Luxury and niche fragrances are always lusted after, but of course can become somewhat injurious to one’s wallet if you want to try several all at once (and we always, always do!)

The problem is, this often leads people to try ‘dupe‘ fragrances (a nice word for ‘copy’ or ‘rip off’) when we are bombarded by companies aggressively advertising these copies on social media, which promise to be ‘as good as the real thing’ or saying ‘you’ll never know the difference’. It’s understandable some are (literally) duped this way – it sounds too good to be true…

And it is.

Luxury copies are often completely unregulated, using untraceable, unsustainable and inferior materials they can be made in unsanitary, sweat shop conditions, in huge vats of copycat smell-alikes, which may not have been fully safety tested, or have been adulterated with rogue ingredients and then passed off as being a ‘bargain’. Presented in such a way these companies suggest they are somehow doing you a favour, in fact, it’s daylight robbery – a theft of artistic ideas (often pretending to be the real thing by copying names and labels). And we have never once, in our combined decades of professional experience, found anyone, with any knowledge of fragrance, who has smelled the real thing and a knock-off dupe and not IMMEDIATELY been able to tell the difference. Fact.

Those in the know have found the way forward when we’re on a smaller budget. Luxury Discovery Boxes are the chance to indulge in the fragrances of niche and designer houses, often giving you the opportunity to try the scented wares from cult brands you’ve not heard of, or not everyone knows about yet. And, of course, not everyone happens to live near a niche perfumery (or feels brave enough to go in, even if you do). Very few of us could go out and purchase full-size bottles of every brand we want to try. Luxury boxes allow you to afford to wear every single one… and get to experience the real deal, made by perfumers, not thieves.

Where to Get Samples?

The best idea is to get a Discovery Box of fabulous mini sizes and samples from a wide range of luxury, niche and top-end designer fragrance houses. That way you can start exploring and trying them all in the comfort of your own home, before you splash out on a full size. This way, you also get to try things you may never have picked up to try in store (indeed, may never have heard of previously!) and have proper time to try on your skin.

Want to Explore More…?

Luxury Brand Boxes are the way forward. You may know you like one scent from a particular house, and are ready to be a bit braver and see what else they do. It’s a fantastic leaping-off point, actually, as many houses offer differing styles of scents while still retaining a kind of olfactory handwriting – the same way an artist will have a certain look to their work you can recognise, or a clothing designer tends to work with shapes or tones that suit you. So, when you’ve found one you love, do explore the rest in their collection (and obvs samples are the best way to do this without breaking the bank).

Written by Suzy Nightingale

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Rich, warm, luxurious and comforting, honey works wonderfully in fragrances to emphasise floral notes, or add touches of amberiness.  And with the profusion of gourmand fragrances out there, honey-lovers can easily find themselves in sweet heaven. We love what the nose Christine Nagel has to say about this ingredient:

‘Honey has two facets – half devil, half angel. In Ambrée structures, it has a sweet, comforting effect, taking you back to childhood. But a small touch in a feminine structure can be extremely sexy…’

Are you already a honey-lover…?  Then you’ll know that honey comes in so many different varieties, each taking their smell (and colour) from the flowers on which the bees that produce it have feasted.  Orange blossom honey.  Eucalyptus honey.  Acacia honey:  the variations are almost limitless, sometimes woody, flowery, herbal or even tobacco-y.  The ancient Arab perfumers were the first to capture honey’s sweetness in perfumery, but today the honey featured is generally a synthetic note – one that’s drizzled sensually over quite a few fragrances in the past few years.

It’s over 15,000 years since man first harnessed bees’ busy-ness to produce this natural sweetener. (According to cave paintings in Valencia in Spain, anyway.)  Symbolically, honey stands for ‘the sweet life’, prosperity, even immortality;  the word itself comes from the ancient Hebrew word for ‘enchant’…  When man and bee teamed together, it turned out to be a win-win situation:  bees got a safe place to live (and a reliable food source, in the form of flowering crops) – and we got to harvest honey and beeswax in unbelievably impressive quantities:  a single beehive can produce up to 200 kilos of honey each season.

Guerlain are known for their love of bees of course, featured in their utterly exquisite and iconic Guerlain Bee Bottles, which have been… ‘An icon for nearly 170 years: timeless, the Bee Bottle is more than a bottle, it’s a statement: a precious Guerlain signature and a craft symbol between tradition and modernity.’ What’s more, apart from using honey in their skincare and as a note in fragrances, Guerlain also fund a number of Bee loving projects to ensure the future of bees (and, therefore, crops – and humankind! For without the bees we are truly lost).

Guerlain explains: ‘First founded in 2018 and launched globally in  2021, Guerlain’s Bee School initiative was founded as a result of the brand’s ongoing mission to teach children about bees and how they positively affect our environment. Nearly 6,000 children in over ten countries have been able to learn about the various issues facing bees and biodiversity conservation. After discussions, question-and-answer sessions, workshops, and games to test their knowledge, each child receives a Bee School certificate at the end of the session. The programme encompasses meaningful initiatives and partnerships…’

With World Bee Day having been celebrated recently around the globe, and with summer scents in mind (now the weather finally seems to be playing ball), what better time to explore honey fragrances, with scents that evoke both the flirty innocent sweetness and the deeper, more ‘devilish’ side of honey’s character, as Christine Nagel so beautifully put it…?

Guerlain Aqua Allegoria Nettare Di Sole

A deliciously unusual icy floral honey absolute that sings of summertime, the magnolia, rose and Sambac jasmine bathed in honey, as if infused with the sun itself, and rippled with that deliciously cool note evoking dappled shade in a courtyard. Glorious to wear at any time, I especially adore wearing this when the heat properly simmers.

£89 for 75ml eau de toilette guerlain.com

Floris Honey Oud

A really good introduction to how oudh can be used in a nuanced way – almost as a seasoning instead of the main flavour – this one is actually delicious (as in, if it came in a jar, I’d want to slather it on buttered toast and guzzle it, or perhaps slather myself in it and roll on a meadow). The dark, spiced honeyed note deepens as the oudh kicks in. Intensely nuzzle-able, there’s nothing whatever to frighten the horses, here.

From £22 for 10ml eau de parfum florislondon.com 

[NB: Also available to sample as part of the Floris Private Collection set, for only £35, and including some of their most iconic scents].

Manos Gerakinis Methexis

The name ‘MEΘEXIS’ derives from ancient Greek, translating as ‘the communication between the divine and the human’. A feast for the senses, cocoa and honey luxuriously swathe fig, while blackcurrant ensures the perfect balance of sweetness, swirled into the reassuring woodiness of cedar. A sprinkle of cinnamon ensures this so-sophisticated, intoxicating indulgence of a scent is seasoned to perfection. Divine!

From £50 for 10ml eau de parfum shymimosa.com

[NB: Try samples of the rest of the collection in the Manos Gerakinis Discovery Set, where for £35 you can explore his other scents].

Sarah Baker Charade 

An absolute stunner of a scent, there’s a mellifluous segue between hypnotic floral notes of tuberose and ylang ylang, generously drizzled with honey that brings forth their headiness and makes them swoon into the dry, grassiness of vetiver and tea. Nestled in the base are deeper notes of leather, amber-y warmth and resins resting on smooth sandalwood and snuggly moss. Completely beguiling…

£145 for 50ml extrait de parfum in our shop

Marc Jacobs Honey

Created by master ‘noses’ Annie Buzantian and Ann Gottlieb, the sunny fragrance opens with a refreshing bouquet of green pear, juicy, ripe mandarin and a cool, fruity punch. Then at the floral heart you’ll find a composition of orange blossom, peach nectar and honeysuckle, followed by a warming base of that gloriously golden honey, creamy vanilla and silky woods. Scrumptious!

Currently £39.99 for 100ml eau de parfum at theperfumeshop.com

Written by Suzy Nightingale

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One of the perfumery world’s most distinguished figures, Master Perfumer Olivier Cresp has composed hundreds of your favourite creations, including Christian Dior’s Midnight Poison, Penhaligon’s Juniper Sling, Dolce & Gabbana Light Blue, Givenchy Gentleman and, of course, the utterly legendary Thierry Mugler Angel – a perfume which became all the more poignant this year with the passing of Manfred Thierry Mugler on 23 January.

Named a master perfumer in 2006, Cresp joined the Firmenich team in 1992 and was honoured with the title Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the French Ministry of Culture in 2012. In 2018 he was announced as the Fragrance Foundation’s 2018 Lifetime Achievement Perfumer Award recipient, and far from slowing down, he’s now launched his own fragrance house of AKRO with his daughter, Anais.

Suzy Nightingale recently had the privilege of sitting down with this paragon of perfumery and in an exclusive interview originally for our magazine, The Scented Letter (which you can also buy a gorgeous print copy of) and discovering exactly how he works…

When does your day start?

Olivier Cresp: I like to play tennis in the morning, then go to the beach in the afternoon… [laughs] No, seriously, I never really feel like I’m working because it’s my passion, that’s why I’m still working within Firmenich, and then my own projects with AKRO – that’s pure pleasure because we have no limits, we can dare. On a normal day, I get to the office around 9:30. I love that you’re interested in this! The other day I had someone filming me all day long, for a short video that will be edited down to three minutes. It’s interesting that people want to know how perfumers spend their days, now. The first thing I always do is talk to the other perfumers – ask how their evening was, have a coffee. Around 9:45 or 10am I open my laptop and then start working.

Where do you work?

I have a double job, in fact: working for them as Master Perfumer, based in Paris, and working for my own house, AKRO. I have assistants, FDMs (Fragrance Development Managers), sales teams, managers, any number of colleagues depending on the project.

How does your day break down? 

My office is open, so I have the FDMs come to see me, followed by the evaluators and the salespeople. After that some customers call me. A new thing is the number of Zoom and Teams online meetings we do throughout the day – a few years ago this just didn’t happen, but since lockdowns, it can be three hours a day of talking to colleagues through this connection. When I’m working on my laptop, I try to concentrate myself on the projects I have open at that time.

How many fragrances might you be working on at any one time?

In the past, when everything was done by hand, I could only work on eight or ten fragrances a day. Now, with computer technology, I can send fifty formulas a day, sending them all over the world. There are perhaps twenty projects I’m working on at once, sometimes more. I prioritise the fragrances by dates and even hours for deadlines. I can be fast. You have to be! Depending on how quick you are, you can win or lose a project. To work fast you must have the experience and use your time well. Instead of doing hundreds of experiments, like I did at the beginning of my career, I now only need to do four or five – then I know exactly what to move in my fragrance formulas and it just works.

Do you compose fragrances mostly in your head? Do you write by hand or use a computer?

