Rei – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

Opens with a fresh blast quickly followed by a bouquet of white flowers consisting of green but creamy tuberose, sweet jasmine and fresh muguet. Odalisque sheers feminine with this flowery bouquet that is paired with powdery iris-violet. The flowers are dominating the blend for a good while and as it dries down, the musk brings a darker layer. The mossy accord comes to life too and it develops into a green, bitter and salty composition.

flexachka – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

This is so beautiful. LOTV/Jasmine and oakmoss with some orris and I guess I get some musk too. Good chypre vibe. I’ve heard even after reformulation still fairly well maintains the character of the original pretty well. Love this. Stunning. Will be wearing this a lot this spring, for sure.

gtlsinderst9 – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

A touch of jasmine indole and a medley of citrus makes for a sweet and acidic jasmine with a delicate civety illusion.
The moss in this composition is fluffy, and combined with white musk and orris makes for a bit of a cosmetic talc or triple milled soap.
Lily of the valley adds a hint of green floral giving the impression of a fresher jasmine, sharp yet syrupy at the same time, smoothed with a cold pearly lather that feels classic and clean.

Giliu3 – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

It is a feminine musk of the scent of white flower. I think that if you put on pumps of the same color as lipstick, it would suit you. It is not dirty, but it is not cute. Although it is classic, it has a bright fragrance and I like it very much.

malgin2008 – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

In my search for the perfect lily of the valley scent, Odalisque soon rose to the top of my test list. There was the Guerlain connection, of course, and the praise heaped on it by Luca Turin. And then there was that note pyramid – how could one possibly go wrong with a moss-heavy, waxy green chypre?
Unfortunately, Odalisque was not at all what I was expecting. What makes a good chypre work is the tightly calibrated contrast between the elements – the bright citrus on top, with the musty, dank moss and resins at the bottom. Odalisque skips the top notes and goes straight to the heart, dominated by lily of the valley and moss. On my skin, the moss was screechy and soapy, and maybe even a little bit aftershavey. Not at all the austere green I was looking for.
In the end, I found my perfect LOTV – the breathtakingly beautiful Diorissimo. Odalisque can only pale in comparison.

ppv – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

I ordered a sample of this as an after-thought, really, thinking that something more oriental would be my style, but I came to love this from my sample. There is a bright, spring-time freshness to the opening, and then the iris, jasmine and lily of the valley blend with the darker oak moss to stop this becoming too floral, moving it into autumnal territory. The longevity also surprised me – I caught this throughout the day.
I was impressed by its presence: clear but tenacious, and its ability to cross moods and evolve over the wearing: going from bright citrus and floral to a more classic (friendly) chypre in the drydown. Luca Turin describes this as somewhere between Après l’Ondée and Cristalle and it does share some of the delicacy and crystalline qualities of these two, but it is also more robust and mysterious, rather than wistful (Après l’Ondée) or determined (Cristalle).
Everyone’s tastes and senses are different but I am surprised to read the negative reviews here – I had such a different experience on all three of my tester outings with this.

-PUPSIK- – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

I was so excited to smell this perfume after reading Luca Turin’s review of it. Such a disappointment! Starts with a very sharp, almost obnoxious Chypre, lasting not more than 15 minutes, and then totally disappears on me… Nothing, absolutely – no smell, either good or bad. Others told me they could detect a faint, soft aroma standing very close to my. I was not able to detect lily of the valley or jasmine at all. Could it be bad or diluted EDP sample? I have ordered from the Luckyscent, and thought it’s a trusted website.

Nelly241283 – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

This is one f the “lily of the valley freshness” scents- however it is retro freshness, chypres is the dominant one in it, while you feel the spring flowers boom and royal bergamot, it is quite ordinary and nothing new. Very strong in the beginning, so use it wisely, but I still don’t see it being wow or popular…
After an hour- still cat urine on the spring flowers 🙁

tichomolowa – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

This fragrance made me so unhappy! There is nothing nice on it. It smells actually like three days old urine, shortly before she turns to ammoniac. One of the worsest fragrance for me so far.

5manut – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

This perfume is an example of why no one should buy a perfume un sniffed. I have a small vial I purchased as a decant and couldn’t wait to smell this highly regarded perfume. Surprise, it smells like my cat’s litter.

