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st-v – :
Exquisite.
As with other favourites of mine, I didn’t “understand” the scent at first. That’s a good sign: it means I won’t get bored after an hour of wear.
The sillage from my skin is true to the bottle. It’s a slightly spicy, slightly green, heady, lush floral. I read it as a gardenia soliflore, possibly because I haven’t smelled many gardenias.
Up close, there’s more change. It’s spicier now, then sweeter. Sometimes slightly powdery. Always beautiful.
EDIT: The vanilla becomes pronounced at the halfway mark, but the gardenia scent lasts throughout the entire drydown. In the summer heat, which makes my skin project insanely but dramatically shortens the drydown, the fragrance lasts 4 hours.
As for the Sotto la Luna series as a whole: If you want weird and unique, go for Gardenia. If you want smooth and elegant, go for Tuberose.
Nata122 – :
The notes pyramid does little for me in conjuring how this fragrance smells. When it first came out of the bottle I had an instant rush of delight as I smelt sweet, boozy notes of vanilla and ripe fruit like melon or guava (almost indolic in their ripeness).
After this gourmand delight of an opening, I get a spicy note which – combined with the sweetness – reminds me of hard-boiled cinnamon or aniseed sweets so I am surprised to see no spices listed in the pyramid.
After this stage I finally get the creamy white florals with a mossier background with the spices adding a gentle kick to the florals rather than taking it over.
This is definitely not what I was expecting and I do not find it similar to Sotto La Luna Tuberose which is much drier and spicier.
Despite the very sweet, deep start, it has a gentler sillage that most Tauer scents, albeit still moderate.
I still need to try this some more (I’m on my second wear) but I don’t think that it will become a love for me. After the incredible start, it does so many twists and turns that it feels as thought I am wearing a different scent after a couple of hours.
tefguebyOweby – :
Unique! A beautiful work.
Manih1980 – :
very weak on the gardenia. strong on the crème brûlée.
Леша1976 – :
I really liked Evelyn Orchid’s description of this as a ‘Gardenia Noir’. Strange, almost singed bloom, like the crispy top of creme brulee. Realistic, and yet, put in a setting that is outre bizarre for such a natural flower. The juxtaposition had me smelling my wrist non-stop to capture the odd accord. Drydown turns into a spicy powder! A very different take on gardenia!
yasya21 – :
Waxy white floral sherbet with an overdose of sickly sweet tonka and vanilla. This is not the gardenia I’ve been looking for.
replikostiansa – :
This is a strange and complex one & I could easily have a love/hate affair with it. At first it is a ‘Wow, that is real gardenia!’ moment. Then it feels as if it is going to reach out from my decollete and grab me by the throat (ie suffocate me) and now in the drydown, it is really beautiful and reminiscent of the lovely Daphne by CdG. Fascinating.
uri1975 – :
Scent – crushed fresh gardenia.
Season/Time of Day – I prefer to use this one all year round, day or night.
Projection – I didn’t get noticed, I didn’t get a compliment.
Longevity – I get 24hrs consistently.
#24
Glom777 – :
I love this, and I’m not a white floral person at all…it’s flowery, powdery with a touch of vanilla and a touch of grass notes that keep it from being too feminine…lasts all day…is a pretty strong perfume – I sprayed the tiniest bit on my wrist today and can smell it very strongly…
vinnySagCasia – :
Sweet, cloying,skinclose and gone. Loads of vanilla. Not worth the money. Tried a sample today and I Don’t like it.
Söt, sliskig och hudnära och bleknar fort. Mängder av vanilj. Inte värd pengarna. Fick en test idag och jag gillar den inte.
nik100 – :
When The Mushroom Moon falls to the horizon and sets, there appears the ghostly form of The Gardenia, soaring above a rich landscape of An Oriental Carpet; ever-so-slowly her light fades to a whisper, and then a dream.
omaman – :
I excitedly bought a decant of this perfume. Sadly, it opened with a strong medicinal vanilla and tonka beans. It is actually off-putting. After awhile it settled into 2 opposing scents of green notes & butterscotch. Apologies, but “ick.” There were no fragrant flowers, much less gardenia throughout. Perhaps since it was a decant, the top notes had been destroyed in shipment or on the decanter’s shelf. Estee Lauder Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia remains my favorite “currently-available” gardenia. This is a bright, true and lovely gardenia.