It’s a good question – perfumers are like writers, some prefer handwriting or dictating, others like writing straight on a computer. Twenty-five, what, even thirty years ago now, I used to do everything by hand and my calculator. I’d handwrite the ingredients and work out the percentages and the price for them, because you have to know that. Those days are long gone. Now we have special programmes that work those bits out for you. When I’ve written my formula on my laptop I send it straight to the robot, the robot compounds about 80% of the formula. Then I have my assistants who weigh and compound the missing 20%. As soon as I get the idea for my fragrances, I know exactly what ingredients I want to use.

The next step for me is to discover the correct type or best quality for that fragrance. In two or three hours it’s fixed in my head. From that point I think about what else it needs to create the atmosphere I want, so I might think about what could create some smokiness or an animalic note, for example. Sometimes the idea is easy, but then it’s not easy to find the right molecules to match that smell in your head. I try to be figurative, to catch the profile of what I want. The other day I had to create the smell of a marshmallow. I’d never done that before really, but in two or three experiments I had it. I knew I wanted orange blossom, I used some violet and some rose-y elements, then some praline and vanilla to make it smell edible. It must be logical. It’s a chronological story, and then I’m never lost that way – it’s kind of a red thread I’m following.

What kind of other inspirations do you look for, during your day? 

I can be inspired by anything, but conversation is really important to me. I buy loads of magazines on all subjects, I really enjoy reading Figaro, but I get lots of feminine magazines especially. I also love walking, being in the forest, foraging, fishing, smelling the seaweed. I always carry blotters with me, so during the day I tend to jot down ideas on those, just in a few words.

Do you break for lunch – or eat at your desk? 

After meetings and working on those, I like to meet colleagues for lunch around midday to 1pm. We always go out because there’s no canteen or anywhere you can food in the office. Perhaps a few times a year if I’m in a hurry I grab a snack and eat that at my desk, but that’s not funny to me, I hate it. I could also go to my house for lunch, because my house isn’t far away, so that’s always a possibility. I might walk there and stay an hour, make myself some nice food, have a change of scenery, then I come back and feel revived by that.

After lunch, how long do you work for – and what will the afternoon be spent on?

I always feel more energetic in the afternoons than I do in the mornings – probably helped by the lunch, inspirational conversations with colleagues and simply the change of scenery – so I feel I can tackle more difficult things then.

What time do you go home? Is that the end of the day, for you? Do you continue to think about the fragrances when you get home?

In the past I used to stay until 9pm, when I was younger I’d work at least twelve hours a day, but I don’t do that any longer. So, let’s say after lunch, from around 2pm I usually stay in the office until 7:30pm minimum, then I go back to my house and do some sport. I never work at home, not ever, otherwise my head would explode. Well, okay, sometimes when I’m fed up, I take my laptop and work from home instead of the office, but on these occasions I’m with my wife and we stay maybe a week in Paris and a week in the South of France, where we have a nice flat.

Seeing the sea, the luminosity of the area – being in Cannes, visiting the islands, the harbour, watching the boats coming in and out – it gives me such inspiration. My nose doesn’t switch ‘off’ as such, but we’re not going around smelling things all the time as a perfumer, not in the same way as when we work, I think it would be impossible to have a life.

Do you need to be in a particular mood, to create?

Not especially, but I do need to feel energised I suppose, I must feel passionate about what I’m doing because otherwise what’s the point?

How long does it take from concept to finished fragrance, in general?

I mean my initial concept can be done in two or three hours, but how long it then takes to come out as a finished fragrance might be two or three years! Ideally, a year and a half is enough to create a great fragrance. You see you have to wait until the year after that to be on the market. There’s one project, I don’t want to say for whom [he chuckles], but I’ve been working on it for eleven years. And it’s still going on!

Do you listen to music while you work, and if so, what kind – pop, jazz, classical…?

No, I can only concentrate in one thing at a time when I’m working. So I couldn’t even read a book or magazine with the radio on in the background, for example, I don’t do that thing of watching TV while you’re on your phone and half reading something else… I do find most of the perfumers like to have music on the radio or stream it from their smart phone, but for me the key is to focus.

Is a visual moodboard of inspirational pictures / colours helpful for you to create?

More and more clients send me pictures to look through. Before, I’d be sent a few piles of pictures a year, in hardcopy. Now it’s mainly digital they can easily create a moodboard, it’s a visual language. To see on the screen what they want is useful. But often they can turn out the same. You know: it has to be strong but easy to wear, pleasing to the market, something different, long lasting, another unique fragrance…

When I’m gathering inspiration for myself, I read through all the magazines that I buy, I like to first of all flick through in about ten minutes to get an overview and see the colours, colours really drive me. I like to keep my eye in, see what people are interested in. Sometimes I then see these images again in moodboards clients then send me, because they often use images they’ve found in magazines, so I like to know the context. Sometimes the inspiration they send is really good, it helps give me ideas more quickly.

What is the most number of modifications you’ve ever had to do, on a fragrance? And the least?

Some just happen really quickly. Dolce & Gabbana Light Blue, for example, I did in forty experiments, but I have some that are painful – the longer you’re working on something I feel it’s the worst for creativity because you can get lost. I’m lost, the client is lost. The entire concept can change, the name, if it’s feminine or masculine in style, literally everything.

How many materials do you have at your fingertips, to work with? And how many tend to be in your regular palette?

Out of 1500 main ingredients I have access to – though it’s what we call a ‘living palette’ and that can always be added to – I’m usually working with the same 400. This means I don’t have to smell them all the time, which might sound strange to some people, but I know them so well I know all the outcomes and possibilities of them. It takes you ten years to get to know them that well – to see, to feel, to touch, then just to know.

How much of your day (or perhaps week) is spent on your own work – creating new accords, working with materials that may have been offered to you by the ingredients houses, to ‘store up’ and use for future finished creations?

I don’t have that time generally. The only trésor time I have, to do exactly what I want, is with AKRO. The thing is, I don’t get to actually smell materials all day, I don’t need to do that anymore to write a formula, I will only then smell them to create a big step in that formula or change it somehow. When we get new molecules or ingredients and extractions to smell, that is always exciting, because I don’t know them!

 Is there one fragrance you WISH you’d created, and why is it so special?

[Without hesitation] Shalimar. It’s what I’ve smelled in my family for years, I love the richness of the bergamot with the leather and vanilla, the benzoin. It’s magic! I created Champs-Elysés for Guerlain – with musk, mimosa, you know, very different. I loved it but it didn’t go so well. [He laughs] I created for them, anyway, and it was a great time. For a masculine, I’d loved to have created Dior’s Sauvage. Another all-time classic. What more can you ask for?

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We are still absolutely BUZZING with excitement from The Fragrance Foundation U.K. Awards 2023, where over 500 guests and nominees gathered at The Brewery in the City of London, to celebrate the fragrance industry and our passion for perfume…

Having begun in 1992, and known as ‘the Oscars of the fragrance industry’, the Awards recognise ‘excellence within the fragrance arena, from Packaging, Advertising through to Best New Fragrance and Ultimate Launch’. With sequins and scent a-go-go it was surely the most glamorous (and definitely the best smelling) location in London!

Part of The Fragrance Foundation award ceremony now also includes The Jasmine Awards, which were launched in the UK in 1990, and are recognised as:

‘…the most prestigious journalistic awards in the beauty industry. They recognise and reward the talents of journalists & visualisers whose difficult task it is to translate the complex art of perfumery into words and pictures.’

Before we get in to the Jasmines (scroll down to see the winners… including the award WE WON!) let’s take a breath and raise our glasses to the incredible fragrance awards winners – many of which are fragrant friends of The Perfume Society, and all of which we whooped with joy for…

We were ecstatic to see the talents of Ruth Mastenbroek on stage collecting the Perfume Extraordinaire award for Zephyr – a gorgeously luminescent and crisply shimmering breeze of a scent we adore. And you can try a sample of the award-winning scent in our Platinum Discovery Box!

And the loudest whoop of the evening was surely from the team at the Versace, when Eros Parfum won the People’s Choice Award!

Versace Eros Parfum is a flamboyantly jubilant modern fougere that exudes confidence via mint, lemon, apple and a unique smooch of tonka, geranium and ambroxan in the heart before woody notes, oakmoss and vanilla swirl the base. And you can try this award-winner as part of our Men’s Must-Have Discovery Box!

Audrey Semeraro, founder of Edeniste, was absolutely glowing with joy to win the Newcomer award for her fabulously mood-enhancing fragrance house…

…as were we, having taken the decision to stock the entire Edeniste collection in our shop as soon as we smelled them, plus putting the Edeniste Vétiver Imaginaire as part of our curated Feel Good Fragrances Discovery Box.

With the announcement of every award, the room lit up with cheers – it’s such a mood of celebration for all, and for fragrance itself! Here are the other proud Fragrance Foundation Award winners who were also whooping it up during the evening…

Media Campaign: Prada, Paradoxe

Design & Packaging: Dries Van Noten, Soie Malaquais

Independent Fragrance: Angela Flanders, Leather Rosa

Interior Fragrance: Diptyque, Roses

Readers’ Choice: CHANEL, Paris-Paris

Newcomer: By Far

Innovation: Launch of Jo Malone London ‘Shining a Light on Mental Health Foundation’

Retailer of the Year: Harrods

Limited Distribution: Diptyque, Opsis Eau de Parfum

National Distribution: Gucci, Flora Gorgeous Jasmine EDP

Online Retailer of the Year: The Perfume Shop

Best New Fragrance: Prada, Paradoxe

Best New Fragrance Collection: Tom Ford, Enigmatic Woods Collection

Ultimate Launch: Frédéric Malle, Uncut Gem

Ultimate Launch: Prada, Paradoxe

We were also so pleased to see the previous Chair of the Fragrance Foundation, the hard-working and supportive Annalise Fard welcomed into the Circle of Champions (the Fragrance Foundation’s equivalent of the Hall of Fame) – such a well-deserved tribute for this incredible woman.

And it is always especially heart-warming to see the importance of brilliant consultants recognised, with Kenneth Green Associates’ Nathan Macpherson La Maire receiving the award for Consultant of the Year Award for 2023. Bravo!

And now, let us take a moment to celebrate the Jasmine Awards section of the evening – a highly anticipated and incredibly prestigious collection of awards which receive hundreds of entries from the biggest names in publishing.

At The Perfume Society, we were so excited to be finalists with FIVE nominations this year, for articles published in our magazine, The Scented Letter (sign up to get your FREE digital copy, here, if you’ve not done so already), and for our blog. It was a genuine THRILL to see The Perfume Society celebrated on the huge screens at the venue, among such talented company as the other incredible nominees and all the fragrance houses. And well, we only went and WON!

