Montblanc Emblem Eau de Toilette

Product Information

Bottom line: you may well like Montblanc Emblem, and it may be a good choice for you, if you can find it heavily discounted and enjoy well presented, inoffensive warm spicy aromatic fragrances with unaccented Iso-E super type dry downs. However, be advised that for certain skin chemistries, like my own, the fragrance just won't work. Blind buy with caution. That being said, it last quite a while. It survived on me the whole day, still sufficiently projecting at bedtime. It gradually gets softer as the day goes on though. Fantastic sillage and longevity, I must say (: The opening sage and grapefruit makes for a very refreshing, fresh-but-on-the-dry-side start (closer to cucumber than fruit) with some moderate projection that lasts for a good 1-2 hours on my skin - the spices start to emerge as the citrus fades, ultimately leading to the considerably sweeter base of tonka and wood notes that radiate a minimal amount for abut another 90 minutes before becoming a skin scent for another few hours. Mont Blanc emblem opens with a soft projection of grapefruit, spicy, woody, and floral accords. The opening is very soft, the notes are not well defined, a pleasant but unimpressive opening. In just a moment the violet leaf of mid notes enters the blend creating the fresh aroma; the cinnamon and cardamon mix together adding a soft spicy touch but nothing prominent. The tonka bean adds a sweet and aromatic touch and the woods do the same. Once Mont Blanc Emblem has reached its full dry-down, it can be summarized as a very soft projecting grapefruit and cinnamon fragrance with faint spicy, floral, and woody accords. The fragrance feels airy, inexpensive, clean, diurnal, faint, fresh, and relatively pleasant. Longevity, even with a heavy hand on the trigger was about two hours and almost the entire time was spent as a skin scent. This fragrance only projected about a foot away for the first 15 minutes, and after that, nothing. Very low sillage, no scent trail, not even a trace of the scent on my shirt which I also sprayed when I came home three hours later from being out. At NO price point is this scent worth purchasing anymore, it seems like reformulation has killed this scent completely.

Yesterday, I sniffed the cap of Mont Blanc's emblem and it seemed very disappointing. I left a review here just below this one that I will keep for comparison.It is not as synthetic smelling as PR's Invictus. Despite that "Emblem" will never be in my want list, I can give Mont Blanc the credit for introducing a good quality sweet perfume. But, I also want to say that I had enough with this category of perfume. They need to be more daring and experiment with different kinds of ingredients. I need something new! Emblem exudes well, but it produces olfactory fatigue very fast for those who wear it. That is, you may think you are no longer exuding, but you are. The durability is very good, exceeding eight hours on my skin. On the skin, Emblem is pleasant and can walk between appointments, from day to night, with ease. The output is slightly fruity and sweet and the evolution shows an oriental body, which gains woody and creamy facets. But it is not an innovative cologne today, nor when it was released. Its fragrance presents a proposal similar to that of 212 VIP Men (2010) and, if worn side by side, it is possible to notice similarities. The biggest difference is due to the creaminess of Emblem, which results from the sage and fava tonka notes, against the alcoholic and salty aspect of the other, due to the notes of vodka, caviar lime and salty amber. I'm all for modern or new scents with those companies tryinf different stuff but gray colognes and musk scents should have died off. In fact I like to use axe as an example. I'd prefer axe gold over this junk. I'll take Lacoste, Paco Rabanne, polo (how original) or davidoff over this in a heart beat how boring that one was. I like my theirry muggler angel (probably spelled the designer wrong) way more than this and I use that about once a month. If I was a millionaire it would be my bathroom spray.

Today's men's popular/'generic' department store fragrance market can be generally categorised into two groups. First, we have the works-every-time fresh citrusy scents. Second, we have the new sweet spicy scents that have lately become popular - the prime examples being One Million and Spicebomb. Professional and formal. Those two words perfectly outline this fragrance. This is not something you wear on a typical day. This is a business suit and tie accessory, or a date-night aroma. Definitely not your average deo-body spray. This is the atmosphere of someone successful and someone who knows what they want in life, and how to achieve it. That said, Emblem reinforces my personal opinion about the fragrances of the brand, which tend to grow in my concept the more I make use of them. Here, there is a little more nobility and maturity, which fit better in my current moment of life. After all, we are talking about almost eight years of difference since the launch of the Carolina Herrera's fragrance, and the market at that time was different. However, I've totally changed my opinion on Individuel for example and I'm not as keen on it as I used to be. Also scents like Exceptionel are frankly suffering from the same issues as Emblem...just too safe and maybe a little boring? Montblanc Emblem is a mediocre fragrance from a generally well regarded house, the notes in which are adequately described by the note pyramid above. On the plus side, it is presented in a great bottle. The fragrance gives off decidedly masculine associated scent queues and is usually available at quite reasonable prices from the on-line discounters. It is: not very strong unless ruthlessly oversprayed; safe for most workplaces; composed of bland notes which project at most moderately; and unlikely to offend anyone smelling or wearing it.Emblem (as well as Legend) is indeed unexceptional but it has distinct elements of masculinity, freshness and sweetness that makes it so easy to wear and understand - it doesn't provoke any thoughts and isn't very surprising but that is EXACTLY what I want. Now don't be mistaken there are bad mainstream fragrances too but my point here is that mediocrity isn't a synonym of garbage. Emblem is nicely blended, has quality ingredients and the signature metallic accord that's in many of Montblancs. Also, It's so wearable it's almost ridiculous - I reach for Jaipur maybe once every 3 weeks but Emblem can be worn from monday to the end of the week with such ease I sometimes forget I'm even wearing anything. It smells like some other common scents, such as Invictus by Paco Rabbane. But, still a very good smell and affordable for the quality it is. Highly recommend.

The only one I still love is Presence which is just such an odd creamy, spicy oriental it's the only one for me with any novelty value. I've actually begun to revise my opinion of Mont Blanc, a luxury manufacturer with a great reputation and their fore into fragrance has to be deemed as a success to most due to the fact they have some winning fragrances. Emblem was announced in March 2014 along with its Intense version (which is rare in this market as there is usually a space of, at least, one year between flanker releases). At the time, Montblanc claimed that the fragrances represented the brand's heritage and, for this reason, the bottle cut into the shape of the famous six-point star. Emblem opens with inviting fresh citrus and maybe a hint of exotic fruit? The heart is another Tonka washout for me though very pleasant but all too familiar and very much the en vogue accord for bland designer fare at the moment. There's a hint of violet and spices, clary sage and cardamom, cinnamon is evident.I think the most important thing to note is that they've never made a bad fragrance and there's not one I wouldn't wear so despite all the naysaying I do rate Mont Blanc. They choose good perfumers and solid concepts that sell. This scent takes you on a far more interesting journey than the moderate price would imply. I know I have an undeniable bias to wood aromatic and/or spicy blends, but I feel like as long as you have a fondness for this family of scents, this would be a very safe blind buy if you know to expect a good woody scent with a fresh dry touch and more sweetness in the drydown than the opening would suggest. Very interesting.