Softdoole – :
If this is gardenia, I’m Lana Turner. Opens with a piercing metallic chemical note, then settles down into baby powder topped with same.
Igor Zhirnov – :
One of the more unpleasant/synthetic smelling gardenia, like it’s drenched in a chemical orange-aid
tochocink – :
Finally I have found a Gardenia without tuberose that I can wear and love! This is so beautiful classical Tauer, this is not a heady,indolic interpretation of gardenia its creamy, vanilla but not in a gourmand sense and a hint of woods with the sandlewood and a little decay? I can find some white flowers screechy but this is not at all like that,I’m so so pleased with this perfume 10/10
dsi83 – :
I was thinking of trading this, and I got some nice offers, so I decided to go back and test it again and honestly I fell in love, soil, rich and dirty, something sweet like decaying plants, a cool green note like night air. How did I mistake this for cloying Queen Helene Coconut? It’s beautiful, not gardenia based but it is beautiful
sigaretvagonok – :
Andy Tauer’s Sotto La Luna Gardenia defies all of the gardenia stereotypes. Definitely not sharp and aggressive, and about as unscreechy as a white floral perfume can possibly be. I actually put off testing this perfume because I was afraid to put it on before going to bed, given my experience with some gardenia creations in the past.
The feeling of Sotto La Luna is something like a cross between Frédéric Malle Carnal Flower and Robert Piguet Fracas, so I do not find it predominantly a gardenia perfume at all. But it definitely is a big ‘yes’ to this nose! It’s a bit sweet but somehow shiny like Fracas and rich and intense in the Carnal Flower way. I would not call this composition “Carnal Gardenia” because the scent is more of a mixture of white flowers, including jasmine, tuberose, and gardenia. The sharp sometimes greenish quality of gardenia is nowhere here to be sniffed.
Based on this experience, I definitely will be trying Sotto La Luna Tuberose in this lifetime–well, at least I hope I will!
ajden – :
Now this is definitely worth a try. Not sure if I like it yet, but it’s a very interesting take on gardenia – it smells fleshy, almost chalky, sweet, but also cool and kinda reminds me of incense sticks. Not your usual gardenia, for sure.
Update: It turns sweeter and more powdery in the dry down, almost like vintage make-up scent. Lovely.
vovanisaev – :
A pure Gardenia noir, it’s quite a warm perfume but with cold dignity in its structure radiating the moonlight on your skin. It’s green and earthy in the beginning, then a fumée Gardenia appears like a distant poem evoking wavelengths of moonlight dancing on the lake’s surface of a mysterious forest, where enchanting creatures are playing lute and dancing wrapped in a smokey air. The moonlit water reflects their movements highlightning them in white out of the dark evening colours. It’s an interesting perfume, abstract in a way, intellectual and poetic. It is rather earthy and refined. Gardenia flower is more like a hint in the scent, not the actual presence. It’s a fine, not raw structuralism. I only tried it once, however wrapped in its sophisticated aura combining the earthy, green freshness and warm powdery, flowery ambience, it was enough to have an excellent first impression. It was a hot, sunny day when I tried it, but I was more like “under the moon(light)” (Sotto la luna) until the early evening since its longevity is great. Unique.
anxatran – :
There are generally two challenges to making a gardenia perfume. The first is that it requires a complete fabrication since the flower itself yields no aromatic essence. The second is balancing gardenia’s heady and sweet notes with its fleshy, salty, umami underbelly.
Another hurdle, though, is matching the specificity of the appearance of the flower and its scent. There are a lot of things in this world that smell like a rose, jasmine or lemon. Nothing else smells like a gardenia, and so for those who can see, the fragrance and the look of the flower are intertwined. If in re-creating the scent of a gardenia the visual image isn’t also summoned, then the representation is incomplete.