WuzaPetkas – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

Odalisque- the perfume that inspires poetry. Thank you BelAria for capturing this scent in words.
This perfume is gorgeous and unique, pure class and unquestionably fbw. There’s something smart and haunting about this perfume. It’s bright and white and yet melancholic at the same time. I honestly can’t pick out a single note. It smells like nothing but itself. I’m baffled by those who find it fecal or boring?? Are they smelling the same stuff? My one hesitation about it is it doesn’t last as long as I would like (4-6 hours) and it gets very soft after about two.

rus7777 – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

I feel so vintage wearing this that I need to throw on a fringed flapper dress, a long string of pearls, somehow flatten out my bosoms, wing out my eyeliner, and throw on Guerlain’s Rouge Automatique liptstick in L’Heure Bleue. And then I’m ready for mischief.
Odalisque hearkens back to that time when extraordinary perfumes were common. My bottle is a recent acquisition so I’m positive that it’s a reformulation. No matter. It smells amazing, and on me, the sharpness is dulled into a sexiness that is subtle yet pervasive. YUM.

boychenko1985 – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

Thanks LadyKarl for suggesting this to me! One night a few weeks ago, all I wanted to do was stay in by myself, drink craft beers, and blare some old-school rock n’ roll (Little Richard, the lesser known Bobby Mitchell, some early Art Neville). I dumped a bunch of Odalisque and Vie de Chateau over myself and sprawled out onto my comfy couch with my computer (no, I only wish I had vinyl) hooked up to my stereo speakers. Wait for it.
Yes, I wore Odalisque and Vie de Chateau AT THE SAME TIME. And I drowned in them. Do you know what? For nearly 2 hours, I kept laughing aloud because of the sensory experience my poor nose was having. I think I might have gotten high off the fumes. Now you probably think I’m crazy, but I doubt I’ll ever mix them again. 😉 It was sort of the equivalent of a Parfums de Nicolai party gone rogue.
So far, these are the only two PDN scents I’ve tried. Odalisque is the darkest floral chypre I’ve come across. Colour: a magenta so dark it’s turning the brown of soil. Overall it’s pretty and clearly meant for women, but the earthiness is of a masculine bent with its slightly smoky tang. I swear I smell hay in Odalisque, which is why I decided to layer it with the unisex Vie. I suppose the note I take for hay is what another might take for “pee” (it doesn’t smell like pee, to me). Someone mentioned a “dusty” texture, but I don’t find it dry enough to be dusty. The jasmine is downright oily to me, only kept in check by the moss and smoke. This oiliness is part of what makes Odalisque dreamy… it *feels* like ocean waves although it certainly doesn’t smell like them.
On me, the citrus lasts the whole way through, particularly in my hair. This is what I love best about Odalisque: Bergamot is one of my favourite notes and I’ve worn the essential oil for years. Bergamot is done differently, here. (LadyKarl, funny that I’ve always thought bergamot is the quintessential wedding scent!) A must-sniff for bergamot lovers?
The first time I tried Odalisque (alone), I was disappointed that the drydown seemed so much more boring than the initial intoxicating and otherworldly burst of beauty. Like many of my favourite pieces of music, though, I needed to give it a few more chances to take it all in properly, to let myself delve deeper. Now, the drydown reminds me of to Mitsouko’s. The oakmoss is somehow treated similarly (isn’t Patricia de Nicolai a member of the Guerlain family, after all?). If Odalisque were airier and spicier, and more vintage-y, it could be close to la grande M.
I can’t wear Odalisque without listening to music, playing music, or wishing I was. It doesn’t just go with Tutti Frutti and Lucille coming from the speakers, it goes wonderfully at the piano with some Czerny Etudes, Bach, and the Moonlight Sonata coming from my heart and fingers, or whatever little ditty I plink out of my guitar strings, any time of day or night. Update: I promptly finished my sample and purchase a bottle.

konst2004 – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

Every time I smell this I get the picture of a big wedding cake in my mind.
Its not sweet; It smells nothing like cake but It smells the way a
wedding cake looks (to me). May be its what the cake symbolizes: a wedding.
I don’t see a marriage; i see a wedding (to clarify)
Its got a real puritanical element to it. The citrus is a soft accompaniment to the pretty belle lily of the valley and the orris root anchors all those wedding chime ideals to the earth
Its a pretty fragrance but it definitely doenst make me wanna stand on my head or do backflips or something

