About
R2
Coefficient of determination · 0 to 1 · never 1
We take fragrances that are hard to find and harder to sample, and build them again from raw materials. Some land very close. None land exactly. We publish the number either way.
Why the name
A perfect score means somebody made a mistake
R squared is a statistic. It tells you how much of what you are looking at your model actually explains. It runs from 0 to 1, and in the real world a 1.00 means the maths went wrong somewhere.
Every house in this corner of the market will tell you their version smells identical. None of them will tell you how close it actually got. We thought the second thing was more useful, so we named the company after it.
How we rate
The scale
Every interpretation carries a fit value, taken from our own wear tests. It is a judgment and not a lab measurement, and we are the ones making it, so weigh it accordingly.
Side by side on skin, most people cannot reliably say which arm is which after thirty minutes.
Unmistakably the same fragrance. Small differences in the opening or in the last two hours.
Clearly the same idea. One element is identifiably different, and we name which one.
Same family and direction, recognisably not the same juice. We say so plainly.
We stop calling it an interpretation. It moves to Originals and loses its number.
The number does not move to suit us. If a reformulation changes the fit, we publish the new value against the new batch and leave the old one visible.
The closest match is not always the best bottle.
Fit is not qualityWhich is where the Originals came from
At some point you stop copying
At a certain point you stop copying somebody else's decision and make your own, and that is usually where the good ones come from. Both of our Originals came out of exactly that, built from more than one reference rather than chasing a single bottle. They carry no fit value, because there is nothing to compare them to.
How it is made
By hand, in small runs
That last one is partly so you know which version you have, and partly so we do, if something is ever wrong with one. It is also most of the reason the range is twenty fragrances rather than ninety.
To be clear
What we are
An independent perfumery making interpretations of fragrances that are hard to find and expensive to be wrong about, plus two of our own.
Where we name another fragrance, it is to describe an olfactive direction and to be honest about where an interpretation started.
What we are not
We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or associated with any brand named on this site. All trademarks belong to their owners.
We do not claim any of these are identical to anything, and we would not trust a house that did.
Start with samples
Nobody should spend eighty dollars on a house they have not smelled. Every set is credited in full toward your first full bottle, so if you go on to buy one, the set cost you nothing.
See the setsQuestions about an order, a batch, or a fragrance you would like us to look at — support.rsquared@gmail.com. One person reads these, so give it a day.