Shihan

A personal labor of love, Shihan is Piotr Czarnecki's tribute to the natural connection between fragrance and dance. As a professional ballroom dancer and dance instructor in his native Poland, Czarnecki had long employed a lifetime obsession with scentmaking to compose fragrances meant to accompany his routines and those of his students, to, in his words, “create their own atmosphere.” But while it may have been originally created for a select few students, Shihan, a warm, exquisitely balanced ambery gourmand, is simply too good to keep secret.

As with a finely crafted dance program, his fragrance (formerly called Sensei) weaves around its central composition with graceful fluidity, revealing wondrous new aspects with each passing moment. The foundation of exceptionally high quality, largely natural ingredients: in the opening, Cuban tobacco and bitter Arabic coffee lend earthy depth to a boozy warm whiskey accord, while colonial spices enliven a mysterious heart of frankincense and myrrh, evoking visions of grand, exotic opulence. A musky amber base purrs with carefully extracted labdanum and sweet ambrette, dreamily resinous.

A perfect blend of lively spice and warm richness that will delight fans of gourmands and ambery fragrances alike.

Whiskey, coffee, tobacco, pepper, cinnamon, incense, myrrh, spicy accord, ambrette, labdanum, benzoin, amber and musk.