Spiritcask is a woody spicy fragrance that launched in 2023. Created by Euan McCall, it features top notes of whisky, pear, cognac, chamomile and rum; middle notes of malt, jasmine and ylang-ylang; and base notes of vanilla absolute, whisky, maple, oak, cedar, cacao, guaiacwood, coffee, labdanum, lactones and leather. Held in the customs house, the wistful spiritmaker plunges their head into the last empty barrel, where cooper-fired sweet nothings whisper and swirl. Place reference: Queen's Dock, Glasgow. Spiritcask is an extrait de parfum.
JORUM STUDIO SPIRITCASK REVIEWS
Fragrantica: Bright, classy and very wearable, Spiritcask is very well blended. I get a really smooth blend of fruit and booze with a nice woody backbone running through the mix. If this had been released as part of Kilian's 'Liquors' collection it would likely get a truck-load of hype. Definitely unisex and can probably be worn in a variety of circumstances, maybe best suited for a summer evening wear. The price for what you get is pretty reasonable also
Fragrantica: Got the sample at 1:00 pm and had ordered a bottle by 2:00 pm. Total love at first sniff. There are a lot of notes, but they are blended very well. The ones I can pick out are whisky, woods, and vanilla, but this fragrance also brings to mind some delicious herbal liqueur made by monks in a cloistered monastery. Not a projector, but I can smell it on me and that's all that matters. In the words of Marie Kondo, this sparks joy. Great joy!
Fragrantica: What an interesting and unique scent! Very complex, high quality, very natural smelling... and that "damp/old wood" smell is easily the most photorealistic I've ever come across. It's actually a little mind boggling how well Eaun has replicated that smell - I was instantly transported to a memory (fixing an old damp wooden fence with my dad as a child)... I can't remember the last time I was so impressed with an "accord". I know marketing is what it is, but to me it honestly does smell like the inside of an old retired whisky barrel. Not one that is still dripping with liquor, but an old one that has dried out and just holds onto the faint whispers of what was in their before. The wood has absorbed so much over the years that even when it "dries", it never truly dries, so the wood feels both dry AND damp... if you smelled that wood inside the barrel, I feel this is what it would smell like. It kinda reminds me of taking Imaginary Authors Memoirs of a Trespasser, making the wood less harsh and more photorealistic (and more "damp"), upping the sweetness and vanilla a tad (but not in a sickly way), adding a bunch of soft boozy diffusive notes to the background, and upping the quality. I'm in no way saying this is inspired by MOAT, this is definitely its own thing (and much easier on the nose, I found MOAT to be a bit too harsh), but with them both being wood and vanilla scents, it's the closest reference point I can think of. Very impressive perfumery - I think once more people get their noses on this stuff I can see it being quite the best seller. Heck, with enough influencer hype I could see this becoming a bit of a hype beast. I definitely haven't smelled anything else truly like it. P.S. Due to it's complexity, I can definitely see this being one of those scents that smells different to different people (as is reflected in these reviews). There's so much going on and it's so well blended that it really is hard to pin down or describe exactly what you're smelling...
Fragrantica: Love this scent. L O V E. Spiritcask is a creamy woody vanilla with feminine leaning whisky notes — a first for me as booze notes tends to go masculine with my chemistry. It’s the most intoxicating scent I’ve come across in a long time. In the dry down, the florals are very pronounced. I have a new favorite house; Jorum has the potential to bankrupt me. I’m so glad they sell their perfumes in 30 ml, making it affordable for junkies like me to keep collecting. But seriously, with Spiritcask, I wish I could buy a vat…or barrel of it. It’s that good. Going onto my list of top 10 now. I’m drunk in love with my Luckscent sample, and pining for a full bottle.
Fragrantica: Begins with an old leather jacket connotation, lifted with a soft mint imperial note. Musty and herbal like a vintage biker jacket you’d find on a hanger in a thrift shop. No terpenoids or violet like typical leathers. It is quiet and comfortable. It is broken in with years of love and wear. Complete with patina, cracks and wrinkles as though it has lived a life twice over. This is supported by a delicious vanilla recreation (maybe containing a little absolute). It is creamy, balsamic and sticky sweet with a gentle suggestion of aged woods humming underneath. After the initial leather jacket blast, this perfume soon settles into the linear, high quality vanilla with a backbone of old, textured woods. Spiritcask makes for a very interesting and mature vanilla centric fragrance. It masters the brief and does well to have not strayed into paths lesser perfumes would have taken. I’m really impressed with my initial exposure to Jorum Studio. Reasonably priced, interesting perfumes and a clear brand identity. I will be diving deeper into their offerings very soon.
Fragrantica: Like an aged barrel of malt whiskey haunted by the ghost of a Scottish child who died mysteriously on the remote, sweet-smelling grounds of the Lagavulin distillery.
Fragrantica: This opens with a slightly herbal heavily boozy pear smell. The booze here is warm, smooth, and slightly spiced, with the whiskey being the most prominent to my nose. The heart has a gorgeous blend of creamy and sweet florals, the ylang ylang here pulling banana-esque and the malt really evokes a bready booziness. The boozy accords stay throughout the entirety of the scent, especially in the dry down where you get a fun concoction of chocolate, coffee, and maple. This sounds like it’d be overtly sweet but it’s not, the maple is sweet but woody forward especially with the oak + cedar here. The coffee is a dark roast and the chocolate a dark one. The whiskey comes out on top again but this is a sweetened one, it’s blended with vanilla liqueur, and it’s oh so woody. This is a veryyyy complex scent but it’s extremely intoxicating.
Fragrantica: It was *so hard* to choose just two Jorum scents to bring home full bottles of, but Spiritcask won out because I was in Scotland as a tourist & I just can't think of a better memento to bring home! Really impressed with this entire line & house, Euan McCall knows his shit. What excited me about this was the potential to use it as a summer-to-fall transition scent, and the way the whiskey notes are almost chocolatey. It's a gourmand, maybe, but not a toothsome one and certainly not a painfully literal one. Bravo.
Fragrantica: Black Forest Cake and caramelized pears. It’s a damp barrel full of precious whisky that transmits a sweet minty like booziness, hauntingly beautiful.
