Vintage Shalimar Extrait Review

I have finally cracked open a bottle of vintage Shalimar extrait and wore it. I don't wear Shalimar that often for some strange reason. For quite a while, I was prowling E-bay and was always on the hunt for reasonably priced bottles of vintage Mitsouko, Shalimar and Jicky. I was mainly looking for the teardrop bottles and if the price was reasonable, I got it. If the bottle was sealed, bonus. Somehow, I managed to score two unopened bottles of vintage Shalimar extrait and one of the bottles was from the 1950's and the other is probably from the 1960's. The one I am reviewing is from the '60's.

The first blast was a whole lot of citrus, something lemony. Since it is vintage, the citrus smells a little bit damaged. Then the vanilla and leather do come out. I've noticed that the vanilla and leather doesn't come as far out in the extrait like in the current EDP, which I am the most familiar with. Nor do I get an animalic growl, well maybe a faint trace of it. Maybe I am too used to the skank in vintage BaV, Keihl's Original Musk and MKK.

After wearing the extrait and then wearing the current EDP version, I had remembered why I don't wear the original Shalimar too much. I don't wear it much because I am not a huge fan of a large dose of citrus in an oriental perfume. I really do enjoy the Shalimar Ode a la Vanille. The Ode a la Vanille does bring the animal growl out and amps up the vanilla while toning down the citrus aspect. But at the end of the day, I wasn't moved by the vintage extrait of Shalimar and that is probably a little sad.