Lattafa Khamrah or Kilian Angels' Share?

If you've ever gone looking for a warm, sweet winter scent, you've surely seen these two names in the same sentence. Kilian Angels' Share is a niche fragrance from Paris, with a bottle that costs as much as a good coat. Lattafa Khamrah is an Arabian fragrance from Dubai, many times more affordable. On first sniff they really do share a lot: cinnamon, praline, vanilla and tonka. But wear them for a whole day and it becomes clear that they are two different perfumes, each with its own character.

Angels' Share: cognac in an oak barrel

The name comes from a term cognac makers use: the “angels' share” is the little bit of spirit that evaporates from the barrel as it ages. And that's how the perfume opens, with cognac that's warm and slightly boozy, cinnamon right behind it. Then comes praline, followed by tonka and vanilla, and underneath it all you can sense oak, which gives the sweetness some gravity and stops it from turning into candy. The result is smooth and rounded: sweet, but grown-up, like a dessert served with a glass of something stronger.

Khamrah: dates, spice and sugar

Khamrah doesn't list cognac in its notes, but it has something Angels' Share doesn't: dates. They give it a dense, fruity, honeyed tone, like a cake studded with dried fruit. The cinnamon is louder, the sweetness more pronounced, and the whole scent is a warmer, fuller shade of amber. Where Angels' Share is polished and calm, Khamrah is generous and playful. It gets noticed, people remember it, and it's easy to overdo, so start with two sprays.

Angels' Share is dessert at a restaurant; Khamrah is cake from your grandmother's kitchen. Both are sweet, but they don't tell the same story.

Which one is for you

Go for Angels' Share if you like sweet but elegant; if you enjoy the smell of spirits and wood; if you wear perfume to dinner, the theatre or the office in winter, where you don't want to be the loudest thing in the room.

Go for Khamrah if you love gourmand scents without holding back; if you want to be noticed when you walk by; if you're after a warm everyday winter scent without the bottle costing as much as a ski weekend.

The best test is simple: get a 5 ml decant of each and put one on your left wrist and the other on your right. Smell them straight away, again after an hour, and again in the evening. Differences you'd never notice in a shop become obvious once a perfume has lived on your skin for a few hours. You might prefer the pricier one, or the cheaper one, or realise you want both, for different days. If this style is your thing, take a look at our pick of scents for cold days too.