Dilema 2021

Dilema by Adi ale Van
Bottle Design Adi ale Van
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7.8 / 10 56 Ratings
Dilema is a popular perfume by Adi ale Van for women and men and was released in 2021. The scent is woody-spicy. The longevity is above-average. It is still in production.
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Main accords

Woody
Spicy
Leathery
Smoky
Earthy

Fragrance Pyramid

Top Notes Top Notes
SaffronSaffron BergamotBergamot
Heart Notes Heart Notes
LiquoriceLiquorice Myrrh absoluteMyrrh absolute
Base Notes Base Notes
Black leatherBlack leather Woody notesWoody notes PatchouliPatchouli PapyrusPapyrus

Perfumers

Ratings
Scent
7.856 Ratings
Longevity
8.347 Ratings
Sillage
7.749 Ratings
Bottle
9.257 Ratings
Value for money
7.024 Ratings
Submitted by Chizza, last update on 19.04.2024.

Reviews

5 in-depth fragrance descriptions
10
Bottle
7
Sillage
9
Longevity
8
Scent
Floyd

290 Reviews
Translated Show original Show translation
Floyd
Floyd
Top Review 51  
No light is allowed in your basement
The timer in the stairwell, its monotonous ticking always goes off when you push open the gate to the vault, the Bakelite light switch cannot be turned and you are allowed into the darkness. Bright is the breath of the cool cellar, like damp earth the smell of the masonry, on its ceiling sparkles tart-sweet and bitter a black light of licorice.
In the indistinct stands a leather sofa, you slowly settle down on it, you feel it more and barely smell it, it has become one with the musty room, with the wooden slats that separate the plots that begin to illuminate the verdigris like moss and everywhere warm dust swirls sweet resin shards through the damp brown leaves that fall through your mind. No light is allowed into this world.
**
"Dilema" is distributed through Flavius Călaj's niche perfume house in Arad, Romania, which collaborates with renowned perfumers and tries to have as much as possible handcrafted by small local companies, a process that lends itself to limited editions.
The fragrance opens with an accord of damp earthy cellar patchouly, which is sharpened and softened at the same time by tart sweet and ethereally bitter licorice. The licorice gives a direction, a bright light reflection on black oil, which is soon absorbed by leather and quenches it at the same time. The impression of a cozy cellar remains, in which mossy woods and dusty-sweet myrrh resins counter the cool moisture with the necessary warmth, making "Dilema" an absolutely portable, moderate fragrance.

(With thanks to Chizza)
48 Comments
10
Bottle
7
Sillage
9
Longevity
8
Scent
ElAttarine

28 Reviews
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ElAttarine
ElAttarine
Very helpful Review 13  
Time machine
Rags soaked in turpentine hang from old, holey beams. Someone has planned to paint or repair things here and then suddenly stopped and left everything lying around. The light falls diagonally into the room through the blind skylight, the dust particles dance in the light. Old wooden furniture and furniture parts stand around, some understandable in their function, others so incomplete that they remain completely mysterious. Strange old leather harnesses, which no one knows what they might have been used for, hang above chairs or chair-like structures with wobbly or incomplete legs. Some of the heavy chests are open, others have their lids closed. The open ones contain dusty books and half-decayed magazines in unknown languages, handwritten papers and letters in illegible handwriting. Perhaps they are love letters that have won or broken hearts at some point. In between, old bottles of licorice liqueur, their contents darkened by unknown lengths of time. Earthy-scented dried leaf twigs lie pressed between the layers of paper.
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A space between past and future. Without contemporary witnesses or people who can provide even fragmentary information, the shadow of memory searches around unsteadily, the memory remains suspended in the air, unable to dock anywhere. Something was here, something may have been important here, these objects may have meant something to someone. On the homepage, Adi ale Van talks about memories, feelings and sensations that the fragrance can trigger by transporting you to different places and times... He is inspired by old Romanian traditions, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the Holy Cross, Adi's own childhood in the Danube Valley, memories of loved ones.
For me, however, the scent also has something very modern about it, representing contemporary Romania, which has always been caught between East and West. A current renowned weekly newspaper is called "Dilema Veche", which means "old dichotomy". The writer Mircea Cartarescu says: "Romania is full of beauty, full of magic. The boulevards of Bucharest are more enigmatic, more melancholy, more human than the cities of glass and concrete. I feel at home among the ruins." I myself have fond memories of a trip to Bucharest, an extremely lively modern city with an architectural mishmash of Art Nouveau, Classicism, Neo-Romanesque, Socialist Modernism, Orthodox churches and magnificent postmodern buildings that reek of big money.
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Dilema can be ordered from time to time, depending on how he keeps up with production, via Adi ale Van's homepage. The bottles are handmade works of art, elaborately and wonderfully packaged, here in a specially designed wooden box with a clasp like an old leather belt with a buckle. They come with a personal thank you note from Adi ale Van on artistically designed paper. Even unpacking the box is a joy and a feast for the eyes.
The cap of the bottle and the bottle itself are artistically designed by hand, you always get a unique piece that looks ancient, as if it had fallen directly onto my table in a time machine from centuries past. The wooden box reminds me of those old attics when households are broken up and things are found that perhaps no one has remembered for a long time...
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For me, the fragrance begins almost pungent and exhaustingly alcoholic, in a very similar quality to Gethsemane, only not quite as harsh and agonizing. I can't make out saffron and bergamot or other citrus notes individually. Bitter myrrh emerges quite quickly. Later, the whole thing becomes more and more licoricey (licorice) and lasts a long time in this licorice phase, which is gradually supported from below with leather and woody notes. At the very end, after several hours, a very soft fragrance remains with light woody and patchouli notes.
Because Anne Sophie Behaghel is named as one of the two perfumers (together with Camille Chemardin) whose work I often greatly appreciate, I had a certain amount of advance confidence in the fragrance. After what was for me a stressful start, it is a moderate, wearable and extremely interesting fragrance with the potential for time travel!
21 Comments
8
Pricing
10
Bottle
9
Sillage
9
Longevity
9
Scent
BobbyGee

