The Story
Why it exists.
The beginning
Two crows visit every evening, flying at dusk to roost in the forest with their flock. Sunyata Calogeros-Smith named them, watched them, and eventually wrote them into perfume. Black Bird is an ode, not a portrait, the birds as metaphor for the wild that passes through daily life, uninvited and entirely welcome. The perfumer understands that kind of relationship: attention as devotion, observation as love. The composition itself mirrors this attentiveness, layered and deliberate, a fragrance that rewards those who stop and notice. What begins as a simple greeting reveals itself over time as something more complex, more enduring.
The note structure reflects the story's duality. Warm spice opens the composition, a greeting at the gate. Then artemisia arrives, bitter, herbal, the bitter green edge that cuts through sweetness. The Bulgarian rose doesn't apologize for being sweet; it anchors the heart with generous floral warmth. Davana adds its fruity-anise character, connecting the herbal and the floral in unexpected ways. The base holds everything together the way memory does: smoky, resinous, warm.
The evolution
The opening buzzes with spice and davana, artemisia cutting through like cold air through warmth. Ten minutes in, the rose blooms. The jammy sweetness doesn't dominate; it integrates. Then incense and oud settle in. Mysore sandalwood rounds the edges. The vanilla whispers. On skin, this lasts past sunset. The drydown becomes intimate, skin-warm, close, the kind of presence that doesn't announce itself but stays. The next morning: a trace of resin and sandalwood, a ghost of the night before. The longevity speaks to the composition's architecture, each note built to outlast its predecessor.
Cultural impact
Black Bird occupies a specific space in the indie fragrance landscape: warm, resinous, and unapologetically complex. It draws comparisons to Or Encens by Issey Miyake among enthusiasts who seek depth and darkness in their scents. The Canadian origin and smaller production scale place it in a different category from mainstream releases, more aligned with artists making exactly what they want to make. The fragrance speaks to wearers who want scent to tell a story, and who find joy in that story unfolding slowly on their skin.
The House
UNTAMEDUntamed Perfumes is an independent niche fragrance house founded in 2021 in Vancouver, British Columbia. The house emerged from the creative vision of Sunyata Calogeros-Smith, a Canadian-born perfumer who transitioned from a career in somatic psychotherapy to pursue olfactory art. Handcrafting each composition in small batches, Untamed creates fragrances that function as sensory explorations rather than conventional signature scents. The catalog spans themes ranging from Pacific Northwest landscapes (Salish Sea, 2022) to mythological imagery (Running With The Wolves, 2021), Mediterranean warmth (My Greek Lover, 2022), and introspective darkness (Ghost, 2024). The brand operates without a dedicated in-house perfumer attributed to each release, suggesting Calogeros-Smith serves as the primary creative force across the entire collection. Untamed maintains an active presence in niche fragrance communities through direct-to-consumer sales and social media engagement, building recognition among collectors who value unconventional approaches to fragrance composition.
The Creator
Sunyata Calogeros-SmithSunyata's style resists the predictable architectures common in commercial fragrance. She favors natural materials and botanical complexity, working with the irregularities that make natural ingredients unpredictable and alive.
