Dry-down

The dry-down is the last act — what's left when most of the volatile material has evaporated. For most fragrances, the dry-down is mostly base notes (musks, woods, resins) plus the heaviest heart materials. A good dry-down is what makes a fragrance worth re-wearing; it's also what your scent smells like in close contact, since by hour 3 you've burned through the projection-heavy openings. Designer fragrances often have polished but generic dry-downs (clean musks); niche fragrances tend to push more unusual base materials (oakmoss accords, deep ouds, animalics).