I’ve honestly never tried anything from Goldfield & Banks and I’m not going to say I’m ashamed that I haven’t tried any of them, but I will say there is now a bit of regret. Goldfield & Banks is a niche house and some of their beautifully crafted fragrances have graced my presence recently including the newly released Ingenious Ginger. A good friend of mine highly recommended this brand and so far out of the four I’ve smelled, two of them hit really high marks for me personally – one of them being Ingenious Ginger.
I can tell you right from the start this fragrance is super bright, citrusy, and floral. It IS a unisex fragrance and I’ll say that it definitely does not lean one way or the other, it’s perfectly balanced to be smack dab in the middle. Keep in mind, this is NOT a ginger scent like the ginger root will give off, it’s the ginger flower that’s the main focal point here. It’s not as spicy as a ginger root but more of a smooth silky effervescent scent that’s very pleasant. The bergamot and lemon are also very pronounced in the opening and add to that immediate freshness that smells intoxicating. So far, the opening is living up to the hype that I keep hearing about.
The mid has a lot of florals; magnolia, jasmine, and rose. The note breakdown says there’s mandarin orange in there, but I found that with the top citrus notes still present in the mid, it’s not so immediate noticeable. You just keep getting that nice overall bright citrus and the sweet-smelling floral notes.
The dry down is a completely different story. The main singer has left the stage and completely changed clothes and is ready for act two. This is where this fragrance really jumps flips and twists and does a 180 on you. If you’re looking for a bright-citrus powerhouse from start to finish, look elsewhere because this one is not it. It’s a shapeshifter and I’m down to play with this any day of the week.
Once all of the floral and citrus notes dry down, you’re left with the most warm and beautiful notes of vanilla, cashmeran, amber, musk, sandalwood, and patchouli. Right? Not even close to what you were thinking! It’s not even close to what I was thinking either when I blind tested this. The only thing I can say that the dry down really smells like Zadig & Voltaire’s This is Him (really good fall scent BTW). It goes from bright and fresh to warm and woody with some of that ginger flower still lingering. An instant hit with me for sure.
With my testing I found this fragrance to last 8+ hours easily and when sweating in the summertime heat the scent definitely projects at a much higher rate. I found myself getting wafts of patchouli (one of my favorites, as you know) after about 6 hours and continuing on and on throughout the day and into the night.
So now that I’ve tested Ingenious Ginger and a few others, I feel like I need to test more. Would you like to see a full review of the entire lineup? Let me know in the comments! For now, pick up your sample of Goldfield & Banks Ingenious Ginger right here and as always, I’ll catch you guys in the next one!
