Byredo began in 2006 in Stockholm, founded by Ben Gorham, and by 2014 it had Mojave Ghost: a perfume built from a drive through the Mojave Desert in California and a rare bloom called the ghost flower, which survives in arid soil without producing nectar. Eight years in, the house had a story for a scent, and people kept repeating it.

That is the Byredo way, as I read it. The brand describes each of its best sellers as "a signature story," made in the first years under its founder and creative director. Bal d'Afrique arrived in 2009 as a tribute to Paris and Africa in the late 1920s, and Mojave Ghost shares a perfumer with it, Jérôme Epinette. The formulas are restrained: a few pivots, balanced, nothing piled on. That restraint is exactly why a Byredo perfume dupe search is really a search for a feeling, a soft, skin-close woody musk.

This edit is pieces from other labels that share the same idea, not the original. For Mojave Ghost the idea is ambrette, magnolia and sandalwood, so I started with sandalwood and musk. I would reach for Kayali's Freedom Musk Santal 34 when I want a sheer freesia and sandalwood skin scent, and Maison Louis Marie's No.04 Bois de Balincourt for creamy cedarwood with a little earthy vetiver. The Maker's Alias leans milky, with rice milk and freesia, while Glossier's You stays closest to bare skin, with pink pepper and iris. Tom Ford's Santal Blush is the spiced, creamy one for a cold evening.

My tip: do not judge on the first spray. Let each one settle on your wrist for an hour, because the musky sandalwood base is the part that decides whether it reads as a soft woody scent or just a pleasant opening.

Gypsy Water, in the words of Harper's Bazaar, is "basically the It girl among the brand's scents," and its key notes include pine needles, incense, vanilla and sandalwood. A good look-alike for it needs two things: a green woody opening and a resinous, smoky middle. In October that is easy to love, with a knit and a long coat.

Diptyque's Eau Duelle is the incense and vanilla one, with pink peppercorn and cypriol, and it sits in a small oval bottle with a black cap. Boy Smells has two hinoki scents: Hinoki Fantome is dry cedarwood with smoked amber and oakmoss, while Coco Hinoki softens the wood with coconut milk and pear. Jo Malone London's Cypress and Grapevine Cologne Intense gives you the cypress and moss, and Tom Ford's Ebene Fume goes smokier with palo santo and rose. Obart's Santal Spirit has black pepper, white incense and cedarwood, and I like it for layering under a wool scarf.

The test: hold the spray an arm's length away and check the middle after twenty minutes. Harper's Bazaar notes that sticking with the amber or woody families tends to last longer than fresh fruit or green openings, so a woody incense base is a sensible thing to want.

What I would skip: anything that opens sweet and never gets to wood. If the incense never turns up, the scent is in a different family, even if the notes list sounds close.

Bal d'Afrique launched in 2009 and, in Harper's Bazaar's words, "starts off bright and citrusy, and later dries down with a smokier finish." Its notes include bergamot, neroli, vetiver and musk, which is the shape to chase: a sunny top that lands somewhere calm and woody.

Tom Ford's Neroli Portofino is the clearest neroli with bergamot and lemon, and Prada's Infusion d'Iris pairs iris with neroli and a bright mandarin opening. Henry Rose's Windows Down is grapefruit and bergamot with jasmine and musk, which is the one I would wear with a trench and sneakers. Clean Reserve's Acqua Neroli adds mandarin and amber, and By Rosie Jane's Remi pairs mandarin with cardamom over white amber. Fugazzi's Orange Crush keeps the orange bright on transparent woods. Jo Malone London's Sea Salt and Bergamot is the cooler, mineral option.

A fitting-room test for citrus: check the end, not the start. Citrus lifts away fast, so spray it, walk the store for half an hour, and see if a woody or musky base is still there. That base is what makes a bright scent feel like Bal d'Afrique's family rather than a cologne.

What I would skip: a very sweet citrus fruit cocktail. Skylar's Citrus Reverie is lovely, but with pink pineapple it is a fruitier cousin, not the vetiver-and-musk road.

A mist is the easiest way into a scent family, and Byredo itself makes body mists for its best sellers. Harper's Bazaar praised one of them: "It will never be cloying like other body mists, thanks to its woody, musky base." That is the detail I would look for here: a base with some wood or musk in it.

Salt & Stone's Santal and Vetiver mist leans woody, with amber and red algae. Phlur's Cashmere Skin is sheer almond, vanilla and ambrette, the closest to a skin scent. Crown Affair's The Signature Scent, a hair and body perfume, mixes bergamot, green tea and sandalwood, and Pattern's Palo Santo hair mist brings wild mint and petitgrain. For something brighter, Touchland's Cashmere Woods has mandarin and jasmine, and Glossier's Orange Blossom Neroli is as light as its name.

How to wear them in cooler weather: mist the ends of your hair and the inside of a scarf, then one pass over the wrists. A hair mist should go on from arm's length so the alcohol dries before you brush.

What I would skip: a mist with a heavy sweet base if you want something woody. It will read as a body spray, and it will not give you the sandalwood-and-musk calm you came for.

Perfume oils sit closer to the skin than a spray, which suits musky woods well. Harper's Bazaar notes that more concentrated formulas "will still be present on the skin for longer," and an oil that you dab on at the wrist is a small version of that idea. It also lives in a coat pocket.

Cyklar's Naked Neroli roll-on blends neroli, sandalwood and musk with jasmine, while Sacred Santal in the same format goes for cashmere wood, vanilla and bergamot. Maison Louis Marie's No.04 Bois de Balincourt is a little 3 mL rollerball with sandalwood, vetiver and amber wood. For a sweeter turn, By Rosie Jane's Rosie is rose, nude musk and vanilla, and Nest New York's Madagascar Vanilla is vanilla bean over coconut. Skylar's Nude Skin has tiger orchid with golden amber, and Coconut Cove is bergamot with ambrox. Chloé's rollerball is powdery lychee and rose.

The test: roll once at each wrist, wait, and only then add a second pass at the collarbone. Oil spreads slowly, so a small dab is plenty, and you can keep it in a bag for a coat-check top-up.

What I would skip: a rollerball for a wide open room. Oils whisper, which is the point, so if you want a sillage that fills a hall, a spray in the same family is the better bet.

I would do this in order. Pick the one Byredo scent you actually love: soft musky wood for Mojave Ghost, pine and incense for Gypsy Water, bright neroli and vetiver for Bal d'Afrique. Then choose one spray in that family, one mist for the scarf and hair, and one rollerball for the bag.

Test the dry-down before you commit, and stay in the same family rather than the same list of notes. A matching notes list does not make a match, so give each one an hour on skin.

Ben Gorham built a perfume house on a drive through the desert and a flower that survives with no nectar. A good alternative does not need that story, only the soft wood that makes you go back for another spritz. If you want to keep browsing, I also put together Perfume Samples.