Leonard Eau de Parfum

Leonard Eau de Parfum is a white flower perfume of the plush, slightly tropical kind, and it is put together with more care than its quiet reputation suggests.

Apricot blossom opens it, which is a flower rather than the fruit: softer, greener and less sweet than apricot itself, with only a hint of the stone fruit about it. Pink pepper gives that a dry, peppery sparkle, and ylang ylang arrives early with its creamy, heady richness, so the perfume announces its intentions immediately.

The heart is where it becomes generous. Lilac is cool, powdery and faintly green, frangipani is heavy, waxy and tropical, and orange blossom lifts the pair with a clean bitterness that keeps the whole arrangement from turning syrupy. Three flowers of quite different weights in one accord is an old trick and it works here.

Musk, vanilla and sandalwood close it, soft, warm and creamy in that order, and the finish sits close to the skin without ever disappearing. Nine materials, and the shape is a steady softening from bright to plush. None of the three flowers in the middle is allowed to dominate, which is harder to arrange than a single flower pushed to the front and is the main reason this wears as smoothly as it does.

At eau de parfum strength expect six hours or so, strongest in the first two hours. Two sprays will do, since white flowers of this weight expand on warm skin. Spring and summer evenings suit it, and so do occasions where a little opulence is wanted; it is pitched at women, and it will particularly suit anyone who finds most modern florals too thin. Two or three hours in it is still clearly itself, which is what the concentration is for.