Specimen 09 Banana Sambac
Banana blossom, blackcurrant and mango melt into white florals over a milky prickly pear accord and driftwood.
Perfumer: Vincent Ricord
Made in collaboration with Sunpride, an Indonesian fruit company, Specimen 09 follows a shift from bloom to fruit to skin, composed by Vincent Ricord.
It opens on lemon essential oil, crisp and sour, beside banana heart — the blossom rather than the fruit — with its green, vegetal pulse. Blackcurrant cuts in with a darker tang, holding the sweetness back for a moment. The heart turns lush: mango flesh spreads out ripe and soft, melting into the dense white florals of gardenia and jasmine sambac absolute, until ripe fruit and heady petals are hard to tell apart.
The base pairs a prickly pear milk accord, an imagined milkiness drawn from the cactus fruit, with vanilla and driftwood. Milky softness and weathered wood give the tropical fruit and flowers somewhere quiet to rest.
