacking the key ingredient which seems to me all other perfumes from the series have “the shock “. Nothing shocking in this one.
pasha-graf – :
Clean,fresh and dynamic. This is different scent, strange, and that surprises you… Well balanced,floral. The sillage is normal, and longevity is good (about 6-7 hours). This perfume that evolves slowly. It is not heavy, is a light scent that gives brightness and liveliness! Overall not bad. I’m curious to try other “L’Artisan Parfumeur Explosion On emotions” …
Sillage: 6/10
Longevity: 7.5/10
Scent: 7./10
Overall: 7./10
pyatakvova – :
A mix of cardamone and a cheap toilet paper. Weird.
avers – :
I have to disagree with all the negative reviews. This is really a beautifully balanced fruity floral and I’m amazed at how it remains balanced, never veering into too much of the woods in the base. I’m wearing it on a very cold wintery day and it is brightening the day considerably.
Gotten some nice compliments on it as well. Not a sillage monster and with decent longevity, I think there is room for a fb of this in my collection.
I don’t like everything Duchafour creates but this is just right.
sergeikatoshin – :
Not my favorite. I spritzed this on at the store, and wore it for the whole day, but it did nothing for me.
Pomegranate is not my favorite scent, and this fragrance has loads of it. Not crazy about the strong woody notes, either. It’s not horrible, but just not for me, especially with such a hefty pricetag.
delial – :
Really I can’t believe L’ Artisan decided to discontinue Deliria and to keep in stock this terrible, dull and mediocre muddle of … of things that couldn’ t stay together neither in a nightmare. Mah.
Cheadajesaume – :
I truly don’t get this perfume. From the notes this sounds interesting, but “Haute Voltige” is awful, no not for being a bad smelling perfume, but for being so boring and having a price tag that this scent doesn’t deserve. Hell, this should go for 35$ maximum.
“Haute Voltige” basically is a syntethic pomegrante scent infused with loads of spices and finishes of as a slightly sweet musky scent, hell this doesn’t even smell like pomegrante for more than 5 minutes.
It’s so generic that I could not even tell which floral notes are here without looking up that it’s peony.
A huge dissapointment. Low silage and staying power of 3 hours. Spend your money and time elswhere.