Private Blend: Japon Noir Tom Ford for women and men

I love this scent and wear it to boot.

It encompasses the notes (earthy and woody) that I like. I must amp the floral notes more that the leather. The dry dowm is subtle.

Perfect for me. :)

Dry woods, a little something vaguely oud-like, and some lavender are what I smell at first, very strong and concentrated. The lavender contributes to a “masculine-fougere”-like feel throughout the evolution of the scent. After the first half hour or so it becomes sweeter, and even woodier than it was at the beginning.

Despite “spice bouquet” being listed as one of the notes, I don’t find this particularly spicy. If there’s any spice at all it’s some ground spices that have been sitting around so long that they’re lost a lot of their scent and mostly just smell dry and woody, suspiciously like vetiver.

I have no idea what “porto noir” is supposed to be other than some sort of miscegenated language construction that’s listed in the official notes and is supposed to sound impressive. Maybe it’s what smells like Sterno fumes to people on Basenotes. There’s a subtle undercurrent of powdery florals, but it doesn’t really smell like jasmine, it’s just sweetly ambiguous. There’s no obvious leather, either.

After about 6 hours, it has dried down to a light vanilla scent. I would say that overall, this is a clean, sweetish, aromatic woody scent, that’s well-made and pleasant to wear.

based on the beautiful reviews here, i had to give japon noir a try.
at first, it is very cloudy... not dark, just very subtle and smoky.. sort of cured. the smokyness is even slightly salty which makes it terrificly interesting.. something in a way i have never smelled before. but then, all of a sudden, it changes drasticly in somthing that strongly reminds me of jicky. just a little warmer and softer without the animalic and edgy notes.. maybe more like shalimar. i think its because i smell a whole lot of lavender. even if it is not listed, it is what i smell loudest... strong lavender, with a little softness of vanilla and amber... and for me, the leather i was looking for wasnt as loud as all the other notes, just a slight touch. so this is how it stays... a little edgy but soft, with strong lavender, citrus and ambery-vanilla notes and slowly fades away.
as i already said, what i enjoyed most were the first 10 minutes... the smell of a room full of cured strong and salty smoke but it amazes me how fast the scent changes from that soft, mysterious smoke into a strong jickyesque lavender-vanilla... and i am so happy i didnt give in to buy myself the perfume worth 220euro after the first 5 minutes, because when the lavender came out, i wished it would fade as soon as possible... to my relief it did. so on me, the lasting-time wasnt what i expected at all from a tom ford fragrance. it was gone after a few hours.

I believe Japon Noir has been discontinued. I am hanging on to my precious bottle.

Perfect, the only Private Blend member that deserves its price. It's so dark and oriental. Strange and heavy, waxy and oily, dark brown, green or black. Definitely woody, a fade smell of honey and peppers appear after a while. It's rich and ceremonial, but I prefer to wear it on a Japanese traditional dress not on a suit. It becomes freak on suit for men. It's more masculine than feminine. Only a pleasant scent of floral mixture in it can make it as feminine. You can bet on its longevity!
I love its darkness and oily pattern, there's nothing extra and impurity in it. Clean and calm, peaceful and silent as a Kung-Fu master!
I grade 10/10 to it totally. The rest of the collection are not on my style, you can find them with cheaper price, although if you search you may find this too, but if I'm going to buy one niche perfume, definitely I prefer Japon Noir.

This is one of my favourite among TF Private Blend. It starts with bergamot, leather and vetyver; jasmine appears a little bit later. Patchouli is there, but not into you face annoying like in some other fragrances. This is an amazing truly unisex perfume. My boyfriend and his friend fell in love with it as well. It's dry, leathery/floral, gorgeous on men and women equally. Thank you, Tom!

This is very, very spicy so if you dont like spicy orientals i'd stay away.

It's really lovely though. I get a citrus and ginger blast up front, this then calms a bit to a ginger, cinnamon and jasmine heart with a bit of vetiver. After a few hours i get a powdery amber accord, cinnamon still with a hint of the ginger and a faint bit of leather. This part lasts basically until you wash it off, or at least it does on my skin.
The changes in development are quite subtle though.
Its a strong scent, so a little goes a long way. Probably best for Winter.

Having spent a great deal of time "getting to know" this perfume, i can say that its stunning.

Incredibly spicey and incensey, and dry. Lingers for hours and hours.

I have heard that this is considered one of the more masculine private blends, but i actually think a woman could easily wear it.

Say what you like about the extortionate price of this line, but it is quality stuff.

This smells so like unburned incense sticks it is unbelievable!

Thats not a bad thing, its lovely and as with most private blends, lasts until you wash it off.

I find it hard to pick out any particular notes in this one.

Out of all the private blends collection, this is one of the more masculine scents, however don't let that throw you. It's very unusual, as part of the private blends launch there was a beautiful casing with a small bit of all of the fragrances in the collection. The beauty in this is that it BEGS for one to mix the scents!

That's the beauty, I found that on its own, this scent really didn't hold a candle to the others, at least not for me, but in blending I found it added a lot of depth and richness to the others (one simple post-Private-Blend mix was my combo of this scent with the amber).

I really love the Tom Ford brand, and this collection, this scent really explains why. It's very thoughtful. Obviously this collection has very masculine motifs however, within the packaging and fragrance combos it shows there was a lot of thought behind it and that really, this collection is much more geared to seduce.. and that means man or woman.