Bolstering the association between scent and the visual appearance of the flower, and therefore adding to this challenge, is the way the look of the flower and its fragrance suggest each other. The creaminess of the scent matches exactly the matte texture and luminosity of the petal. The creepy, fleshy quality of the aroma is enhanced by the flower’s likeness to cyanotic or vampiric skin. The hint of blue color to the creamy white matches the cool, liquid quality of the aroma. Gardenia has a visual/olfactory mirroring similar to the way sound and meaning echo each other in onomatopoeia.
Tauer clears the first two challenges easily. The top notes of gardenia smell like a particular slice of the scent of a gardenia. It is an abstraction, as any attempt at re-creating a gardenia will be. The success here is in the point of view. It is a perfectly proportioned sketch of the flower, not a photorealistic image. It stimulates your imagination, and engages you to complete the image for yourself. As for the umami, Tauer gives us a dusty mushroom, one that suggests that dank dark place where a mushroom grows as much as a mushroom itself.
As for the challenge of the sensory mirroring, Tauer shines. The scent of Sotto di Luna Gardenia is like a gardenia under a black light. The aroma suggests spiced cream, a cool touch, a bone marrow blue-tinted white. Over time the specific appearance of a gardenia goes away but the shape holds. The precise abstraction remains, and the surface tension between sweetness and meatiness, creaminess and dustiness lasts through drydown. The gardenia itself is gone, but the angular lushness that characterize it remains. A wonderful ‘morning after’ scent.
evgenichs – :
What I’m learning about Tauer is it’s best to just smell without reading the notes and to smell it as a whole rather than the sum of its parts. For it appears that Tauer’s sensibility regarding fragrance lays somewhere in the Twilight Zone. I mean this in a good way. This fragrance smells like a dessert in a Michelin rated restaurant: a gardenia pot de creme with a scraping of lemon zest, maybe a hint of spice and almond extract. It is a woman in a sundress on a warm spring day, who likes to gather flowers as much as she likes kinky sex. It is innocent, playful, and also sensually indulgent. This fragrance makes me feel kinda giddy, like I might start giggling at my own private joke at a funeral. Needless to say I’m enjoying it. I would recommend it to those who don’t particularly like heady white florals (like myself) as this is something quite different.
Flarcewew – :
THIS is the bright elusive gardenia fragrance of my dreams. I’ve tried sample after sample of so-called gardenia fragrances from my want list and one by one removed them from said list because they smell like nothing so much as generic, watery, any given flower and far too tame. Somehow it became the trend to make them so green that they smell more of leaves than of flower. Not this.
Sotto la Luna Gardenia is very woody on me at first, and calls to mind a woodshop full of artists sculpting wood, complete with the burnt smell of freshly sawn cedar and pine. Someone has strategically placed water bowls filled with gardenia blossoms throughout the shop, and is baking a custard pie. But I am standing outside the shop, catching wafts of the combined scents as they blow out into the night air.
It is nostalgic, wistful, melancholy, sensual…and it sends me over the moon. This is the creamy gardenia that I have craved; I don’t want the leaves nor the sharp green so prevalent in other gardenia renditions. I just want the flower, and I would never have thought of mixing it with wood, but it works and is splendid. I almost want to cry, it is so lovely and unique. I have to have it; there is no other choice.
I applied some before heading out to Walgreen’s and a girl who worked there walked past me with the perfunctory “You finding everything you need?” then she stopped in her tracks, turned around, and asked “What IS that perfume?” When I told her she immediately went in the office and looked it up. I ended up giving her my sample as I have collected about 6 samples of this now and how could I not help out a fellow fragrance lover? Sillage is obviously fabulous and longevity, very important to me if I am shelling out big bucks, is about 3 hours strong now with no sign of fading anytime soon.
