Aqua Regia

Aqua Regia announces itself with an audacious contradiction: the bright, petitrol-sharp facets of Calabrian bergamot colliding headlong into supple leather, their friction generating sparks of spice that read almost peppery. Blackcurrant weaves through this clash not as a jammy fruit, but with its characteristic foxy, cat-piss edge intact—green stems crushed underfoot in late summer. This is XerJoff operating in their most baroque register, where Singapore patchouli's chocolatey earthiness tangles with salted caramel, creating an accord that hovers between patisserie and something far more louche. The violet brings its own duplicity, oscillating between powdery cosmetic and metallic ionone shimmer, whilst Florentine iris adds its grey, root-like austerity to prevent the composition from tipping into pure gourmandise. What emerges is leather jacket worn over cashmere, expensive and lived-in, with bourbon vanilla and cedar providing a woody-creamy framework that feels substantial without being heavy. This is for the fragrance obsessive who finds Cuir de Russie too austere and Dior Leather Oud too obvious—someone who wants their leather scents laced with contradictions, where sweet and bitter, rough and refined, occupy the same breath. It's unisex in the truest sense: neither masculine nor feminine but unmistakably adult, worn by those who understand that the most interesting fragrances exist in the liminal spaces between categories.