Practical Guide: The Scented Letter Magazine, Time to Spray Your 5 a Day – Suzy Nightingale

Creativity: Instagram, All The Perfumes I Wore Last Week – Sali Hughes

Literary: Glamour Magazine, It’s time to stop treating affordable perfumes like dirt and champion the must-smell-now scents for under £30 – Alice du Parcq

Short Piece: Country & Town House, The Green, Green Grasse – Jan Masters

Rising Star: Fabulous, How to smell expensive (without breaking the bank) – Tara Ledden [NB: We couldn’t find this piece online, but you can read Tara’s other work for Fabulous here]

The prestigious judging panel had to read so many submissions, and we were full to the fragrant brim with gratitude for this recognition, and send huge congratulations to ALL the finalists, and to the winners, which we were over the moon to be among.

Until next year, fragrant friends, we’ll be wafting on a scented cloud!

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post The Fragrance Foundation & Jasmine Awards 2023! appeared first on The Perfume Society.

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How do find the ‘true you’ and know if a fragrance suits you? This is one of the most frequently asked questions we get at PSHQ, and to be honest, it’s one of the reasons we launched (incredibly, nine years ago, now!)

One of the the best ways to really tap into that ‘true you’ and discover what you need from a fragrance on any given day is how it resonates with you – how it makes you feel, not just what it smells like.

Personal Preferences:

From childhood, we are all conditioned to have individual smell preferences, and our response is based partly on our individual genetic make-up (our DNA), and partly on our life experiences. So: that crushed tomato leaf note that reminds you of a beloved grandmother and her greenhouse – or the jasmine that was growing round a door when you were poorly on holiday, and which you can hardly stomach. Technically, we all have an ‘olfactory fingerprint’, which is unique to us: it is our life’s experiences all locked away in our smell memory. In the same way that we each respond differently to different smells, we don’t all like the same pictures, or the same music. (And wouldn’t life be boring, if we did…?)

Your DNA:

Your physical make-up can have an impact, but there are many, many exceptions… Please remember this is a very broad rule-of-thumb, and can also change with hormone levels…

• Blondes with fair skin may find they are happiest with rich florals, as their skin may have a tendency to dryness, and subtle/citrus fragrances will evaporate quickly.
• Brunettes / black hair often have medium/dark skin which tends to contain higher levels of natural oils, allowing scents to last longer; they may find Ambreés (deeper, more resinous) notes work well.
• Redheads tend to have fair and delicate skin, and sometimes this turns out to be incompatible with perfumes dominated by green notes.

How to Find a Fragrance You Like:

We’ve previously published a piece on how to find a fragrance, where you will find all the tips and tricks you need to get your hands (and nose) on a selection of scents

But… Does it Suit Me?

Ask yourself this question, only, at first: Do you really like it? If so, then yes! We can never hope to please everyone with our scent choices, so our advice is, don’t even try.

Sometimes, though, when people ask this question it’s because the fragrance is out of their comfort zone. It’s completely true that some fragrances – particularly the bolder or more complex and unusual ones – can take longer to fall in love with. The most important thing is to give fragrances TIME on your skin – not just one spray on one day, then walking away if it doesn’t immediately grab you.

If you’ve smelled the scent on your skin on more than one occasion and you’re still not sure, make sure you check our tips to try before you write it off as a definite ‘no’.

Other times, people ask this question if they simply can’t smell a fragrance on themselves very strongly. This might be because you’re ‘anosmic’ (unable to smell) some of the notes. This can happen with large molecule notes (like musk), and amazingly, scientists currently still don’t know why we can smell some things but not others. Or, it might be because you’re so used to smelling the same ‘signature’ scent that your nose has ‘switched off’, and doesn’t register it anymore.

The best way to find the ‘true you’ with fragrance…

…is to try several – try scents you’d never normally consider wearing, even those that feel so different they might be a little challenging at first. That’s why we started doing our Discovery Boxes nine years ago, and so love curating them to this day!

Really get to know the new fragrance samples – and yourself – by considering what it is you do or do not like about them. It’s just as useful to learn what we dislike, at times, rather than sticking with something safe but dull. Do you wish they were brighter, lasted longer, were bolder, smoother, softer…? Now you know a little of what you need, what the ‘true you’ requires, and you can ask an assistant in store, or search for those key words online.

It’s a starting point, and the beginning of a wonderful journey. Next, you might have learned of a brand you’d like to explore more of. And then you’re already in the midst of a wonderful journey…

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post How to find the ‘true you’ with fragrance… appeared first on The Perfume Society.

May we admit to being rather obsessed with the idea of what the official anointing oil for the Coronation smells like?

Okay, well we know we’re among fragrant friends, so we’re not alone. and here we’ll be exploring the scents of the Coronation, both ancient and newly inspired…

A few years ago, a fascinating BBC documentary (sadly no longer available to view online) delved behind-the-scenes of the late Queen’s Coronation on June 2, 1953; and it held a scented secret for sharp-eyed fragrance fans… While discussing the ancient rituals of the act of anointing the monarch, our eyes were drawn to the oil itself – rather incongruously kept nestled in a battered old box and bottle of Guerlain‘s Mitsouko!

We’d definitely consider being baptised in Mitsouko, but it turned out it was just the bottle and box. Oh well. No matter, for the story of the oil’s recipe was rather deliciously revealed…

The oil was made from a secret mixture in sesame and olive oil, containing ambergris, civet, orange flowers, roses, jasmine, cinnamon, musk and benzoin– actually sounding rather Ambrée in its composition – and must surely have smelled glorious.

The anointing ritual is usually hidden from view – a private moment for the monarch to reflect on their duties and the significance of being touched by that oil – and so a canopy is held by four Knights of the Garter to shield our gaze. This time, though, while King Charles is anointed beneath the canopy; Queen Consort, Camilla, shall be anointed in full public view. Either way, quite a scent memory.

In fact, the phial containing the original oil had been destroyed in a bombing raid on the Deanery in May 1941. The firm of chemists who’d mixed the last known anointing oil had gone bust, so a new company, Savory and Moore Ltd, was asked by the Surgeon-Apothecary to mix a new supply, based on the ancient recipe, for the late Queen’s Coronation.

We’d quite like them to whip up a batch for us, too.

During the ritual, the highly scented oil is poured from Charles II’s Ampulla (the eagle-shaped vessel shown above) into a 12th-century spoon. Amidst the pomp and pageantry of it all, our minds keep returning to the mysteries of the anointing oil, and whom that bottle and raggedy box once belonged. Whomever they were, we congratulate them on their taste!

Meanwhile, our minds (and noses) turn to more recent royal evocations in fragrant form. Which of these five might you choose to wear for an occasion (or simply to feel extra special any day you fancy)…?

Penhaligon’s Highgrove

Composed in close collaboration with King Charles, this is a highly personal take on the scent of a beloved silver lime tree in his garden. Using headspace technology to capture the smell of that actual tree (rather than attempting to recreate it), the softly cocooning blossoms glide on a bright, citrus breeze with mimosa and cedar. Refreshing at any time, we feel.

£160 for 100ml eau de parfum penhaligons.com

Experimental Perfume Club Smell Like a King

A brilliant blending of heritage and modernity, think wooden-panelled rooms and freshly rolled cigars glinting with a verdant freshness that radiates herbaceous greenery and mellowed with a husky muskiness that exudes a new confidence. Easy to wear yet stylishly characterful, this could be a signature scent. Hurry, though – it’s a limited edition: so we say, stock up.

From £35 for 8ml eau de parfum experimentalperfumeclub.com

Clive Christian Town & Country (Crown Collection)

Fascinatingly, this was originally created in 1925 and worn by Winston Churchill; now recreated for a modern era, this timeless scent is beautifully composed, with a softness belying the effervescent opening. Velvety clary sage leaves cloak a magnificently smooth grey amber, seamlessly melded with a perfectly grounded sandalwood. Effortlessly engaging.

£400 for 50ml parfum clivechristian.com

Angela Flanders Platinum Rose

The very picture of perfumed elegance, this crisply pleasing rose rests on a dew-flecked, leafy base and was originally crafted for the occasion of the late Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee. When a breath of fresh air is required, along with an assuredness that never fails, this is one to bring inner strength and feels like floating on a tenderly blushed breeze.

£85 for 50ml eau de parfum angelaflanders-perfumer.com

Dolce & Gabbana Q

Lovers of modern regally-inspired scents should try this, resplendent with luscious cherry enrobed in creamy heliotrope. Add the fragrant fizz of frothy citrus, the delicate luminescence of jasmine petals and a glimmer of crystal musk amidst the assuredly dry cedarwood base as it warms, and you have a scent fit for any occasion you need to feel in charge of.

From £61 for 30ml eau de parfum theperfumeshop.com

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post Scented secrets of the Coronation (& fragrances fit for royalty) appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Regarded as a lucky charm ever since its first introduction from Japan to Europe in the Middle Ages, lily of the valley has become synonymous with the month of May and ‘the return of happiness’.  One of the reasons The Perfume Society chose lily of the valley as our symbolic flower, and why we launched on May 1st – to our astonishment, that was NINE years ago, now!

For the French, May 1st traditionally represents the start of gifting bouquets of “muguet” to loved ones to signify the regard in which they’re held and as a token of prosperity for the year ahead. A tradition supposedly begun when King Charles IX was presented with a bunch of the delicate blooms, and decided to gift the ladies of his court, too.

In Europe, ‘bals de muguet’ were historically held – lily of the valley themed dances that offered the tantalising prospect for young singletons to meet without their parents’ permission.

An iconic (and ultra-chic) lily of valley fragrance was the original Dior Diorissimo, designed in 1956 by Edmond Roudnitska. Composed in homage to Christian Dior’s favorite flowe, the lily of the valley was to be found on his personal stationary, jacket lapels, printed on his fashion designs, and, on one occasion, inspired his entire 1954 spring collection.

A more recent icon is Penhaligon’s Lily of the Valley, which was launched in 1976 – tapping into the fashion trend for romantic nostalgia – and which is wonderfully described as ‘Lacey leaves. Dappled light. Green, clean, wholesome. Lily of the Valley is as fresh and optimistic as the morning dew, grounded by notes of bergamot and sandalwood.’

With the young gals dressed in white gowns and the dapper chaps at those historic bals wearing lily of the valley as a buttonhole, we’re sure there was many a ‘return to happiness’ on such evenings… Now the custom is tied in with France’s Labour Day public holiday, and the tradition of giving lily of the valley to loved ones during May still holds strong.

Lily of the valley has also made its way into countless bridal bouquets (including that of Kate Middleton for her wedding to Prince Willliam);  in many countries, it’s linked to this day with tenderness, love, faith, happiness and purity.

So what does lily of the valley smell like?