ВалD – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

Very retro – delightful femimine dustiness and dryness of oakmoss with a touch of iris and musk and joyful pronounced note of sweet and juicy tangerine. Strangely that I can not find a slightest trace of lily-of-the-valley in this lovely chipre. Maybe something that is usually referred to as “white flowers”, although I don’t smell neither jasmine or magnolia.
I can’t say that it’s too oriental as well (as the name tends to push in the Sultan’s courtyard direction), I picture a dry elegant older lady doing her leisury shopping wearing pearls, a Chanel suit and a coquettish hat. When I’m a bit older I would wear Odalisque with pleasure in, I hope, similar setting. I like this scent a lot, just don’t know how to fit it into my perfume wardrobe – what would be the occasion? So far I’m at a loss, so content with a sample.

GOOL – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

Hauntingly beautiful, like a siren’s song. This scent is silent yet wailing, lovely and bleak. The pale white flowers that make up this fragrance are neither over embellished or jolly, but bare boned and forlorn. I wrote a poem to sorta help myself put the scent into words.
Is there beauty to be found in heartbreak,
the loss of love from long passed days?
As if torn from the earth,
wind tossed,
sea sprayed,
Odalisque is a scent of green, blue,
and gray.
Green are her memories,
the young love she once knew.
Blue are her longings,
she dare not hope will come true.
Gray are her moments,
both solitary and wrought.
The earth has forsaked her,
the wind has betrayed her,
and the sea has doused her wounds with salt.
Lasting power is moderate I would say, about 6+ hours. Sillage is relatively low, but memorable nonetheless.

criluffisulse – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

Odalisque was the first of Patricia de Nicolai’s perfumes I tried, and I’ve been a fan from the first sniff. There is something about the way Odalisque is blended that it has a much smoother arc than so many other green chypres. The oakmoss isn’t bitter, and the top notes aren’t sharp. I suspect it’s the use of lily of the valley and what smells like gardenia. I can’t think offhand of other chypres with a dominant muguet note, and I think the dewy roundness of the note eases things. Also, if it’s gardenia that I’m catching, it’s got a little of that earthy almost truffly feel and counterweighs the floral coloratura.
Not to be dogmatic here, but this doesn’t really seem totally like a chypre to me. I definitely find it to be a mossy floral, but, even though the PdN websites lists the notes of bergamot and mandarin up top, I don’t get the bergamot sharpness. The green in Odalisque is wet and grassy and I attribute it to the lily of the valley. The fruit is almost peachy or apricot. I think the fruits and florals are beautifully proportioned and allow the moss to be the gentle counterbalance without seeming too dark or bitter.
Whatever the genre, Odalisque has an hypnotic, almost narcotic quality. This is the scent equivalent of eating lotus flowers. Odalisque makes me want to lay in and enjoy the lazy pleasures of life.
Edit: I’ve just tried the most recent iteration of this at ScentBar. I now know the despondency of the reformulation blues. It smells as if the chypre portion of the fragrance has simply been removed without any attempt to compensate and what’s left is a watered down floral. PdN can certainly do a pretty floral, but the notion that by comparison we suffer is really brought home to me. I’ll treasure the bottle I have.

taurrrus – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

Another elegant floral from PdN. I don’t get the green chypre notes that others have mentioned, perhaps due to reformulation. However, what I do get is a very pretty, wearable floral scent with a slight salty note in the background. (It actually reminds me a bit of Ysatis?)
This is quite long lasting and one of those fragrances that puts you in a good mood.

SerP – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

Pleasant but somewhat wishy-washy. Not a patch on Diorissimo, the Empress in this category. But I would wear it for daytime. On the whole, it’s better after a few minutes of spraying whereas Diorissimo is good from first to last — and beyond.

fraultulp – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

I like it, mea culpa:). It’s old-fashioned in some way, and yes, it’s not Diorissimo (which I like very much, too), it’s much more dusty, chypre-green, I feel orris and musk and oakmoss in it. According to PdN website, top notes are green citrus, bergamot and tangerine, heart: lily of the valley, jasmine, orris, oakmoss, base: musk… It lasts long with medium sillage, the heart is the most beautiful to my nose, and for me the base isn’t unpleasant at all.
However my favourite from this house is Le Temps…

koston999 – 2022-06-11:

