Calvin Klein released Reveal in 2014.
Reveal starts off on the right foot with a great bottle. It's a puffy flat square divided in half diagonally into triangles. One half is clear glass showing peach-colored juice inside. The other half is the cap, which is shiny silver plastic. The bottle has one flat side to allow it to stand upright, but Reveal also makes good visual sense as a lay-down bottle and that's usually how I orient it. The cap has 'REVEAL Calvin Klein' inscribed small on the lower right half of the front of the cap. Taking the cap off reveals (see what I did there?) that the bottle is slightly domed at the top, which looks more attractive than if it came to an abrupt edge. The atomizer is silver and has good performance.
Reveal's notes are a pink-forward medley of peppercorns, synthetic amber, sandalwood, salt, skin musk, and a very well-cleaned vetiver. Fittingly, none of them are hidden. You can smell at least a little bit of everything Reveal has to offer from the moment you spray it. It gets variety from how the balance of everything changes as it dries.
The opening is especially sweet, fruity, and creamy from a heavy dose of pink pepper and the buttery undertone of the woods. A green note, the vetiver and something else I'm not sure about, expands and cools Reveal down. The green and amber are similar to the ones in Obsession, to the point where I wonder if Reveal had been a derailed flanker. But where Obsession is grounded and warm, Reveal is buoyant and cool. Reveal's salt paints a convincing picture of a beach trip on a day when it's too cold to go into the water. That was part of its vision. Promotional material for Reveal referenced "...a cashmere scarf that covers the shoulders." The perfume conveys the scarf, too, with cashmeran. Sometimes you have to do the obvious thing, you know?
Reveal has good projection and longevity. It dries down to a 'skin but better' scent that hangs around for hours, in a welcome way.
It turned out to be very hard to explain Reveal. I've come very close to burnout wearing it so much while trying. I'm gonna take a long break from it. But I do like it.
- 1/18/24