Almost spicy, so green and sweet, with crisp hints of lemon: that’s lily of the valley. The flowers themselves are really mean with their oil, though, and synthetics are more often used to recreate lily of the valley’s magic:  Lilial, Lyral and hydroxycitronellal are among them.

Far from reserving this magical note for May, or thinking that it has to be ‘old-fashioned’ smelling in a scent, we love the way perfumers use lily of the valley to ‘open up’ and freshen the other floral notes in a blend. It can smell like a woodland walk just after a rainshower (so very apropos for our weather right now, in the U.K.) or add some gentle sparkles of sunlight amid more verdant or deeper, shady phases as a scent unfurls on your skin.

No wonder we chose this delightful, flower-filled date in the calendar to launch The Perfume Society – incredibly, NINE years ago, now – running hither and thither all over London handing sprigs of lily of the valley to fragrant friends!

And my, how our friends have grown in this short time! With a readership that stretches around the globe and our Instagram followers now topping 67.8K, we have been delighted with some of the truly beautiful pictures some of our followers have been sharing there. Just feast your eyes on the stunning pictures we’ve sprinkled throughout this post…

With your help we’ve come so far. We wish we could come and give every single one of you a sprig of lily of the valley to show our heartfelt appreciation for all your support, but for now, accept this symbol of love and luck, from us to all of you…

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post It’s our NINTH birthday! Paying homage to our symbolic flower: lily of the valley… appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Paper is something we have an increasingly infrequent contact with in this relentlessly digitised world, and perhaps nearly as importantly, smell far less frequently in our every day lives. Could this be why perfumers are seeking to evoke the scent in the fragrances we wear?

There’s a functional sterility to the burgeoning ‘metaverse’ that’s abhorrent to sensorialists – those of us who revel in our senses, welcoming the smell and comforting caress of books and paper (and you know, food, fabrics, the infinitesimal layering of textures that IRL [In Real Life] offers us), as we might a lover’s touch.

For book (and printed paper) lovers, particularly; while E-Reader devices and scrolling on phone screens certainly have huge benefits – instantaneous access to literature is not to be, pardon the pun, sniffed at – but they lack the tangibility of literally burying your nose in a book, or feeling a piece of paper as you write on it (in pen! How very old school). Indeed, research shows that, while levels of comprehension are similar no matter how you read a text; people struggle to accurately recall events or timelines of a long story on a screen, as opposed to reading on paper.

The report concludes that it’s the ‘kinaesthetic feedback’ of holding paper in your hand that connects us to the perception of what we’re reading; that is, using our sensory organs to better locate and store vital information. I’ve previously written about the concept of vellichor – what makes the smell of old books so special – so want to widen that thought, here, to the more literal smell of paper itself.

Explains scienceabc.com:

‘…over a period of time, the compounds within paper [break down to] produce the smell. Paper consists of cellulose and small amounts of lignin(a complex polymer of aromatic alcohols). Paper that is even more fine contains less lignin than cheaper materials, like the paper used in newspapers.’

I would argue the smell of paper – old and mysterious or newly seductive – is also a huge part of our emotional intelligence, our interconnectivity, scent and memory combined.

In those ancient library type fragrances (and which I still absolutely adore) it’s often the combined smell of crumbling leather bindings, dust and polished wooden tables that conjure a feeling of being in a particular space. But the smell of paper itself needn’t always be musty.

We might be in a shiny new bookshop, or have just cracked the spine of a sensorially satisfying weighty magazine. The paper might be that of an artist, awaiting the stroke of a brush, or of a writer’s virgin sheet, greedily thirsting for the first drop of ink…

Paper does have a unique smell. In those dusty old tomes it’s the breaking down of paper compounds that releases lignin (similar to vanillin, the primary component of vanilla, which has been proven to be a remarkably calming smell). In new paper, explains perfumer Geza Schoen, who once created a limited edition Paper Passion fragrance, in collaboration with Wallpaper* magazine; recreating the scent ‘was hard’ he admits. ‘The smell of printed paper is dry and fatty; they are not notes you often work with.’

Difficult though it may be to replicate, the smell of paper is something we yearn for, a comfort we crave in our hyper-digitally-connected yet progressively solitary lives. Comically satirising a future in which we’ve become so disconnected with paper’s scent that it repels us, author Gary Shteyngart’s novel, Super Sad True Love Story, imagines a time ‘Books are regarded as a distasteful, papery-smelling anachronism by young people who know only how to text-scan for data…’ as The New York Times review puts it.

Well, I’m very glad to say, we bibliosmatics are not there yet. The yearning to smell paper is still real, and these perfumes prove it…

Diptique L’Eau Papier

Rice steam accord melded with white musk cleverly evokes the paper’s creamy grain; drifts of mimosa tracing the outline of torn edges while deeper notes appear fleetingly, like freckled ink drops in water, punctuating the clarity with sheer shadows before the paper comfortingly subsumes.

£90 for 50ml eau de toilette diptyqueparis.com

Rook Perfumes RSX/03 School

A limited edition project in which participants imagined the smell of school, this pleasingly avoids boiled cabbage, instead exploring the heady rush of opening new books, cold air, pencil shavings and the textural thrill of fingers tracing wooden desks scarred with names, love hearts, learning.

£99 for 30ml eau de parfum rookperfumes.co.uk

Commodity Paper (Personal)

Achingly soft, especially in the ‘Personal’ (most hushed) version, this is whispers in the library, passing a beloved book to someone special, your fingertips barely brushing, but a gesture that says so much. The molecular wonder of ISO E Super sighs to skin’s warmth, an amber trail beckons.

From £22 for 10ml eau de parfum commodityfragrances.co.uk

Carner RIMA XI

Inspired by Spanish poet Gustavo Adolfo Becquer’s passionate poem, Rhyme 11, the paper of this perfume feels fresh with possibilities at first. Then, the cool kiss of mint is seduced by spices and Indian jasmine petals, a discovery of crumpled, tear-stained, love letters slipped under a mattress.

£100 for 50ml eau de parfum bloomperfume.co.uk

Gri Gri Tara Mantra

Playing with the power of words, monastic incense curls beguilingly, a trail of promise leading to the temple you seek. It could be a church, might be a library, but let us say instead we are in a bookshop, gleefully thumbing piles of temptations, a woody path of patchouli and potent escapism.

£95 for 100ml eau de parfum shymimosa.co.uk

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post Paper Trail: why we love paper’s smell (& perfumes evoking it) appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Shakespeare and his love of flowers are eternally entwined in our imaginations, and now we have hot-off-the-press news of a specially commissioned fragrance inspired by the bard…

Though much of what we know of Shakespeare’s life is supposition, and hotly debated by historians to this day; what we can surmise is that he loved flowers – including references to over fifty types of them within his writing, using them to highlight the emotional tone of scenes, reflect character’s thoughts or send messages his audiences would have readily understood in the ‘language of flowers.’ Artists, writers and musicians still find much inspiration in these floral allusions, and little wonder, given the veritable bouquet of creative suggestion Shakespeare proffers.

Botanical Shakespeare: And Illustrated Compendium, £20 (Royal Shakespeare Company shop)

Many of the flowers Shakespeare alluded to in his work have led to well-known phrases we still use, such as ‘a rose by any other name’ and ‘gilding the lily’, but it’s worth pointing out, lovely as they are, these are slight misquotations. In Romeo and Juliet, the rose is used to there to garland Juliet’s complaint about their families refusing to let them marry because of an ongoing feud, saying:

What’s in a name? that which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet. [Act II Scene II Line 43]

As for the lily, that pops up when painted, in King John, with a courtier commenting

To gild refined gold, to paint the lily

To throw perfume on the violet …

Is wasteful and ridiculous excess [Act 4 Scene 4 Line 11]

I respectfully arch an eyebrow at the slightly scathing mention of perfume, and though of course it’s a literary way of saying that natural beauty need not be embellished, would point out that many fine fragrances have been created to evoke the violet (it being one of the flowers unable to have its scent naturally extracted); but shall forgive the courtier (and, therefore, Shakespeare) for not being privy to such scent chemistry knowledge.

Shakespeare’s Flowers cards, £3.99 for 5 x A5 pack, DaysEyeCards

In any case, April 23rd is National Shakespeare Day, the anniversary of the bard’s death, and though the exact day of his birth is unknown, also the day his birthday is traditionally celebrated (his baptism being recorded as taking place on April 26.) So, this would have been excuse enough for me to celebrate his gorgeous floral allusions by showcasing some fragrances I feel are particularly pertinent to Shakespeare’s love of flowers. However, Fate intervened to reveal an even more intriguing story…

While thinking about writing a general Shakespeare and fragrance type article, a little bird (in fact, fellow fragrance writer and friend Amanda Carr, co-founder of We Wear Perfume, and currently organising the inaugural Barnes Fragrance Fair) happened to mention to me that 4160 Tuesdays founder and perfumer, Sarah McCartney had recently received a rather fabulous private commission to create a Shakespearean-inspired fragrance for none other than Gyles Brandreth. A noted Shakespeare expert, broadcaster, author and language-lover.

Currently named Sonnet No.1, the fragrance is actually for both Gyles and his beloved wife, the writer Michèle Brown, in celebration of their forthcoming wedding anniversary. Describing the ingredients she used for the composition, Sarah chose: ‘Rose, violet, lavender, lily, narcissus absolute, musks and hay absolute,’ with two versions having been made, one including beeswax absolute.

Before you ask if we can all get our hands (and noses) on it, Sarah explains, ‘I only made it on Monday, so at the moment just 30mls exist, but it’s gorgeous! (Though I say it myself.) I’d like to launch it, but it would have to go through its stability tests and all the official processes before it can go public.’ Well, it probably does seem only fair to let Gyles and Michèle enjoy the fragrance first, but golly it does indeed sound gorgeous, so fingers-crossed. In the meantime, fragrance and Shakespeare lovers should consider another beautiful 4160 Tuesday’s scent. Says Sarah:

Ealing Green was originally made for a fundraising event on Midsummer Night in Ealing, and I used herbs and flowers mentioned in the play… wild rose, thyme, grassy banks, violets and oakmoss feature.’

We were invited to make a midsummer scent for a 2013 charity evening in Ealing, West London, using plants and flowers named in Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, so we imagined the scenes taking place by Pitzhanger Manor on Ealing Green, and created the aroma of a magical summer evening. Its perfect for wearing in the heat.
It starts with a wander through the herb and flower gardens of Walpole Park, takes in a picnic on the grass and ends up lying on the lawn by the pond, staring at the clouds floating by, smelling the warm earth.

4160 Tuesdays Ealing Green £65 for 50ml eau de parfum

What better time to purchase a bottle and immerse yourself in the floral imagery of Shakespeare?