3 out of 5

According to boisdejasmin’s blog, the notes included are: bergamot, mandarin, galbanum, jasmine, lily of the valley, tuberose, ylang ylang, patchouli, oakmoss, amber, and castoreum.

freedoww – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

An Odalisque is a lonely woman.
The word converted into French by some orientalist traveler back in the Ottoman days as odalisque is actually odalik – oda meaning chamber/room in Turkish, an odalik was a kept woman in the chambers that were provided for her – today, we simply call her mistress.
So, I keep thinking if this bright chypre/floral is really appropriate for a mistress. For me it lacks the lust and the mystery of a woman whose only purpose is to please whoever got her “oda” for her. But I have read that it’s been reformulated, perhaps the true odalik spirit lay in the original formulation.

Ferro – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

1st sniff: Lightly behind a nondescript floral is another smell–salty, soft smoke, maybe seaweed or even fresh sweat. It’s peculiar but pleasantly so. I find myself imagining a campfire in the distance on a beach.
Half an hour later: Oh this smells heavenly! The florals have bloomed and put out nectar, like real flowers (not so real that I can identify them). There’s something kind of dreamy about it. The moist flowers are lovely, but demure. The sweat/smoke is faint so that even though I keep catching it, I also think it might be my imagination.
Drydown: The nectar has dried up. The florals are a blah, perfumy stereotype. The soft smoke and salt is long gone. I don’t recall seeing musk in the scent pyramid, but I smell some. When I sniff my wrist, it’s not bad, it’s just not fantastic any more. If only this were a linear perfume and the heart carried on forever.
The sillage was modest and the longevity was just about perfect. The opening notes lasted maybe fifteen minutes, the heart an hour or perhaps two, and after six, the drydown is quite faint.

kapubachca – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

I read (on other sites) that many get a lily of the valley dry down with this. So, I did a side-by-side comparison to Caron’s Muguet de Bonheur. And, no. Muguet is buttery yellow and fresh, and Odalisque is a screechy weed. Many have mentioned that this has been reformulated, which has to be a shame for it’s original admirers.
On another note, does the title make anyone want to yodel? Come on: “High on a hill was a lonely goatherd
Lay ee odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo.”
As I went about my evening this played in the background of my cluttered mind. Soon it became: “Loud was the voice of the lonely goatherd
Lay ee odl lay ee odl- lay ee PEW!”
That was my hint that it was time to wash. I’m not used to panning a Nicolai scent, but this is really harsh on me. No matter how long I waited, or how hard I tried, I could not get the faintest smell of sweet jasmine. It was just goatherd poo, all night long.

Sca31 – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

Her take on lily of the valley, but don’t expect Diorissimo. This is lily of the valley in their setting, the wet woods of Spring, where the earth is coming alive after the frozen season. It does have a chypre feel to it, as the notes of the dry down show up even shortly after the first ten minutes, and they just grow as the eight hours progresses. Two spritzes are enough. Low sillage. One of my favs.

grafberkut – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

After releasing a thundercloud of lily and jasmine, this fragrance takes on a fierce, angular, and faintly tinny green demeanor that, to my nose, borders on the unpleasant. If you came to PdN via Odalisque and came away disappointed, don’t be discouraged — PdN has many more (and far more lovely) scents to offer.

Emawaymouff – 2022-06-11:

5 out of 5

I wholeheartedly agree with everything NLS said. All I’d like to add is that Odalisque reminds me of a stronger, greener version of Byzance. If you like Byzance, give this a try, otherwise I’d check out Sacrebleu Intense or Fig Tea from this company! 🙂

вахмурка535 – 2022-06-11:

4 out of 5

Floral? I’d say Odalisque is more like Chypre Floral or straight-up Chypre. Odalisque is the first perfume from Parfums de Nicolai that I have tried, and I’m glad I bought just a small sample.
About two hours in, it’s very lovely. Nothing new or special, but it smells like a classic example of a non-sweet, chypre floral. Reminds me somewhat of Paloma Picasso or a less floral Patou 1000.
Unfortunately, for the first hour or two, I find it almost unwearable. It’s very sharp and green, with a hint of that “cat urine” note that turns so many people off of the Chypre category altogether.
The staying power and sillage are decent.
I haven’t given up on this perfume house, but I can’t honestly recommend this scent. There are far nicer chypres, chypre florals or florals (whatever category your nose says is appropriate for this one) to spend your time and money on.