Los Angeles by Gallivant

I wore 'Los Angeles' by Gallivant every day for a week, and here are my thoughts about it...

The Results in short

Source: 10ml Parfumado atomiser

• How much I like it for daily wear: on me 6.5, though layered it can be an 8; but my husband loves it and rates it 9

• How much I like it for occasional wear: 8.5

• Composition rating: 8

• Lasting power: 6 or 7

• Did my view change as the week went on? Somewhat - new facets were revealed

• Did I get bored of it? No

• Any Compliments? Yes - husband is a big fan of this one

• In three words: hip beach bonfire

• Cost and value for money: Very good

• Will I buy it? Quite possibly, though not yet

Notes from Gallivant:

Top: Clary sage, Mandarin, Pineapple

Heart: Narcissus, Tuberose

Base: Cade, Guaiac wood, Nagarmotha / Cypriol, Musks, Heliotrope

First thoughts first

I want to start off by saying that I think Gallivant is a great brand. I put them in the same wheelhouse as some others: DS & Durga, Commodity and Bastille. I also see kinship with Mason Crivelli. This is my perception. Gallivant is a hip, independent, artistically-driven house that aims to provide escapism and 'travel' through scent, and, since 30ml bottles are part of their offer, does so at an affordable price point.

Nick Steward, brand founder, had a career in the fragrance industry (including Product & Artistic Director at L'Artisan) before getting "back-to-basics" and launching Gallivant, which he calls 'slow perfume'. So this guy knows fragrance, and whatever he does with Gallivant will be intentional. The line offers kick-back-and-relax perfumes that are intended to have transportive qualities and I can say that of those I've tried, he succeeds.

Los Angeles is one of my favourite cities in the world: it's where I would most like to have 'armchair travelled' to (to use David Moltz's phrase) when I was younger. A place of dreams. Hollywood. Recording studios in the hills. Mulholland Drive. The Viper Room. Sunset Strip.

LA has changed since my teenaged dreams, I guess, because people have changed. To me, having been recently, it's all coffee shops, the smell of graphic novel pages, Santal 33, hot concrete under blazing sun, sunscreen, sunsets, street artists, hotel toiletries, Sephora, people smoking marijuana on Venice Beach, vegan brunch, açai bowls... This is a cleaner LA than that of the 80s and 90s, but it's still a hugely evocative place. It's still a place where dreams are made.

With Los Angeles (the perfume), Nick Steward and parfumer Karine Chevallier do conjure up a very particular place: it is the LA I recognise. There's the sticky cocktail from the pineapple, there's the hint of Santal 33 or some other 'hipper than thou' niche DNA, the smell of the foliage, of the blazing sun, of darkened concrete corners of mid-century hotels as the sun rises and sets. An expensive candle. Sea salt in your hair. But then, there's also the burning. Because to me, Gallivant's Lost Angeles smells mostly like LA on fire.

Have you read Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid? It's about a famous family who throw a party at their Malibu house and I don't think it's a spoiler to say that the place is ablaze by the end of the fateful night. If you're planning to read it, get a bottle of Los Angeles and give yourself an immersive experience.

7 Day Test

Wearing a fragrance all week means I have enough time to really get my head around it. It did conjure up Los Angeles for me, but also East London. You see, for me, this is a drinking outside a bar on Broadway Market kind of perfume. It's craft beer in Bethnal Green. It would also make the most perfect festival scent. This is bang on 10/10 for a hazy night watching great bands as the sun goes down, cider in hand.

Note wise, it doesn't jump out as a floral fragrance to my nose, though it has those floral facets. I'm a tuberose lover, but I don't smell tuberose, though I can see that it is there to add some girth to the mid-notes. I do detect aquatic notes, and some light heliotrope. The pineapple is sticky but far away; the oud too, like a guy passing by in a club. There's a little spice, but paired with the ocean spray, it adds piquancy without making it too warm. Then there's the smoke: whether it's a bonfire on the beach or a forest or something else.

Because of the florals it's completely gender inclusive, though I think I'd prefer it on my man to myself and do plan on giving him my decant. I haven't tried it out on him but I can see he may well love this one on himself - he rated it highly on me and on the paper strip I put under his nose.

I actually found that this one pairs really nicely with other perfumes. I layered it with several, including beachy ones like Bain de Midi by Maison Matine. Because it's got that smoky aspect on me, I found it is a nice 'topper', where it's adding a bit of smoke to my hair, or making another fragrance smell more hip. I might reach for it if I was going to an art gallery and wanted to smell interesting, or a BBQ with friends.

This is a definite 'like' for me, and something I will experiment more with. It's a good one to have in the collection for that bit of armchair travelling. Next time I want to be in Los Angeles, or at a music festival, all I need to do is pull this out of my drawer, and I'm there.

Available in 30ml (£65) or 100ml (£145) from Gallivant.