So synonymous with flowers is Shakespeare, in fact, that seed boxes of Shakespeare’s Flowers are now available from Shakespeare’s Globe shop, where you can choose from ‘…the Shakespearean Growbar, containing the seeds of three Shakespearean flowers: heartsease, marigold and columbine. Or the Tudor Herbs Growbar, containing the seeds of three herbs familiar to the Tudors: fennel, lemon balm and winter savory.’

Shakespearean Flowers Growbar £12

[Just don’t spray the flowers with the perfume, is all I’m saying. We know how he’d have felt about that.]

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post Sarah McCartney: Celebrating Shakespeare’s flowers in fragrant form appeared first on The Perfume Society.

The theme of our latest issue of The Scented Letter magazine is ‘Fragrance For a New You’, chosen because, we truly believe, perfume allows us to choose who we want to be that day.

It does so invisibly – so you don’t need to don a superhero costume or dye your hair magenta (unless you want to, which we highly encourage!) Instead, perfume seems to work on our psyche, with the ability to both outwardly project our innermost personalities, or to bolster bravado, energy or playfulness we might otherwise struggle to don the mantle of amidst the ongoing daily chaos of our lives.

The truth is, since the start of the pandemic we feel, there’s been a seismic shift in the scent world. Many reported wearing more fragrance than ever during lockdown, to travel with their nose, spark scent memories or play with their perfume collection as though it were a dressing-up box. Which, we are here to tell you. it most definitely can be!) And, with many of us still working from home – something our parents would probably never have imagined – so too have we filled those dual-purpose spaces with scented candles and diffusers, as the boom in home fragrance sales proves.

Concurrently, there’s been a more gradual change in the way we wear it: a realisation that the once standard ‘Signature Scent’ was no longer up to the job of reflecting every facet of our characters (or helping mask the more tender bits of our souls on a difficult day). With the wider cultural encouragement to explore what it means to be – uniquely – ourselves, others became more familiar with the concept of layering scents to create their own ‘bespoke’ blends.

So, with the world as your olfactory oyster (though smelling rather more appealing), and with such a plethora of perfumes to choose from; where does one begin the journey to ‘find yourself through fragrance’?

Firstly, you need to get to know what you like, and more than that: how particular perfumes make you feel. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But so many of us become stuck in a bit of a scented rut, or just don’t know where to start with widening our fragrant horizons. Follow these tips to start your own ‘new you’ scent journey, here…

Where to Start?

Use our simple Find a Fragrance tool – just type the name of a fragrance you already know and love, and the so-clever algorithm suggests six new scents with similar characters to try, with prices to suit all budgets!

How to Test?

Your taste in fragrance changes over the years – just as in food preference – and depends on weather, what you’ve eaten recently, your mood and hormones. So, take your time to explore a new scent out of your comfort range.

Spray on a blotter first and come back to it at hourly intervals. Write down your initial thoughts, then re-try a few days (and weeks) later.

Many perfumers trained for more years than a heart surgeon, memorising ingredients by connecting their smell to personal scent memories and images that immediately spring to mind, unbidden.

Smell has no distinct language. If you’re struggling to describe a scent, try likening it to fabric (is it velvety, suede-like, cotton fresh, silken or fluffy?) Perhaps it reminds you of music (played on which instruments? Fast or slow?) Or you might picture a place – imagine the air temperature and scenery it evokes…

Your nose gets used to smelling the same things, so avoid wearing the same thing daily. Try layering to re-awaken your senses or branch out with exciting new discoveries!

Like all artists, perfumers tend to have a certain style. If you fall in love with one (we’re predicting several) of these, research them online: we bet you’ll fall for others.

Scent molecules are volatile and evaporate at differing rates. Citruses are lightest, often found in top notes and disappearing rapidly; florals tend to be in the heart while base notes are heavier, woody or resinous. Make these stages last FAR longer by using matching or unscented body lotion, spray into your hair or on clothes (after testing on tissue!)

Undecided? Spray on a scarf rather than skin: you can take it off and sniff again, later! Spraying on fabric (or your hair) also helps make it last far longer as the molecules don’t warm up so quickly (or evaporate) as on skin. As does…

Use an unscented (or matching) body lotion or oil. Fragrance doesn’t last long on dry skin (or in hot climates). It clings far longer to moisturised skin – so slather up, then spray.

Fragrance samples are THE best way to try new things, dive nose-first into a whole new house you’ve never tried or perhaps a differing perfume family than you’d normally go for.

Where to Get Samples?

The best idea is to get a Discovery Box of fabulous mini sizes and samples from a wide range of luxury, niche and top-end designer fragrance houses. That way you can start exploring and trying them all in the comfort of your own home, before you splash out on a full size. This way, you also get to try things you may never have picked up to try in store (indeed, may never have heard of previously!) and have proper time to try on your skin.

Want to Explore More…?

Brand Boxes are the way forward. You may know you like one scent from a particular house, and are ready to be a bit braver and see what else they do. It’s a fantastic leaping-off point, actually, as many houses offer differing styles of scents while still retaining a kind of olfactory handwriting – the same way an artist will have a certain look to their work you can recognise, or a clothing designer tends to work with shapes or tones that suit you. So, when you’ve found one you love, do explore the rest in their collection (and obvs samples are the best way to do this without breaking the bank).

Our Biggest Tip?

Give fragrance TIME. Let it settle. Try it several times (in the morning and /or evening, and when you’re in differing moods, if possible). How we’re feeling, the weather, our hormones and even the food we ate recently all have a huge effect on how scents smell on our skin. Plus, being braver can take time, too. Allow yourself the pleasure of exploration, take notes, compare with friends: have FUN finding yourself with fragrance, while finding a new fragrance for you.

You may surprise yourself with what you end up falling madly for. You know, the one that goes beyond merely smelling nice to that eyes rolling back in your head moment, emitting guttural noises of pleasure at, which people stop you in the street and beg to know the name of.

Oh. You don’t know that one? Well, you’ve just not found it yet! It’s out there. Waiting for you… whomever you feel like being today, tomorrow, and next week.

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post How to Find Yourself With Fragrance appeared first on The Perfume Society.

What are the right scents to wear for each season – and do they actually change on your skin during the year, or is it only how you perceive them…?

Well, have you noticed your favourite fragrance can smell different sometimes?

The fact is, all aromatic molecules need an amount of heat (usually from your skin) to work. The temperature of your skin and the air dramatically alter the rate at which the molecules evaporate and dissipate, and this then changes the way the perfume smells – to you, and others around you.

Because of this, many of us prefer to wear lighter, brighter fragrances in warmer months and swap for something cosier as the temperature drops, but is it really true you should only wear (for example) citrus / fresh fragrances in summer?

One of the things to consider when choosing a fragrance is the weather – both when you’re trying it, and when you want to actually be wearing it, because it DOES change how you perceive a perfume, and how it performs on your skin.

Hot weather intensifies the fragrance notes and makes them ‘bloom’ on the skin more quickly – when molecules heat up, they evaporate more quickly.

Colder weather slows down the evaporation rate (so top and heart notes last much longer) and you might find your scent doesn’t project as much in the winter.

But sometimes it’s not even about how they last on your skin – it’s the feeling particular fragrances evoke. So, just as you wouldn’t wear a heavy jumper in the summer, wearing a fragrance that makes you think of cashmere or velvet and roaring log fires on a sweltering day can just feel… wrong.

Having said all that – there are many cultures and people who actively prefer to ‘lean into the heat’, and wear perfumes which swathe the skin in billowing woods, sizzling spices and sticky resins at the height of summer, or perhaps choose cooler, Cologne style scents in winter; and that’s fine, too. It all comes down to personal taste, of course, but it’s true that because of temperature and humidity, scents can certainly feel right for one season and completely wrong for another.

We know it can be confusing, so with the weather in mind, we put together a specially curated selection of fragrances in a Seasonal Scents Subscription Box…

How it works:

Pick your Quarterly or Yearly plan

Discover new launches and bestsellers from well-loved brands, curated with the seasons in mind.

Arrives at your door for the new Season

Receive your seasonal box every 3 months and start smelling fabulous.

Get exclusive access to the online smelling notes and unboxing video.

Containing hand-picked fabulous fragrances, mainly female and unisex scents, from globally adored leading brands (sometimes also including the most adorable miniatures) will land at your door each passing season (approximately every three months) – so you will always have a new scent to try that’s just right for the time of year!

Seasonal Scents Subscription is

Quarterly Subscription £18 for a single box, super flexible rolling contract.

You will be charged every three months, but the subscription can be cancelled at any time up to 48 hours before the launch dates for future boxes (see below). OR you can opt for £68 for a Yearly Subscription – a great saving on all four boxes.

Only available in the UK. Postal charges are usually free but may be incurred at checkout depending on your postcode. We are currently unable to offer this subscription to Northern Ireland, the Scottish Highlands, or any offshore islands of the UK. If in doubt please contact us for advice at The Perfume Society  before ordering.

Launch dates 2023:

Spring – March 2023
Summer – June 2023
Autumn – September 2023
Winter –  December 2023

Read below to discover all the fabulous things this subscription includes…

We’re currently welcoming Spring with scents that echo the joyful sight of buds and blossom, while Summer is a chance to revel in the bliss of bright, luminescent fragrances. For Autumn, we sashay forth in fashion-forward, more sensual scents and in Winter we get our cosy on with scents you’ll want to snuggle into.

Each Seasonal Scents Box Includes:

Seasonal Fragrances  – A collection of fragrances from 1ml – 7ml, these will be kept secret until each Seasonal Scents Box is launched, we just love the element of surprise!

Online Smelling Notes – accessible via a QR code within your box, guiding you through the fragrances and how to start smelling.

Unboxing Video –  also via the QR code, for every box our Head Fragrance Writer Suzy Nightingale will guide you when opening your new box.

Hints & Tips – to ensure you get the most out of your fragrances and have fun!

So now, why not consider changing up your seasonal scent wardrobe and getting a perfumed treat delivered to your door?

The post Are Scents Really ‘Seasonal’? appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Set your alarms right now, because on Friday April 28, starting at 4pm Eastern Time in America, the 35th annual Perfume Bottles Auction will conduct its live online auction – with bidders around the world logging in to try their luck at owning some of the world’s most exceptional perfume bottles.

Here, we take a sneak peek at the fabulous catalogue ahead of the sale, to show you some of our favourites, and we’ll be catching up with how the sale went in the next issue of The Scented Letter magazine, so stay tuned…

Since 1979, organiser and founder of The Perfume Bottles Auction, Ken Leach, has been working ‘to create public and corporate awareness of the artistry to be found in vintage perfume presentation.’ His antique shop’s show-stopping merchandise ‘has served as a source of inspiration for glass companies, package designers, and celebrity perfumers, before ultimately entering the collections of perfume bottle enthusiasts around the globe.’

