Le Male by Jean Paul Gaultier

I had a bout with this one when I was much younger and it was new on the scene. Now like HorationCaine, I find it downright annoying.

It is a pleasant enough scent to be sure, and the overwhelming number of young men I run into in Los Angeles heading for the clubs that have bathed in it tells me that young women must like it.

It's very sweet, vanilla and loud. Once you know the scent, you'll spot it in a crowd many feet away from anyone wearing it.

It's not a scent for mature men. And by mature I mean around 30 or so with a minimally serious demeanor. It's one of two scents in my collection that I looked at and said "I can't wear this!" Into the trash it went.

jhclare;2098449 said:

I've never tried this, but 212 Sexy Men is supposed to be a dead ringer too. May be a cheaper way to try this type of fragrance!

John

Click to expand...

But if you've not tried the JPG, you wouldn't really know if the 212 is an accurate facsimile, would you?

That aside, I wouldn't recommend people try this scent in the first place, if not for their own sakes, then for the sakes of the people around them. This stuff is heavy and sweet, synthetic, uncomplicated, and generally nauseating. It's also unremittingly long lived, so you can continue to foul the air for hours and hours. There's not a whole lot else I can say about it. Wear at your own risk.

Having said that, I have known women who do respond positively to the scent. My ex-girlfriend absolutely swooned over this stuff, so I did try wearing it for a spell. I hated it so much, I had to stop wearing it, no matter how she might have wanted to ravage me if I had it on.

I've never tried this, but 212 Sexy Men is supposed to be a dead ringer too. May be a cheaper way to try this type of fragrance!

John

Le Male is, to me, the 1990's as defined by a scent. Mediocre, saccharine, artificial, superficial.

The notes are mint, lavender, cumin, blah, blah, blah . . .

Really, with this one, the notes aren't relevant. There's nothing in Le Male that smells natural, beyond some aspects of the mint and vanilla in the base. I get an atypical explosion of sharp sweetness, haloed in a dusty, slightly floral glow, with a very rich vanilla/tonka drydown. Despite how good that may sound, my overall opinion of Le Male is that, in a phrase, its day has passed.

With the exception of the classy and composed Allure Homme by Chanel, I don't see any real reason to revisit the overly-sweet and downright cloying world of '90s preppy designer frags, and Le Male is at the top of my "Now Expired" list. I'll concede that the first impression this made on me back in 1996 or '97 was quite stark; I did feel it was a bit exotic and very unique. It's one of the strongest colognes ever made, and will easily last you 10 hours, maybe more. I've never been one who believed in the whole "one spray-ahead and walk-through" method of applying cologne, but with Le Male I make an exception. Any other way of applying this is insane.

As a design major, I have to praise the packaging, tacky as it is. The sculptural nature of the bottle and the soup can are embarrassingly different. But the $75 price tag makes this fragrance a one-time buy. Besides, if you find you like the cloying vanilla sweetness, you can get Perry Ellis 360 White for less than half the price. It's an unabashed knock-off with a nearly-identical mid-basenote range. The fact that Ellis is able to mimic Gaultier so well doesn't say much for the originality of either frag's construction. But then again, imitation is the surest form of flattery.

If you haven't already tried this, skip it. If you have tried it, and are sort of curious about reliving the Le Male experience - skip that, too.