Montale is a brand known for its oud-based fragrances. What is funny is of the Montales I own only one of them is an oud-based perfume. I find I gravitate to the house style of intensity above everything when it isn’t carrying some oud with it. One other thing about Montale it is one of the most prolific brands and it becomes difficult for me to keep up. I tend to ask those who carry the line whether there is anything new worth trying from Montale. After the Holidays Josie from Osswald NYC told me I should give the recent The New Rose a try. Inwardly I groaned as I was already looking at the first few new rose scents for spring arriving in the mail. I said send me a sample thinking I would dismiss it easily. Except it wasn’t so easily pushed aside.
When I saw the note list I was thinking The New Rose was going to be a typical fruity floral and, in many ways, it is. What makes it stand out is Montale tones down the bombast a smidge which allows The New Rose some breathing space not typical in a Montale fragrance. Into that space there are more subtle components than normal for a Montale as well. It adds up to a high-quality rose perfume.
The New Rose opens with the nucleus of Bulgarian rose there from the first moments. Precision is not a word I often use with Montale fragrances but the Bulgarian is placed firmly in the center of everything to come. It is a good choice because it has both spicy and powdery aspects which can be used to interact with the other ingredients. The New Rose becomes a study in how to play nice with rose. First up is lemon in its most luminous form which nestles into the spicy part of the rose. Peach comes along and falls into the powdery part. Lily of the valley provides contrasting green floralcy. These are all commonly used fruity notes with rose except in The New Rose, used in higher concentrations, it makes it different. The base is a solid Oriental version of sandalwood, vanilla, and ylang-ylang to give this a creamy smooth finish.
The New Rose has 18-24 hour longevity and above average sillage.
This is the wrong time of year to give me a new rose perfume unless it is different. The New Rose is satisfyingly unique enough to fit that.
Disclosure: This review is based on a sample provided by Osswald NYC.
–Mark Behnke