With unparalleled access to private collections and never before seen pieces, the yearly auction garners huge excitement in the fragrance world. Some truly rare and exquisite items will doubtless only be in the reach of serious collectors, but other pieces can be obtainable prices – it all depends how many other people are lusting after the same bottle, of course!

Each year, we look forward to our friends at the Perfume Bottles Auction  their catalogue with us (which is a feast for the eyes in itself, as well as encompassing a huge amount of important history behind the bottles and fragrances); and we swear each year’s collection is even better than the last!

So, what does the 2023 Perfume Bottles Auction stash have in store for us? Let’s take a look at just some of our personal highlights…

This ‘Extraordinary 1934 Parfums de Burmann Pleine Lune sur le Nil (Full Moon on the Nile) black crystal Egyptian Revival perfume bottle’, was presented ‘in conjunction with the launching of the newly established Burmann perfume company and shop on the Champs Elysees. However, both the perfume and the bottle proved to be too expensive to produce, and this ambitious project was not pursued.’ Estimated to achieve $30,000–$40,000, and being so rare; no wonder it’s the catalogue’s cover-star.

This dazzling piece is a 1946 Salvador Dali design, produced by Baccarat (no 798) for Elsa Schiaparelli Le Roy Soleil (The Sun King), and ‘The Duchess of Windsor having been one of the first to receive one, wrote to Schiaparelli: “It is really the most beautiful bottle ever made, and the Roy Soleil is a very lasting and sweet gentleman. I cannot tell you how I appreciate your giving me such a handsome present which has displaced the Duke’s photograph on the coiffeuse!” Schiaparelli wrote in her autobiography that it was “…too expensive and too sophisticated for the general public, but…not destined to die.”‘ (Estimate $10,000–$12,000)

We’ve seen photos of this extraordinary bottle circulating online previously, those versions often in less than pristine condition, while this piece is immaculate and has so much for information to go with it. It’s a ‘1925 De Marcy L’Orange trompe l’oeil presentation, simulates a halved orange, glazed ceramic bowl holding eight orange segments in a metal frame, blown glass perfume bottles in perfect condition.’ Which of the fragrances would you have loved to smell first? Each segment held one Chypre, Ambre, Rose, Héliotrope, Jasmin, Muguet, Mimosa and Violette. (Personally, we’d have been at the Chypre and Ambre.) Estimate $800–$1,000, it’s sure to prove a-peeling [sorry!]

We’re loving the side-eye this cheeky minx is serving in the ‘1925 Favoly’s La Poupee Parisienne presentation for Chypre hand painted blown glass perfume bottle, metallic thread bow.’ Estimated $200–$400, she could be coming home to party with your perfume collection if you’re lucky. (And obvs she was a Chypre gal – with that expression, what else?)

This French ‘1920s Hetra for Elesbe Le Papillon Embaume butterfly‘ bottle was made for a  presentation of Oeillet (Carnation) scent. Completely darling, and we don’t know if we’d rather display it or run around giddily playing with while whooping with joy [don’t worry Perfume Bottles Auction pals, we wouldn’t really play with it. Much.] Estimated $600–$800, enthusiasts should get their nets at the ready.

The work on this ‘Sea Weeds’ model bottle is quite breathtaking, and it’s a ‘1925 Andre Jollivet design, produced by La Verrerie de la Nesle Normandeuse for Volnay Yapana clear glass perfume bottle, deeply molded front and reverse, blue patina, inner stopper, silvered metal cap, embossed label on side. Some of the bottles truly are art pieces in their own right, and this one certainly belongs in that category. $2,000–$4,000

Well now, this is irresistible, isn’t it? A ‘1944 Elizabeth Arden music box presentation for On dit (They say) clear/ frost glass bottle and cover, with inner stopper, sealed with perfume, as two ladies, their heads touching, one whispering a secret to the other…’ And what is the gossip, we wonder?! With panels of the box showing various high society social scenes, where no doubt the cause of the chin-wagging occurred, this is a delightful, whimsical piece we could stare at for hours.

There are SO many more we love, but to show them all would be to basically reproduce the entire catalogue, so why not go and have a browse (and gasp) for yourself? If something particularly takes your fancy, you can register for the 2023 Perfume Bottles Auction online: the instructions for bidding are all there, and if you have questions you can ask those via their website, too. Now then, which one(s) would you most like to own…?

[Our feature image for this article is the ‘1924 Julien Viard design, manufactured by Depinoix Glassworks for Bonwit Teller & Co, Paris Venez avec Moi (Come with Me). Estimated $4,000–$6,000. Utterly beguiling, non?]

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post Perfume Bottles Auction 2023: The world’s most fabulous flaçons… could be yours! appeared first on The Perfume Society.

In the recent Esxence fragrance fair in Milan, one of the highlights was smelling the aptly-named Abundance – a new fragrance by Australian perfume house, Map of the Heart.

We’ve long been huge fans of this always-artistic fragrance house, and love the way their scents imbue a sense of the landscapes they are inspired by. Indeed, many of the ingredients are indigenous to Australia and brilliant perfumer Jacques Huclier collaborated with Amelie Jacquin for this latest launch.

For V.8 Abundance, the verdancy and freshness billows forth from the first spritz – it was composed during Lockdown in Australia, so co-founder Sarah explained to us, and was borne of a sense of longing for nature and wildness that we all seemed to experience, no matter where we were based in the world.

Bitter orange fizzes with pops of pink pepper, a mellow drift of incense on the breeze suggesting adventure, exploration. The intriguing note of Christmas Tree or ‘Flame Tree’ is in the heart, but cast aside thoughts of yuletide celebrations and instead think of wide open vistas clustered by vast forests, shady places, an ancient place of sanctuary. As with all Map of the Heart fragrances, seams of Australian Sandalwood ripple throughout, here, joined by White Sandalwood, deep rivulets of Akigalawood and resinous benzoin, adding to the sacred nature of the scent as it warms on your skin.

This is a sneak-peek, because Abundance isn’t yet available on their website, but you may be sure when it is, there will be a rush of fragrant fans clamouring to own it – either in the heart bottles which made them so famous (and look for all the world as though they belong in an art gallery); or the more conventional bottles they now also produce.

Intrigued? You should be! We are thrilled to say the Map of the Heart Discovery Sets are now back in stock in our shop, and there you may try the rest of the collection to date. The only questions is where will you begin your Map of the Heart journey…?

Clear Heart v.1 – Australian summer: surfing, swimming, hot days, cool breezes and the salt that hangs in the air promising more.

Black Heart v.2 – Smoky. Impolite. Dangerous. It’s smoky heart of mysterious spices is shot through with shards of fresh eucalyptus and citrus to create an impolite mix of opposites.

Red Heart v.3 – Explosive. Seductive. Addictive. A composition of feijoa, tuberose and spices with sensual notes of musk and vanilla.

Gold Heart v.4 – Nurturing. Precious. Ancient. An exotic warm breeze that wraps around to protect and nurture.

Purple Heart v.5 – Brave. Instinctive. Triumphant. Inverying the olfactory pyramid by opening darker and then brightening

Pink Heart v.6 – Mingles on the skin with the spiciness of the sumac accord and cistus absolute for a mesmerising ride.

White Heart v.7 – The ethereal and sharp opening of French lavender, aldehyde and cardamom coolly invite us into the vast landscape of love.

Map of the Heart Discovery Set £35 for 7 x 1ml samples eau de parfum

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post Map of the Heart – an Abundance of Creativity appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Chocolate fragrances tend to garner two responses if you mention them: untrammelled delight bordering on lust, or shudders of utter disgust.

Love or loathe this niche section of gourmand ‘foodie’ inspired fragrances, we can assure you that not all scents with chocolate as a note are overtly sweet (indeed some are dark, mysterious compositions you might not recognise the note in unless you were told). Don’t believe us? Here we present a selection box of chocolate perfumes with truly something for every taste…

Tempting as it is to eat an entire batch of artisan chocolates, here’s a way to inhale them for longer. Made for a friend of the perfumer and founder, Sarah McCartney, who actually lived above a chocolate shop, melt into a tempting melange of ‘…cocoa butter, 100% cacao, a dash of coffee, hazelnut extract and a drop of vanilla absolute form this most realistic of posh chocolate scents that sits gently on a soft carpet of musks.’ Divine!

4160 Tuesdays Over the Chocolate Shop £100 for 50ml eau de parfum
In our Shop

Inspired by Mugler‘s childhood memories of fairground smells, this dark chocolate, candy floss, caramel concoction was groundbreaking when first launched in 1992 – often cited as the first true ‘gourmand’ – and retains that power to this very day. Once sniffed, never forgotten, it’s the much copied mixture of berries and patchouli that cuts through the sweetness and swaggers onwards for hours, years, miles…

Thierry Mugler Angel £65 for 25ml eau de parfum
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‘Why be a star when you can be a legend?’ asks the always artistic, eternally glamorous Sarah Baker, introducing perfumer Chris Maurice’s enticing composition for her house. Balancing bergamot’s brightness with the honeyed headiness of orange blossom, petitgrain pierces through the sweet swirl of butterscotch and dusting of sinfully dark chocolate. Cradled in Laos oudh, Suyufi agarwood and amber, it’s the ’24 Karat glow’ of celebrity’s golden age, made manifest.

Sarah Baker Gold Spot £145 for 50ml extrait de parfum
In our Shop

If you have ever experienced lifting the gilded lid of a beautifully packaged box of Charbonnel et Walker‘s Sea Salt Caramel Truffles, you’ll recognise perfumer Julie Massé photo-realistic longer-lasting fragrant interpretation of the addictive cocoa confection. Caramel and bourbon vanilla rock on the precipice of sweetness before being dashed through with a hint of freshly-hewn sandalwood and an ultra-intriguing definite note of the salt crystals to set your taste buds salivating.

Shay & Blue Salt Caramel £25 for 10ml eau de parfum
shayandblue.com

Here is Dior perfumer-creator François Demachy’s ‘ode to vanilla’, which from the initial sparkle of orange to the swoon of that sticky, dark pod’s scent, does not disappoint. Like wearing an amber cloak of silk velvet, texturally cosy with a glamorous, golden sheen, with undulating seams of rum, dark chocolate and patchouli throughout. Apparently inspired by an off-menu dessert created for Demachy by Parisian restaurant Maxim’s, we’re going to need a bigger spoon…

Dior La Collection Privée Vanilla Diorama £99 for 40ml eau de parfum
dior.com

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post Chocolate Fragrances for Every Taste appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Long before ‘gourmand’ foodie-inspired fragrances were even dreamed of and while smell was still perceived as the poor cousin of our other senses; one 18th Century polymath was championing the exquisite pleasures that taste and smell bring to everyday life. And more than mere pleasure alone: in fact, he heralded the proper appreciation and scientific study of these so-neglected senses…

‘Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are.’ So said Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, 1755-1826, a French lawyer and politician whom, apart from law, studied chemistry and medicine, and eventually gained fame as an epicure and gastronome.