Drydown becomes soft and sweet (but not candy sweet) with a mere whisper of the woods remaining and sadly no gardenia. BUT I still love it. And I must have it.
karentvh2 – :
At first this smelled to me like nothing so much as Queen Helene’s Cocoa Butter body lotion (with the awful coconut scent). As I learn to separate the notes, I sense the complexity, the heady freshness of flowers over warm vanilla and tonka bean, a floral breeze blowing through a kitchen where one is baking. Beautiful.
Aleks79 – :
I can’t stop sniffing my arm.
this fragrance is exactly like the story of Heidi, it is a place on the greeny mountains, away from different villages around where you can see these villages from the top at night as the lights are slightly sparking a distance away from the houses. the moon is held high, its ray is casting on my swiss design hut and on the green fields around me, while i am lying on the fresh dewy grass sniffing the gardenia prints from a sheer scarf, the soil, few dusty roots, my vanilla tart with jasmine flavor on sandalwood plate, and the cooling dews, while the silky moonlight is caressing my skin gently as I’m listening to Chopin’s Nocturne op.9 No.2 thinking about those amazing memories I’ve had and planning my future. this is the scene you will smell from this blue pentagon shaped bottle
now it’s true, it’s too harsh and tough in a way that if you sniff it directly you’ll get the harsh effect, but if you swing your arm, wrist, or hand while this potion is on then you’ll notice the scene I’ve mentioned above.
im neither a fan of Tauer nor gardenia, but this one is something can’t be neglected & needs to be mentioned with nobility and class.
Numdefopt – :
Sadly I must concur with many of you who have left a negative review. I love gardenia in perfumes but this has an air of the potting shed about it. At the beginning, a pleasant coconut note appears, which is soon replaced by a very strong earthy, mushroomy aroma, which doesn’t fade. Quite peculiar.
kavas – :
Terribly disappointing, even unpleasant. As we know, there is no gardenia absolute so, Tauer’s “take” on a gardenia scent presents to me as a dark not-floral almost licorice-like in effect. I can’t think who would want to smell like this, or where one might wear it. Maybe a night-club, if you have trouble getting to the bar, because other people find it repellent and will get out of your way… I hate to bin samples but oh dear, this is appalling. A pity, as his other work is so good! My personal rating is 0/10; a muddy mess, and devilish to get off.
ANNAAttetryStem – :
This Baby Sings The Blues..
I had to wear my sample several times, before I could write my review. I was so excited when this fragrance came out, and couldn’t wait to receive my sample. I even put off purchasing my lovely LADDM, as I was afraid that I might fall in love with this one even more! First of all I want to say I gave this several tries, in different weather conditions etc.
The opening is very green, bordering on bitter. A tightly closed green Gardenia bud, drifting in and out of a smokey background. This lasts a bit too long for my liking, and made me feel almost sad. When the middle notes finally turn up, they aren’t able to overcome the greenness of the opening. The rose is very light, and I get a hint of jasmine, but stays firmly in the background. The base notes are the best thing about the whole structure of the fragrance. The dry down is very pleasant, and the Gardenia then becomes creamy, and sparkles. I feel the sandalwood and tonka bean sort of save the day for this fragrance. I am a huge fan of Andy Tauer fragrances, and I wanted to express my true feelings for this perfume, as I perhaps had put it on a huge pedestal before I had even tried it! My anticipation of having a great gardenia fragrance was bought down a notch. I feel many people will adore this scent, particularly, if you enjoy green fragrances, with a smokey vibe. This Gardenia certainly fits the bill, for Billie Holiday always wore this flower, while she sang the blues. Some of the notes are sad, and some lift your soul.
oleg73 – :
What creates Tauer is always a source of discussion, because of the way he deconstruct the olfactory notes. Also in “Sotto La Luna Gardenia” I have the impression of perceiving the main ingredient in a completely unique way: the gardenia is dusty, sour, coal, far away …. but there is and it is strikingly original. Thanks Tauer.
jjylaivticq – :
Sotto la Luna is a real beauty on my skin. It opens initially with a spicy sweet note, just like buttery cinnamon toast in the oven. This lovely scent is soon overtaken with a metallic vibe, almost a well used tools, metallic scent, like a tool shed on a farm. Then some earthy notes enter. The middle notes remind one of a potting shed with old rakes and earthy potting soil. It’s a bit strange, this phase is not pretty, but it ‘s intriguing. It is a reminder of the earth from whence came all gardenias and all flowers. Also, you can tell these notes are going to balance something else and end up being just perfect. The earthy and metallic aldehyde notes calm down after about an hour and beautiful creamy flowers and vanilla enter, balancing those rather feral and ferrous notes with incense, spices, and wafts of luscious creamy gardenia and jasmine.