220 Reviews
BobbyGee
BobbyGee
1  
Adi ale Van / Dilema
Very cool and carnal ... leather and woody fragrance. The beginning is spicy and incense resin (myrrh) mixed with leather notes. The farther away, the more leather and wood comes out and this is the main leitmotif of this fragrance, which for me is a bit similar to Duro (Nasomatto). There is also one interesting thing about it that I feel over time ... an interesting and tarry note. A bit similar on my skin it comes out as in Oud Imperial (Monte Carlo) or Dark Aoud (Montale) or maybe Black Tourmaline (Durbano). I think it's due to cypriol and slightly 'dirty' patchouli. A fragrance for me, probably more for men. Fairly good projection for 2-3 hours, then close to the cutaneous. Durability up to 6-8 hours.
0 Comments
9
Pricing
10
Bottle
8
Sillage
9
Longevity
8.5
Scent
Dan93

22 Reviews
Translated Show original Show translation
Dan93
Dan93
1  
Downsides
Dark long figures of light wind their way through narrow alleyways.
Searching by night for lost souls who are easy to catch.
They are often those whose lives are at a dead end.
Whose longing for meaning stretches out of their visages.
They squirm and fade away day after day in their own dilemma.
Yet they are their own army of silent lambs.
1 Comment
9
Pricing
10
Bottle
9
Sillage
9
Longevity
9
Scent
Lanatra

13 Reviews
Lanatra
Lanatra
1  
Lovely ambivalence
Sometimes ambivalence is one of the more precise descriptions of reality, and Adi Ale Van's description of Dilema as "a kaleidoscope of the senses that surrounds you" is not just hype. There are oriental hints, I am somewhat reminded of the scent of Georgian red qvevri style wines – I think it is the combination of minerality, leather and liquorice that gives that effect.

But of course, a perfume does not smell like red wine as such. This is the confusing effect of Dilema – it is both rough and unpolished, dusty, leathery, dotted with green incense and slightly sweet; the liquorice suddenly transforms into a saltier version combined with toffee. The woodiness is sometimes reminiscent of oud, but then a few minutes later it is obvious that it is not.

Like everything from Adi Ale Van, this is art rather than any generic style of perfume. Still, there is a core of traditional perfumery categories involved, I just cannot decide which. At times I think of Dior Homme Parfum and French "cuir" scents, but other times the Levant with the mentioned oud tradition. I suppose that is Romania to you, a region that is neither oriental nor occidental but sits exactly where it sits and absorbs a little bit of everything that happens through its rich history. Fantastic, it is only a bit rough edges that stops me from giving a full 10/10.
0 Comments

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