His seminal work Physiologie du goût (The Physiology of Taste), contains Savarin’s philosophies and observations on the pleasures of the food, which he very much considered a science – long before the birth of molecular gastronomy and serious studies of taste and smell had begun.

And smell was very much at the forefront of the gastronomique experience, Savarin had worked out; exclaiming: ‘Smell and taste are in fact but a single composite sense, whose laboratory is the mouth and its chimney the nose.’

Previously considered the least important of the senses – indeed, smell remains the least scientifically explored, though technology is making huge leaps in our understanding – Savarin proclaimed that, ’The sense of smell, like a faithful counsellor, foretells its character.’

Published only two months before his death, the book has never been out of print and still proves inspirational to chefs and food-lovers to this day. Indeed, he understood that taste and smell must work together in harmony for full satisfaction of the senses, Savarin observed that ‘Smell and taste are in fact but a single composite sense, whose laboratory is the mouth and its chimney the nose.’

Preceding the remarkable leaps in knowledge high-tech equipment has allowed and revealing how entwined our sense of smell is to the taste and enjoyment of food, Savarin also observed how our noses protect us from eating potentially harmful substances, explaining ‘…for unknown foods, the nose acts always as a sentinal and cries: “Who goes there?”‘ while coming to the conclusion that a person’s character may be foretold in their taste and smell preferences… ‘Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are.’

We once devoted an entire issue of our award-winning magazine The Scented Letter to taste and smell – as of course we are gourmand fans in ALL the senses. And so it is heartening to know that Brillat was on our side here, with this extremely useful advice we selflessly pledge to carry through life:

‘Those who have been too long at their labor, who have drunk too long at the cup of voluptuousness, who feel they have become temporarily inhumane, who are tormented by their families, who find life sad and love ephemeral… they should all eat chocolate and they will be comforted.’

Wise words, indeed. We plan to enjoy all the sweet temptations that come our way, in scent form and in chocolate. Talk about having your cake and wearing it, too!

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post The first gourmand: Brillat-Savarin – an 18th Century chemist who knew you are what you eat (and smell!) appeared first on The Perfume Society.

We’ve set a fragrantly themed trail of clues to lead you around our website – simply follow your noses, find the hidden easter eggs and in our fragrant prize draw, one lucky person will WIN a bottle of Atelier Materi Cacao Porcelana, worth £210!

Cacao Porcelana is an incredible, ultra-chic gourmand scent – it’s chocolate, but NOT as your nose thinks it knows it. If you don’t think you’re one for gourmand creations, be prepared to have everything you think you know about chocolate turned on its head when Cacao Porcelana reveals the bitterness of the beans, rippled with rum and swathed in rings of tobacco…

White cacao beans are a rare ancestral variety of cacao also known as the ‘Nectar of the Gods’. The beans are removed from the pods, fermented, then sun-dried and roasted. White cacao yields sensuous notes of walnut and milk with hints of tonka bean.

After opening on sweet, syrupy top notes, Atelier Materi’s Cacao Porcelana unpacks its bitterness, sustained by powdery and woody notes. Light tobacco, patchouli and sandalwood scents give Cacao Porcelana a sensual, even fleshy signature.

We are sure you’ll fall hard for this delicious scent – surely the chicest way to enjoy chocolate, ever?! Here’s how you could be in with a chance of smelling delectable this Easter…

How to hunt: Simply read the scent-themed clues and set off in search for all the colourful eggs pictured below (FIVE in total) scattered across our website, then drop us an email info@perfumesociety.org telling us the location of each egg.

One winner will be chosen –  due to postal restrictions, only entries from U.K. residents, sorry!

Closing date: Sunday 9th April 2023 at midnight.

Fragrant clues to egg hiding places around our website:

1 – Brush up on your history to this ‘sweetest smelling king of all’…

2 – This Working Nose‘s first scent memory is of cakes that ‘…smelled like Anis and Vanilla, made by the Carmelite nuns in my town.’ (He’s famous for creating some of the world’s most-known scents, and now has his own house, Mizensir).

3 – This ingredient is found in Cacao Porcelana – an unexpected soft smokiness adding to its sensuality?

4 – This Fragrance Family is the most recent, including the note of chocolate, these ‘foodie’ fragrances smell almost edible!

5 – Reading this book (originally developed for people who’ve lost their sense of smell / taste due to Covid) will have you drooling…

We wish you all a very happy Easter, and good luck!

Terms & Conditions: No cash alternative to the prize will be offered. The prize is not transferable. Only entries accepted from U.K. residents, prize cannot be posted elsewhere. Closing date for entry is midnight 09/04/2023. After this date no further entries to the prize draw will be accepted.

The post Easter Egg Hunt to WIN Atelier Materi Cacao Porcelana, worth £210! appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Sometimes we receive news of fragrance launches that makes us ask if it’s April Fool’s Day – but did you know that many companies have actually created fragrances inspired by anything and everything from fast-food brands and Stilton cheese to Captain Birds Eye fish fingers? (Yes, really!)

Fragrance is such an individual choice, don’t you think? We all have completely differing reactions to certain notes or combinations – what’s one person’s yum is another’s yuck, and that can be based on anything from childhood memories and cultural or long-buried associations to the simple fact of personal preference. What’s more, there are scents that may remind us of favourite foods or sweet treats we enjoy – hence the Gourmand family of fragrances have held sway since the 90s.

It would take the concept of ‘niche’ to a whole new level, however, for fragrance fans to actively seek out scents that smell of fried chicken, pizzas and sprouts – no matter how much we might love munching them. Well… you’d think so, wouldn’t you? But increasingly, brands are latching on to the power of perfume to promote their products. Though these might be novelty scents, they did actually sell!

Have YOU tried any of these, or purchased one as a joke gift for a friend…?

Birds Eye recently offered consumers the chance to win a limited edition eau de toilette inspired by Captain Birdseye himself – played by Italian-born actor and seafarer Riccardo Acerbi, who was unveiled at the start of 2018 as part of an £8m marketing campaign for the brand. ‘We know the British public have a soft spot for our captain,’ explained Birds Eye spokeswoman Annalisa Fanali, and so they gave him his own signature scent, ‘inspired by the hypnotic and evocative power of the high seas.’

Named Ahoy! the fragrance promises top notes of grapefruit and mandarin with patchouli, thankfully nothing fishy to smell here. Fifty bottles of the scent were up for grabs in the competition, which ran on Birds Eye’s Facebook page in the run-up to Christmas. If you weren’t a lucky winner, one imagines you wont be able to pop down the shops and pick yourself up a bottle in the immediate future, which is a shame because it sounded rather appealing. Unlike some of the previous novelty fragrances, below…

In 2012, having revolutionised the pizza world with stuffed crusts, the fragrance world was perhaps not ready for Pizza Hut Perfume. What began as a joke on their Facebook page escalated to an actual scent being created, which they temptingly described as ‘boasting top notes of freshly baked, hand-tossed dough.’ The limited edition perfume was designed to commemorate Pizza Hut Canada, and only 110 bottles were produced and shared with fans. ‘Will we be seeing Pizza Hut perfume in department stores any time soon?’ their press release asked. ‘Only time will tell.’ Spoilers: nope.

Currently showcasing their vegan-friendly range, those missing their whiff of something meatier were recently offered a unique opportunity to ‘fill your home with the scent of Gravy’ in a KFC Candle. Another limited edition (no, really?) candles were limited to only 230 editions and again, used as a competition prize on social media. We cannot comment on the authenticity of the gravy scent, sadly, but certainly the wax colour looks… somewhat disturbingly… realistic.

Now this will raise eyebrows (or twitch nostrils), but I don’t think this next one’s as crazy as it perhaps sounds. Eau de Stilton was launched to promote the cheese as part of a marketing campaign all the way back in 2006, and apart from genuinely loving the bottle design, while the sound of a blue cheese-inspired scent might seem off-putting, I think certain undiluted jasmine oils smell like strong cheese – due to the huge amounts of ‘indoles’ found in the aromatic molecules, which to some noses even smells sightly fecal. It goes to show, it depends how something is described before we actually smell it. I’d have given this one a go!

Those fast-food chains really love their fragrances, it seems, because in 2015 we saw Japan promoting a Whopper-scented Burger King Perfume. Alas only available for one day, reportedly, it’s another meaty scent I cannot report first hand (or nose) on, and I will have to try and get over the huge disappointment of that, somehow. And, championing the love of the great gastronomic institution that is the Full English Breakfast, one fragrance garnered headlines around the world when they launched a perfume based on the aroma. Meatier still, popular meat-based snack company, Peperami, once released a spray ‘Puperami’ that, it claimed, would unite lost dogs with their owners. A case of ‘we’ll meat again’, maybe?

But it’s not only food products that are the inspiration behind novelty scents: In 2021, Richard Branson launched not only a new cruise-liner, but a scent to go with it, called No.1 Ship (and with the tagline, ‘It smells like ship!’ showing his tongue was firmly in his cheek. Perhaps we might place our final novelty fragrance example in the same bracket _ a whole set of scents based on… condoms. Yes. Just when you think you’ve seen (and smelled) it all.

While the majority (if not all) of these are novelty items – released in strictly limited editions to create a media buzz around the brand – it’s an interesting concept that engages us in a different way, and the fragrances will still have been created by a perfumer working to a brief (albeit rather more bizarre than they are used to!) Of course those highlighted above are to be taken with a pinch of salt (and vinegar, as far as the captain’s concerned), but it will be fascinating to see if any other brands pick up on the perfume buzz and create their own ‘scent of’.

What would you like to see (and smell) next…?

Written by Suzy Nightingale

The post April Fool’s Scents? Actually… these are all REAL! appeared first on The Perfume Society.

Because we all get stuck in our scent ways sometimes, or only focus on shiny, new launches, we created a guide to Fifty Fragrances You Should Try (or at least sniff) in a lifetime.

Seeking out and smelling these scents helps build a library of scent knowledge. Some are over a century old, others created by ‘rising star’ new houses in the fragrant firmament. Among them, you’ll encounter scents that changed the course of perfume history – and you may even recognise their olfactory echoes in many newer launches you go on to try.

You can read Part One here, but if you’ve already limbered up your noses, let’s take a look at the last twenty five names on our list – and remember that list could well have been five times as long! We simply chose some to give you a great overview of the olfactory timeline and fragrant landscape you should explore…

[P.S: We’re thrilled the longer version of this article, which appeared in our 50th issue of The Scented Letter magazine, is up for a Jasmine Award!]

