[unpaid/sample] Using a tornado reference – both olfactorily and visually – that has been the pandemic and taking us to the home of famous tornados, Kansas, Jonathan Ward’s first fragrance is interesting. Firstly, I’ve never seen a bottle like this and finding artistic newness in the big world of fragrance is quite something, and secondly, it’s difficult to pin down exactly what category Kansas would naturally fall into.
At the first spritz, I found Kansas bright and sweet – there’s a top jasmine note that my nose immediately said thank you very much for as well as ylang ylang and bergamot mingling in the juice. I’m surprised at how those big, striking top notes settle into something more earthy and warm as the wear progresses but to my nose, the jasmine fuelled sweetness stays throughout.
This fragrance makes several changes in the wear – I thought I’d lost the jasmine trail when drier more earthy notes became apparent but they moved out of the way when the tonka bean came into play and put the flowers back nicely. There’s cedar and sandalwood that give it a masculine aspect under the feminine (speaking traditionally) tones but it’s designed to be gender fluid which I think it really is. Assigning gender to fragrance is difficult – everyone has different tastes regardless, but in my own mind I didn’t discover the ‘masculine’ element until some way through the wear and when I did pick it up I liked its presence. It’s my theory that your nose will pick out what it both loves (or loathes) first, so I’m happily in a jasmine swirl right now and have to seek out the other notes with more purpose. It’s £92 for 30ml EDP or £6 for 10ml HERE.
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