PENHALIGON'S Endymion Eau de Cologne

I'm on my second bottle, rounding the corner to third. Endymion is traditional yet progressive. It is old-fashioned yet in a modern way. It works in casual settings and the most formal. You could wear this to a job interview or a funeral. You can wear this in the morning for coffee, at night to a Michelin starred restaurant. It is incapable of being oversprayed. It is sweet but never cloying or even close to being cloying. It has universal appeal like nothing I've ever worn. I'm not calling it an all-rounder, even though it is. I'm saying it is close to a perfect formulation.

Difficult for traditional and conservative heritage houses like Floris or Penhaligon's to create new fragrances that address contemporary sensibilities while being faithful to the house's tradition. The weight of history, one might say. I think that Penhaligon's have lost this in recent years, starting with Sartorial and the Halfetis and the Babylons. By the time you get to the plastic elephant and canine headed bottle caps they've totally lost me. Sartorial is a very nice fragrance; I have it and use it somewhat frequently through the colder months. But it doesn't seem like Penhaligon's. It seems American. Department store fragrance counter American. Sharp, metallic American frags are fine, but they have no connection to 19th century London. As I said, it isn't easy being a heritage house. I don't envy Penhaligon's in this regard.

But Endymion fits that tradition while also being contemporary. Such an ethereal fragrance that somehow makes leather whisper rather than shout. It has a delightful cycle from top notes through dry down. I'm comfortable wearing it to work but it's also a perfect cool evening choice. It shimmers like the strings in Mahler's Symphony #2. Gentle and versatile. Spray it on and go out to watch the northern lights. It's what I imagine the aurora smells like.

I woke with a start at 5:00 this morning, drenched in sweat, a churn in my stomach. I had taken way too high a dosage of cough medicine, and my body was not happy about it. Dry heave - okay, I guess it's fine now.

After dealing with that, the last thing I wanted to do was go to work, but circumstances left me with no choice. I needed something light, not too spicy, smooth. Please no giant "scent cloud" today. Just something nice, pleasant, barely there.

I reached for my sample of Endymion, knowing its Eau de Cologne concentration wouldn't be so intrusive, and the second I sprayed (and dabbed the residual dribble) I knew I made the right choice. Despite having to drag myself to work, it's as if Endymion tucked me back into bed and smooched me on the forehead. Nothing else in my collection does this, and if it tries, it's way too loud to be effective.

Previously, I'd written Endymion off as a waste of money. Why would I get this wimpy creamy coffee scent when I have Pure Coffee? Okay, past me. Time for a lecture: You're not always going to want to smell like a dark roast black coffee. Sometimes you're going to want to smell like a local cafe around the holidays - warm, inviting, coffee smells lingering with bakery smells, bakery smells lingering with the faint whiff of a stranger's perfume.

I see my fragrance collection as a support system, in a way. It helps me see myself how I wish to be seen, it helps when I'm feeling depressed, it helps when I'm bored. Endymion is the fragrance equivalent of that friend who can sense when you need a hand to hold. He starts out as a hug and dries down to your dear friend, holding your hand, giving it gentle strokes when he hears so much as a sniffle out of you. Endymion is the friend I'm ready to welcome onto my shelf.

~ I thought I had smelled, tested, worn all the quintessential Gentleman scents up until I shook hands with this top hat, leather glove, lavender lapel wearing proper English Gentleman! This is perhaps the first serious contender to potentially dethrone my Signature Chanel? I am completely enamored with the perfection of Endymion's soft, sweet, confident personality. The lavender is so smooth so romantic this will surely please anyone who would accompany you on a Sunday drive or a fall walk in the park! This is warm and welcoming in it's subtle leather and musk base the perfect companion. I give this Penhaligon's an endorsement for any man who wants to bring his style to the next level and please many noses along the way!

Endymion would make John Keats proud.

This is a fragrance that comes across as poetic, romantic, and intellectual. Endymion does not scream seduction - indeed, this fragrance does not scream anything. Rather it is a whisper in the ear, a biting of the lip. It is a reminder that, as Keats put it, "a thing of beauty is a joy for ever".

This is a gentleman's fragrance... One that requires the wearer to be something more than the usual, else the lady who catches a whiff of this scent will lean in to find nothing hidden behind the curtain.

If a man were to wear this to a club, he might find that he stands out, as if he does not belong in or near the repugnant clouds that follow those wearing the maniacally aggressive (and repulsive) One Million. For some this will be a good thing. For others not so much.

Endymion is romance, not sex. Words of love, not heavy breathing and rustled sheets.

"A thing of beauty is a joy for ever." True