Dream On... Yeah, sing with me, sing for the year, sing for the laughter, sing for the tears, sing with me, if it's just for today, maybe tomorrow, the good Lord will take you away... Dream on! Dream On! - Aerosmith.
I've owned a bottle ever since it debuted in 1996, to replace my previous cologne Solo Soprani. Pretty good segue, considering it was considered a light scent and not too serious. To this day I must have a bottle to go back to and "remember". That's why I recently decided to buy it once more when I saw it online for a funny price around 20 something bucks.
The Dreamer depicts very nicely the essence of this perfume because when I wear it I feel like I'm floating between the dream and the real world. Some notes are pulling me to one side like the clean and light opening, and others like sweet and smoky drydown to the other... What a beautiful fragrance. It's is one of those fragrances that makes you stop dead in your tracks, in the best possible sense, so unusual, so creative, and just so damn good in my opinion. I like it when I smell a risky fragrance, one that was obviously not designed to sell to the average consumer, one that is controversial, one that receives complete contradictory reviews. I've come to the conclusion that I adore challenging fragrances, and this is no exception if you like Dreamer, another outstanding one to try is L'eau Bleue D'Issey. Man or woman, yes woman, wear this if you want to stand out from the crowd and bask in your own uniqueness!
The Dreamer is something of a hybrid between fougère, oriental, and gourmand. It's remarkably light, yet crisp, with hints of sweetness and richness throughout, with that 90's cleanliness keeping it all in check.
The opening is like when you first open a pack of cigarettes, I'm not a smoker but I always loved the smell of unlit cigarettes, a gorgeous sweet fresh tobacco scent. A sheer opening, both warm and fresh at the same time that gently enwraps and gives a pleasant sensation of well-being. It is very aromatic, bitter sage and floral lavender blend magically with spicy tarragon, juniper grains, and poisoning artemisia. It's harsh but settles down to a comforting and warm male floral.
The oriental aromatic heart combines notes of waxy and soapy lily and powdery iris that blend in with the amber very smoothly. It's got the fluffy powdery floral note that has a smokey woody masculine undertone. The iris stands out a little more loudly as a member of The Dreamer's heart, with the token geranium and an almost invisible touch of rose rounding it out. It can be heavy and in your face in time. Overall, It's got the good, the bad, and the ugly layering all in one. The old formulation was quite powdery. The new one is less powdery and more floral.
The drydown is the most stunning I have smelt in a long time. It has that lovely sweet tobacco smell, with what kinda smells like vanilla and musk, animal musk if you smell it close to your skin. It's that glorious leafy tobacco flanked by tonka and amber, with literally nothing else to get in the way, with maybe a cedar aftertouch bringing in some sustain. The tobacco isn't of the already-dried or smoked variety like with some scents, and more of the "raw leaves and blossoms in the sun" kind of feel, lending it an outdoorsy vibe that its other ingredients don't suggest. By the time this reduces to the skin, all you smell are tobacco, amber, coumarin, and wisps of those aqueous florals including the potent iris coming up for encores when the air hits just right...
The more I smell the Dreamer, the more I fall in love with it. It is the rare fragrance that is beautiful and interesting in all of its phases, although I like the drydown the best. It is unusual, ever-changing and mysterious. I find myself smelling my wrists very often when I'm wearing this. I do this because it offers a moment of serenity, of inner peace, that takes me away from the bustle and stress of everyday life. It has a gorgeous bottle I might add too, with one of the more unique integrated sprayers I've seen, which becomes the cap rather than fits inside the cap like most of this type. The usual Mediterranean business adorns the cap otherwise and the bottle itself features the classic Versace Medusa head.
Fall and winter are the best times for The Dreamer. Sillage and longevity are average, so it's going to take some reapplication for an entire day's use, but if you keep this to evenings and weekends it will get you through all right. If you were going to get just one tobacco-themed designer scent and didn't want to break the bank on something from an exclusive line, this would be a pretty strong contender for that pick. In the wise words of Aerosmith: Dream On!
-Elysium
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