Ingredients · Woods · dry-down

Patchouli oil

Say itpuh-CHOO-lee oil

Damp earth, cocoa and red wine.

Perfumers add camphoraceous: the cool bite of a chest rub.

What it is

Oil distilled from dried, lightly fermented patchouli leaves, in Indonesia.

When you smell it

Dry-down: hours later.

What perfumers do with it

Earthy-woody pillar of chypres and orientals; adds depth, fixation and a dark, sweet richness.

Worth knowing

Its signature smell comes largely from norpatchoulenol, a trace molecule far more potent than the dominant patchoulol.

Known in

Angel (Mugler, 1992); Borneo 1834 (Serge Lutens, 2005)

Also called

Pogostemon cablin; patchouly

On the label of 57 of the 232 perfumes read so far

SauvageDior · printed “Pogostemon cablin oil”ShalimarGuerlain · printed “Pogostemon cablin oil”Eau SauvageDior · printed “Pogostemon cablin oil”Bleu de ChanelChanel · printed “Pogostemon cablin oil”Coco MademoiselleChanel · printed “Pogostemon cablin oil”LaytonParfums de Marly · printed “Pogostemon cablin oil”

See all 57

Named by the house, not on the label, in 49

MitsoukoGuerlain · “patchouli”AngelMugler · “Patchouli Leaf”Acqua di GiòArmani · “Indonesian patchouli”La Vie Est BelleLancôme · “patchouli”Portrait of a LadyFrédéric Malle · “Patchouli”AventusCreed · “Patchouli”

See all 49