D.S. & Durga — Coriander
Essence
Coriander is one of the earliest and most idiosyncratic releases from Brooklyn indie house D.S. & Durga, composed in 2008 by co-founder and self-taught perfumer David Seth Moltz as part of the brand’s “Solos” series. Its conceit is a clever inversion: coriander is a spice, but, as Moltz puts it, “it is cool,” fresh, green, and pungent rather than warm, so the fragrance builds an entire cool-green aromatic around cracked coriander seed. The result is a light, sparkling, herbal-green scent with an unexpected saline-aquatic undertow and a clean musky drydown, one that many wearers find smells less like culinary coriander than like an exceptionally clean, green, peppery soap.
Scent Profile
The opening is bright, fresh, and pungently green: cracked coriander seed sharpened by sappy lime and the herbal scrawl of rosemary, with a cool peppery lift from cubeb. Wearers consistently report a soapy, clean facet, one calling it “a sudsy bar of Irish Spring dusted in coriander,” and a striking saline, sea-breeze quality that “nips the nose.”
The heart is briefly herbal-floral, with clary sage and geranium, before the whole thing dries down fast into a soft, powdery white-musk skin scent that several reviewers describe as “an elevated, classy baby powder” or the clean skin of someone freshly showered with plain soap.
A perceptive technical reading identifies a heavy ambroxan presence in the drydown plus muguet facets, and draws a structural parallel to Comme des Garcons 2 Man. Many note that it does not actually smell like culinary coriander or cilantro. The arc is a vivid first hour of green spice collapsing into a long, quiet musky base, and the signature accord is cool green coriander-pepper over clean white musk.
Performance
Performance reports are bimodal and skin-dependent, but the central tendency is light and short. The brand itself frames it as “an everyday scent, light enough to meld with skin and project its presence with a subtle aura,” and many wearers report the bright opening fading within twenty to thirty minutes to an hour, with the soft musky base lingering quietly. One reviewer logged “moderate sillage, adequate projection and three hours of longevity,” and a SPY.com writeup similarly pegged longevity at roughly three to four hours before it goes “light and watery,” recommending it as a delayed-release subtle scent rather than an all-day performer. A minority get much more, citing strong sillage and traces lasting on clothes for days. Buy it for the effect, not for projection.
Wearing Context
Coriander is overwhelmingly a warm-weather, daytime, casual scent, repeatedly recommended for spring and summer and for hot, humid days especially, where its cool green-saline character functions almost like a fragrant air-conditioning. Several wearers extend it year-round, with one making a spirited case for fall and winter on the strength of its cool, not warm, spice. It is widely treated as unisex despite its feminine classification, and prized as an unobtrusive office and everyday green, with one reviewer saying it replaced Glossier You as their go-to office scent. The recurring social image is of effortless, clean, put-together casualness.
Comparisons & DNA
The most-cited comparison is the structural kinship to Comme des Garcons 2 Man, sharing a dihydromyrcenol-and-muguet-over-woody-vetiver skeleton, with Coriander greener and more ambroxan-driven. Reviewers also liken it to Frederic Malle’s Angeliques Sous la Pluie, a similar airy green that reads more refined but performs less well than Coriander’s “gin and tonic” lift. Within the house it is grouped with the brand’s other green and fresh work like Italian Citrus, and its “if you like this” suggestions reach toward Debaser and Bowmakers. Family-wise it is a cool aromatic-green with a clean-musk base, distinct from the warm-spice register coriander usually inhabits.
Reception
Reception is polarized in a characteristic indie way: lovers of green, herbal, and aquatic scents adore it, while those expecting either a true-to-life coriander or a long-lasting fragrance feel let down. Praise centers on its uniqueness, freshness, and plant-and-spice honesty, with fans calling it their favorite green scent, while detractors call it a “run-of-the-mill modern soapy scent that doesn’t really go anywhere,” too synthetic, or simply not coriander-smelling. The most substantive professional-adjacent writeup, on SPY.com, judged it “a pitch-perfect unisex scent” that had replaced the writer’s everyday office fragrance. No major perfume critic published a dedicated review, so its reputation rests on retail and reader coverage.
Versions & Reformulation
Coriander has been offered in a 50 ml eau de parfum, a 100 ml size, and a 10 ml pocket-perfume travel format, and it remains in production, though the full retail bottle is noted as intermittently unavailable. No formal reformulation is documented, though the usual caveat applies that an oakmoss-listed, IFRA-sensitive green from 2008 may have seen quiet ingredient adjustments over its long run. Treat it as a single ongoing composition absent specific evidence otherwise.
Acquisition Notes
This is mid-priced indie-niche, with the smaller bottle running roughly $75 at authorized stockists and a 10 ml pocket size offered as a lower-commitment entry, plus a subscription option. It is widely available through D.S. & Durga directly and authorized niche retailers, alongside decant services for sampling. The brand encourages sampling before full bottles, which is the sensible route given how divisive it is, and counterfeiting is a minor concern for a current-production niche scent.
Notable Facts & Lore
- Every D.S. & Durga scent ships with a story and a playlist; Coriander’s narrative is set in coriander fields “above Odessa on the Black Sea.”
- Moltz’s conceptual hook is that coriander is the rare “cool” spice, defying the warmth association of nutmeg, clove, and cinnamon.
- The fragrance embodies the house’s “armchair travel” ethos and Moltz’s musician’s approach of treating notes “like musical tones.”
- D.S. & Durga was founded in 2007-2008 by Moltz and his architect wife Kavi Ahuja Moltz.
- It is widely regarded as a quietly loved sleeper of the early catalog rather than a headline bestseller.