Guerlain Cuir Beluga is from the L'Art et La Matiere Collection. It was launched in 2005 in celebration of the renovations being completed on the Paris Guerlain headquarters on the Champs-Elysees. This is in the tall rectangular bottle pictured, not the 2021 version.
The perfumer was Olivier Polge. Notes from Guerlain on its creation - Light and shade meet on the skin. With Cuir Beluga, the Guerlain perfumer chose to interpret the softness of white suede in an absolutely luxurious and addictive version. Like an intense, warm light on the skin, the fragrance opens with an aldehyde mandarin accord drawn out into an everlasting flower note and then wrapped in a voluptuous cloud of amber, heliotrope and vanilla. An intense and totally unexpected sensorial experience.
Notes of aldehydes, mandarin, patchouli, immortelle, vanilla, amber, heliotrope, white suede
From Kakfaesque - "Cuir Beluga opens on my skin with a brief touch of light boozy sweetness, followed by heliotrope and a hint of honeyed floral Immortelle, all wrapped in a soft, rich, deep, amber embrace. The heliotrope smells simultaneously like delicate flowers, almond paste, meringues, powder, and sweetened Play-Doh. It’s an incredibly soothing, comforting mix, and instantly made me think of Mary Poppins wrapping someone up in a warm, pink flannel, while telling them to have a spoonful of sugar. The boozy touch quickly vanishes, as does the immortelle. The latter never smells of any of its usual manifestations on my skin. It’s not dry, dusty, green, curry-like, or heavy maple syrup. Instead, it was merely a brief touch of warm flowers, that accentuated the delicate floralacy of the heliotrope."
From Olfactoria's Travels - "The leather in Cuir Beluga will certainly disappoint leather fetishists, for simply not being there. It is the softest, most innocuous, but extremely elegant off-white calf-skin that I picture in my mind’s eye when wearing Cuir Beluga. Something you’d love to touch, but would be immediately afraid of ruining by doing so."
From The Non-blonde - "Some smell suede and compare Cuir Beluga to Daim Blond, but I don't agree. To my nose it's the finest most luxurious leather you can find. I have a pair of tall Jimmy Choo boots that feels this soft and timeless. It's something that could have existed 50 years ago and has both an air of mystery and a determined backbone, despite the softness and the obvious sex appeal. I love touching and smelling my boots (us scentheads tend to shove our schnozes into the weirdest things and places) as it gives me a similar thrill to experiencing Cuir Beluga."
From Basenotes - "Layer in gorgeous suede/leather notes, with an extraordinarily beautiful powdery effect on top, a little heliotrope sheen in the middle, and you have another excuse to praise the gods of fragrance. Cuir Beluga is a bona fide masterpiece, one of Guerlain's crown jewels. High likelihood you'll fall in love. It's pretty irresistible."