26. Jimmy Choo £62 for 60ml eau de parfum jimmychoo.com

Feminine, empowering and instantly game-changing, in 2011 those who clamoured for the stunningly glam shoes suddenly wanted to wear Jimmy Choo on their wrists (and necks, décolletage, behind knees…) Olivier Polge leant his mastery of ingredients to creating this fruity Chypre that tempts with tiger orchid, toffee and Indonesian patchouli. One to wear while dancing on tables.

27. Jo Malone London Lime, Basil & Mandarin £110 for 100ml Cologne

When the now-iconic scent first whooshed its way into the perfume world in 1999, we were still in recovery from an era of powerful ‘room-rockers’. Inspiring countless Cologne-esque copies from others who’d not predicted this fragrant about-face, none can beat the original zesty, feel-good zing of just-squeezed citrus with handfuls of torn basil and thyme leaves still warm from the sun.

28. Jovoy Psychédélique £145 for 100ml eau de parfum 

The ultimate tribute to the Sixties: an intoxicatingly intense patchouli fragrance that’s dark and smoky, twisted through with the golden gleam of amber, and a no-brainer for any patch-lovers to swoon over (as we often do). A glorious example of a ‘phoenix’ perfume house – restored way beyond its former 1920s glory, now also an indie treasure trove of shops for fellow scent obsessives.

29. Kenzo Flower by Kenzo from £42.99 for 30ml eau de parfum

Kenzo’s new bloom for the millennium, it’s the imagined the scent of a poppy – one of those so-elusive flowers we adore but which remain frustratingly ‘silent’ and scentless in nature. Step forward the artistry of perfumery, in the hands (and nose) of Alberto Morrillas, and this 2000-launched scent now celebrates over 20 years of powdery, violet-tinged, hawthorn-dusted beguilement.

30. Lalique Encre Noire £25.23 for 100ml eau de toilette

Perfumer Nathalie Lorson excelled herself in 2006 with this love song to the scent of vetiver. Smouldering, inky, bone dry, and slightly dangerous, it wraps the wearer in a cloak of woody cypress, fluffed a little at the edges by cashmere, and ruthlessly seduces with a lover’s neck caress of still-cool muskiness. We dare any sex to wear this and not cast a spell over all in its trail.

31. Lancôme La Vie Est Belle £65 for 30ml eau de parfum 

In 2012, this free-spirited fragrance first sashayed its way on the world’s scent stage, embodied by Julia Roberts in the advertising campaign, created by a trio of top-notch noses (Anne Flipo, Dominique Ropion and Olivier Polge), and reportedly with 5000 trials in the making. Full-bodied iris is the star, swagged by radiant orange blossom and jasmine, the fruitiness shot through with praline.

32. Le Labo Santal 33 £157 for 50ml eau de parfum

Since 2011, whole cities have become scented by Santal 33, such has been the popularity of this creamy, dreamy, woodsy perfume story. It’s some story. Former L’Oréal executives Fabrice Penot and Eddie Roschi already had 10 scents to Le Labo’s when Santal changed everything. Starting life as a candle, perfumer Frank Voelkl made it ‘deeper, more comfortable’ and created a must-sniff cult classic.

33. Maison Francis Kurkdjian Baccarat Rouge 540 From £150 for 30ml eau de parfum

A modern classic, created for the 250th anniversary of the iconic crystal house in 2015. Luminous and sophisticated, Baccarat Rouge 540 lies on the skin like an amber floral and woody breeze. A poetic alchemy, the aerial notes of jasmine and tingling, warm radiance of saffron carry intriguing mineral facets of misty ambergris and woody tones of freshly cut, brown sugar-sprinkled cedar.

34. Maison Margiela Replica By the Fireplace £55 for 30ml eau de toilette

Captured in an apothecary-style bottle, with a label echoing the designer’s clothing tags, each Replica fragrance evokes familiar scent memories and moments linked to specific locations. In 2015 we were beckoned to a French alpine fireside, delicious chestnut cocooning pink pepper and clove, contrasting with warm notes of cashmere and orange flower for cuddle-me-closer woodiness.

35. Marc Jacobs Daisy £68 for 50ml eau de toilette

Jacobs’s playful yet sophisticated attitude is reflected in his love of fragrance and most especially this wildly successful scent of 2007. The essence of a youthful spirit, sunny, happy and free, the airy simplicity and charming bottle topped with oversized daisy cap has become iconic. With numerous international awards to its name, each new ‘spin’ on Daisy delights us afresh.

36. MEMO Paris Irish Leather £230 for 75ml eau de parfum

Collating an olfactory album of scent memories, husband and wife founders Clara and John Molloy (via perfumer Alienor Massenet) have distilled huge charisma into this aromatic, honeyed leather, inspired by Clara’s ancestral roots. Swathing green freshness in a somewhat animalistic spirit, the chill of frosted juniper and clary sage is soon smouldered by the warmth of an open fire.

37. Miller Harris Scherzo £110 for 50ml eau de parfum

Tasked with creating a fragrance to conjure up F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Tender is the Night, Mathieu Nardin’s 2018 artistic interpretation is an ode to darkness and light. Blood orange, davana and golden olibanum collide in a kaleidoscopic splash of brightness, while shadowy dark roses mingle with patchouli and oudh. Tinged with sweetness, this artistic endeavour allows your inner child to dance.

38. Molton Brown Black Pepper £120 for 100ml eau de parfum

This iconic sizzle of a scent was ahead of its time by several decades, evolving from bodywash in the 80s to perfumer Jacques Chabert’s personal fragrance in 2001, and finally into the grateful public’s hands (and wrists). The pepper’s enhanced by lemon and ginger up top, dark green herbs in the heart – a true wake-up call to get you going any time you need a fragrant boost of energy!

39. Mugler Angel From £65 for 25ml eau de parfum

An olfactory ‘shock’ when it launched in 1992, with its unashamedly unique, good-enough-to-eat candyfloss, bold berries and an unprecedentedly high concentration of 30% ultra-rich, woody patchouli. Mugler’s childhood funfair vision, brilliantly interpreted by Olivier Cresp and Yves de Chiris, will be among the stars, forever. Manfred Thierry Mugler, 1948–2022, R.I.P.

40. Narciso Rodriguez For Her £59 for 30ml eau de parfum

This eau de parfum version in the soft pink bottle (as opposed to the black EDT) was created by Christine Nagel and Francis Kurkdjian in 2016. Echoing the feminine strength of Rodriguez’ empowering designs, the rose and peach melt seamlessly into a softly simmering amber and signature musk base. Seriously sexy in the most unfussy, unbuttoned way, it still makes our hearts beat faster.

41. Nina Ricci L’Air du Temps £33.50 for 30ml eau de toilette

The first fragrance love affair for so many, it’s hard to believe this first came out in 1948, though the twin doves atop the cap (symbolising peace) make perfect sense. Perfumer Francis Fabron swathed a delicate bouquet in airy aldehydes, the clove-like spiciness of carnation and a dusting of violet and iris. Classically classy, did you know it’s worn by Clarice Starling in ‘Silence of the Lambs’?

42. Ormonde Jayne Woman From £90 for 30ml eau de parfum

Socrates drank black hemlock to poison himself, but Geza Schoen used it in 2002 for a quite different effect, oodles of the absolute lending mysterious shadows to a dusky forest, otherworldly whispers amidst the verdant undergrowth, all set against the backdrop of a violet-streaked, vetiver rich, amber-tinged, sunset. It could easily conquer your heart (and anyone near).

43. Penhaligon’s Halfeti £190 for 100ml eau de parfum

Inspired by a small Turkish village famed for its roses, perfumer Christian Provenzano coaxes baskets of the blooms to radiate in the hot sun. Steeped with spices, the nutmeg and oudh sweep in clouds across supple leather (and often, onto the streets, actually wafting from Penhaligon’s boutiques). That distinctive amber woodiness in the base has ensured its smash-hit status since 2015.

44. Prada Infusion d’Iris £125 for 100ml eau de parfum

From the moment it launched in 2007, Daniela Andrier’s scent gained cult status. smooth and crisp all at once, cleverly reminiscent of clean linen and warm skin, neroli and mandarin make for an airy introduction to which Andrier’s fused an exquisite tapestry of elements – accenting green galbanum, cedarwood and vetiver with the almost bread-like buttery-softness of iris. Sheer genius.

45. Robert Piguet Fracas £175 for 100ml eau de parfum

Created in 1948 by the indomitable Germaine Cellier, this remains the tuberose against which all others must be measured. Emphatically voluptuous with a heady coolness, this deliberately divisive, Baroque floral has apparently been beloved, among others, by Rita Hayworth, Brigitte Bardot, Courtney Love and Isabella Blow. In other words: shrinking flowers need not apply.

46. Ruth Mastenbroek Signature From £70 for 30ml eau de parfum

British perfumer Ruth’s own memories of her life in England and her exciting travels abroad formed the basis for her first scent, fittingly named Signature for the way it so perfectly becomes part of you. A distinctively timeless Chypre that’s laced with luscious pineapple, the oakmoss and patchouli base become a warm sunshine-infused hug whenever required.

47. Serge Lutens Féminité du Bois £110 for 50ml eau de parfum

Originally launched by Shiseido in 1992, during his creative tenure there, this fragrance came with him for the launch of his own ground-breaking niche perfume house, HQ-ed in Paris’s Palais-Royal, just a few years later. The genderless woody fruit accord gives us a forest of dry cedar swathing a superbly spiced plummy, lipstick-y violet.

48. Tom Ford Black Orchid £140 for 50ml eau de parfum

An instant cult classic from its 2006 launch, famed for the seductive black truffle-infused orchid, rum soaked plums, gleaming, burnished ylang ylang and the silky, lingerie-like stroke of sandalwood and vanilla in the base. Darkly delish, devilishly moreish, Tom Ford smoothly bridged the gap between out-there edgy niche and luxe designer dreaminess. We’re still here for it.

49. Viktor & Rolf Flowerbomb £65 for 30ml eau de parfum

In 2005 Viktor & Rolf veritably exploded onto the scent scene, with this immediate blockbuster putting the edgy and rule-breaking Dutch design duo firmly on the fragrance map. Traditional note structures were cast aside by Carlos Benaïm, Olivier Polge and Domitille Bertier; instead, overlapping floralcy entwined with a milky muskiness. Still the bomb.

50. YSL Opium £65 for 30ml eau de parfum

In 1977 the world was seduced by this audaciously named fragrance; still controversial today, back then it caused a scandal. The opulent swathe of ambrée vanilla, by perfumers Jean Amic and Jean-Louis Sieuzac, was still shocking us in 2000, when Sophie Dahl’s infamous naked ad saw portrayed her experiencing an Opium-induced olfactory ecstasy. (As well she might.)

Written by Suzy Nightingale

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