Sotto la Luna is definitely not a heavy in your face gardenia. The gardenia notes peek in and out during hours of wearing this fragrance. It is gardenia petals scattered about with smoky spices and earth, leaves around them. This may not be to everyone’s taste. It is definitely not your ordinary creamy jasmine or gardenia. But I love Andy’s interpretation of these florals and will be asking for a bottle of this lovely juice for Christmas if not before. Sotto la Luna is simply divine to my nose, unique, beautiful and daring.
karnaj – :
First of all, I want to say that I adore many of Andy Tauer’s creations, including the masterpieces “L’air du desert maroccain” and “Lonestar Memories”.
But this “Gardenia sotto la luna” is quite disappointing. Tauer decides to combine gardenia petals with some strange earthy undertones that don’t work at all. The result is a bizarre mix that smells acrid and old fashioned in a bad way and it captures nothing of the intoxicating and carnal nuances of gardenia flowers.
Lektis – :
While very nice, one of the most puzzling perfumes I have tried based on the name. Gardenia Soto La Luna smells more like breakfast to me than any white flower. Andy has made it clear that he does not care for gardenia normally and that could explain why that note is so buried and difficult to locate for me. I was expecting a more obvious gardenia. I get more of a creamy, woody, buttery cinnamon – it is almost gourmand. The floral notes keep it from smelling quite as edible but it smells almost like some creamy sweetened exotic breakfast beverage I have never tried…but would like to. An interesting fragrance and I believe it would be most appreciated in colder weather. A warm scent that makes me hungry actually. It makes me want coffee and baked goods. Which is something I totally was not expecting. It is a comforting and delicious smell but the gardenia nearly escapes my olfactory system. But after several wearings and sniffing it alongside an actual gardenia, I was able to locate it. But just a warning to gardenia lovers, don’t expect the usual gardenia fragrance. This is more of a gourmand.
Indedenuh – :
Interesting stuff. But NOT Gardenia!! Earthy for a while on the skin, but on me, it turns into something kind of sickly sweet. Almost reminds me of some popular mainstream fragrances. A disappointment for me, as I typically think Tauer’s fragrances are unique and beautiful.
garikmix – :
I am finding this has a lot in common with Loretta which I didn’t enjoy, but I like this a lot better. A rich floral which screams Tauer even if I hadn’t known who it was by ,I would have guessed immediately on smelling.
archik-11 – :
I respect this, but I don’t like it. I was hoping for a heady gardenia, and instead I got sandalwood and a forest floor. It’s an intelligent and complex perfume, but not to my taste.
Wetosss – :
I did not get much green, but mostly a coconutty gardenia, maybe with a little amber and vanilla. This is a very incensey perfume, much like his Le Maroc Pour Elle without all the powder. It’s been a while since I have been in a headshop, but I remember the displays full of what must be about 50 different kinds of incense sticks in every scent you could imagine. This is like mixing a coconut incense stick with a gardenia one. The phrase that comes to my mind over and over again is Arabian Nights. I just think of a desert oasis at night. It is very enchanting, mysterious, just out of reach…like a beautiful mirage.
erekon – :
Pvfp, don’t you realize industry insiders and jornalists can have access to perfumes before their release to the public?! Those could have rated it in here.
alexander911 – :
I’ll never understand why people insist on rating perfumes they can’t have tried yet. The release date is a month away! Insider information? Amazing psychic abilities? Sheesh. 🙁 (10 Aug 2014)