Initio Parfums Privés Oud for Greatness Eau de Parfum

What It Smells Like

Initio Oud for Greatness is a spicy oud fragrance, and the scent the house is best known for. It leads the Black Gold Project collection and is one of the best-known modern oud perfumes: clean, powerful and instantly recognisable.

The opening is saffron, nutmeg and lavender. Saffron has a dry, leathery, slightly metallic glow, nutmeg adds warm spice, and lavender brings an aromatic freshness that makes the first minutes feel bright rather than heavy.

The heart is oud, also called agarwood, the dark resinous wood at the centre of Middle Eastern perfumery. Here it is polished and smooth, woody and leathery, with none of the barnyard quality that natural oud can have. It is the reason this fragrance works so well as a first oud.

The base is patchouli and musk, earthy and warm, which gives the oud a long, clean trail. Fragrantica's community ranks warm spicy, fresh spicy and oud almost level as the leading accords, and rates it 4.23 out of 5 from more than 8,500 votes.

Who Made It

Initio does not name the perfumers behind most of its fragrances, and neither Fragrantica nor Parfumo lists one for Oud for Greatness. We would rather leave the credit open than guess. The house presents its fragrances as the work of a collective, with the materials and their effect on mood placed ahead of any individual signature.

Who It's For

Oud for Greatness is for people who want presence. Fragrantica lists it for women and men, and it is worn by both.

If you want to understand why oud became so popular in Western perfumery, start here. If you prefer quiet or sweet scents, it will be too assertive, and Oud for Grace is the softer, sweeter member of the family. It is a fragrance that people notice and ask about, which is a large part of its appeal.

When to Wear It

Fragrantica voters place it in winter and fall, and night scores twice as high as day. Cool air suits the spices and the oud.

Wear it for evenings, formal events and occasions when you want to make an impression. Parfumo's community rates both projection and longevity as above average, so one or two sprays are enough, and more is rarely a good idea indoors.

About the House

Initio Parfums Privés launched in Paris in 2015 with an unusual premise: that scent acts on mood and attraction before we consciously register it. The fragrances are built around materials chosen for that effect, such as musks, woods, resins and the jasmine-like molecule hedione, and they are grouped into collections with a stated purpose: The Absolutes, The Carnal Blends, The Black Gold Project, the Hedonist collection and Supercharged.

The bottles are heavy, square-shouldered flacons with a metal medallion on the front, and the compositions tend to be concentrated and long-lasting. Initio is a boutique-only house at Redolia. It is sold at our perfumery at 92 West Main Street in Somerville, New Jersey, and not through the website. Read how our boutique-only houses work, then come in and try it on skin before you decide.