What Makes Creed Aventus SO GOOD?! | Creed Aventus 10th Anniversary Review

(bright ambient music) - It’s good. But is it that good? Let’s discuss. (bright ambient music) I’m Brian Sacawa, you’re watching He Spoke Style where we are dedicated to giving you all the tips, knowledge and inspiration you need to dress well, have more confidence and unlock your potential. It’s rare that I’ll do a single fragrance review but since it is the 10-year anniversary of Creed Aventus, I thought it was apropos especially because this fragrance is held in such high regard, and is often called one of the best if not the best fragrance in the entire world. And that is not an exaggeration. People absolutely love this fragrance. It gets tons of compliments and I’m sure you’re wondering, what is it that makes it so good? Before we get to that, just a few quick bullet points about the history and background of this fragrance, so introduced in 2010, crafted by Olivier Creed in collaboration with his son, Erwin, it was inspired by the life of Napoleon Bonaparte.

01:20 - The name is derived from A which means from and ventus the wind from the wind, which is an allusion to always being driven and moving forward towards success. And speaking of success, Aventus has become the best selling fragrance in the entire history of Creed which stretches back all the way to 1760. So obviously what makes a fragrance a blockbuster fragrance is how it smells. And I have to say that Aventus is a very special scent. It’s very difficult, in my opinion to do something that is unique, but that also appeals to a very, very wide audience.

01:55 - And I think that’s especially true when you are dealing with a brand that has a very long history, that is by and large, a niche brand and a product that is not cheap. 50 milliliter bottle costs $325 hundred mil $435, 250 mil $670, 500 mil $1,055 and a 1,000 mil bottle coming in at $1,600. So we’ll come to whether or not I think it’s worth the price. But now let’s actually dive into some of the notes that make Creed Aventus such an unmistakable scent. On the top you’ve got bergamot, black currant leaves, apple and pineapple.

02:37 - When you spray this, immediately you’re hit with that freshness. And the note that does come through the most is pineapple, completely unmistakable. It’s got that sweetness you’re imagining right now but it’s not overpowering. It’s very balanced with everything around it. Right out of the bottle, this pineapple note is what I would say is the number one element that makes Aventus so interesting, different and unexpected.

02:59 - Of course, there’s more to any great fragrance than what you smell right off the bat. Now as this dries down, it develops in the middle with notes of pink berries, birch, the woodiness really does start to come through at this stage. And you also have some patchouli and jasmine. As it fully develops the base notes, you get hints of our musk, oakmoss, ambergris and vanilla with the latter kind of peeking through very distinctively. Overall I would characterize the scent as slightly sweet, fresh and somewhat woody.

03:27 - Creed on their website calls it a fruity and rich fragrance, rich I can kind of get behind, fruity, I think is a little bit of mischaracterization. There is definitely that unmistakable pineapple note but it’s not fruity in the way that that suggests. It’s definitely a masculine scent that can be worn all year round. And in terms of longevity, it lasts around eight hours on my skin and becomes more or less of a skin scent in the last hour or two. For as many people that love Creed Aventus the fragrance does have its fair share of haters as well.

03:58 - And a lot of people who are in that camp generally find Aventus unremarkable in terms of how it actually smells, and attribute its popularity to the marketing effort that was put behind it. There are also people who I might call fragrance snobs or maybe fragrance hipsters is a better term, who simply don’t like it because it is so popular. But you got to think that it’s popular for a reason, right? I mean, a fragrance doesn’t get as popular as Aventus if it smells like (beep) it doesn’t matter how much marketing you have behind it. If it doesn’t smell good, it’s not going to be a winner. So there’s definitely something special about Creed Aventus.

04:34 - In a certain way it’s as neutral and boring as like Acqua Di Gio or Eau Savage and that it has that sort of mass appeal to it but it’s also unique in a very inoffensive way not in a niche fragrance or fragrance nerd kind of way. And that is what I think really gives it the edge in the realm of fragrances that have that universal appeal. What’s different however, and since I mentioned Acqua Di Gio and Eau Sauvage is the price. So those two were in the $80 to $100 range whereas Aventus as you saw it and probably know, is upwards of $3 to $400, which begs the question is Creed Aventus worth it? I can only give you my opinion here and I definitely encourage you to have a discussion about this in the comments, and in my opinion, Creed Aventus is worth it and deserves a place among the most classic men’s fragrances of all time. I didn’t include it in my roundup of the top 10 most classic men’s fragrances but that was because it is such a modern scent.

05:33 - If you are a fan of classic fragrances, I definitely recommend you check out that video right over there. See what my favorites are, and see if I’ve got yours on the list. .