In Your Opinion: 295 posts

Recommend me a Perfume February 2024

Our “Recommend Me a Perfume” thread is open this week. You can use this space to find perfume recommendations, to share your discoveries and favorite scents, and to ask any questions about scents, aromas and flavors. Or you can just tell us what perfume you are wearing!

How does it work: 1. Please post your requests or questions as comments here. You can also use this space to ask any fragrance related questions. To receive recommendations that are better tailored to your tastes, you can include details on what you like and don’t like, your signature perfumes, and your budget. And please let us know what you end up sampling. 2. Then please check the thread to see if there are other requests you can answer. Your responses are really valuable for navigating the big and sometimes confusing world of perfume, so let’s help each other!

To make this thread easier to read, when you reply to someone, please click on the blue “reply” link under their comment.

Photography by Bois de Jasmin

Scent Diary : 72 Seasons

“Bush warblers start singing in the mountains.” This is the name of the current season, according to the traditional Japanese calendar. The calendar is divided into 24 parts, called sekki, from Risshun (Beginning of spring) in early February until Daikan (Greater cold).  The 24 sekki are each split into three making up a total of 72 kō. Each kō is about five days and it has a poetic name adapted to Japanese climate.

To read through the calendar is to travel through the Japanese year, tracing the changes in nature and observing our surroundings in their minute detail. The names of the seasons are concise and yet descriptive, evoking perfectly the transformation as winter fades, spring undulates into summer and fall smolders into winter. As Murasaki Shikibu, the 11th-century author of the marvelous Tale of Genji noted, “It is nature that gives me the most pleasure, the changes through the seasons, the blossoms and leaves of autumn and spring, the shifting patterns of the skies.” If you’re curious to learn about 72 seasons, I invite you to read this article in Kyoto Journal.

Scent Diary is a place to write your observations about the scents around you–and about scents in your environment. Whether you write down 1 recollection or 10 matters less than simply reminding yourself to smell. You can add as many comments as you wish. You can comment today or over the course of the week; this thread will always be open. Of course, do share what perfume you’re wearing or what particularly good scented products you’ve discovered.

While looking through my articles, I found this article that I wrote a few years ago but that still remains popular and often-read: A to Z Tips for Enjoyable, Affordable and Rewarding Perfume Hobby. If you have any tips to add, I’d love to hear them.

Photography by Bois de Jasmin

Recommend Me a Perfume January 2024

Our “Recommend Me a Perfume” thread is open this week. You can use this space to find perfume recommendations, to share your discoveries and favorite scents, and to ask any questions about scents, aromas and flavors. Or you can just tell us what perfume you are wearing!

How does it work: 1. Please post your requests or questions as comments here. You can also use this space to ask any fragrance related questions. To receive recommendations that are better tailored to your tastes, you can include details on what you like and don’t like, your signature perfumes, and your budget. And please let us know what you end up sampling. 2. Then please check the thread to see if there are other requests you can answer. Your responses are really valuable for navigating the big and sometimes confusing world of perfume, so let’s help each other!

To make this thread easier to read, when you reply to someone, please click on the blue “reply” link under their comment.

Photography by Bois de Jasmin

Scent Diary : First of the Year

Happy 2024 to my readers and friends! I wish you many wonderful experiences, health and success. Above all, I wish that 2024 will be a more peaceful year than the previous one.

What was the first thing you smelled this year? One of the exercises I gave to my ISIPCA students to develop them ability to notice and describe aromas is to track the scents they smell over the course of five consecutive days. It was a training method I learned as a perfumery students and I always found it effective. Even these days when I make a point of keeping a scent diary for several days and noting what odors I observe around me, my perception of aromas becomes heightened.

So with the goal of starting the year well, here is my list:
Jasmine tea–white grape, apricot jam, suede, green buds.
White hyacinths–I made an arrangement with white hyacinths and pine branches and I smelled the vivid wet almond and earthy rose scent as soon as I walked into the living this morning.
Panettone–my homemade panettone was scented with orange and lemon peel, vanilla and rum-raisins.
Kefir–my morning, holiday or not, starts with feeding my army of pets–sourdough starters, nukadon, and kefir. Kefir smells wonderfully of green apple and lemon.
Hermès Cuir d’Ange–my perfume today, soft leather and tender musk, with a whisper of violets and faded roses.

I would love to read your lists.

Scent Diary is a place to write your observations about the scents around you. Whether you write down 1 recollection or 10 matters less than simply reminding yourself to smell. You can add as many comments as you wish. You can comment today or over the course of the week; this thread will always be open. Of course, do share what perfume you’re wearing or what particularly good scented products you’ve discovered.

While looking through my articles, I found this article that I wrote a few years ago but that still remains popular and often-read: A to Z Tips for Enjoyable, Affordable and Rewarding Perfume Hobby. If you have any tips to add, I’d love to hear them.

Photography by Bois de Jasmin

Recommend Me a Perfume December 2023 and a Giveaway

Merry Christmas! Warm wishes to you this holiday season.

Our “Recommend Me a Perfume” thread is open this week. You can use this space to find perfume recommendations, to share your discoveries and favorite scents, and to ask any questions about scents, aromas and flavors. Or you can just tell us what perfume you are wearing!

As a gesture of gratitude to everyone who helped our community with their quests and wishlists, I would like to offer you a giveaway. Everyone who will participate in this thread will be entered into a draw for one set of vintage and niche samples from my collection. The set includes 20 fragrances from the classical houses like Guerlain, Chanel, Caron as well as niche staples like Serge Lutens and L’Artisan. I made several of these sets for gifts this year, and I decided to offer one to you.

If you don’t wish to be entered into the giveaway, please note so in the comments. The contest is now closed, but please continue to comment and help others with their searches.

The winner is Marianella. Congratulations! I will contact the winner via email shortly.

How does it work: 1. Please post your requests or questions as comments here. You can also use this space to ask any fragrance related questions. To receive recommendations that are better tailored to your tastes, you can include details on what you like and don’t like, your signature perfumes, and your budget. And please let us know what you end up sampling. 2. Then please check the thread to see if there are other requests you can answer. Your responses are really valuable for navigating the big and sometimes confusing world of perfume, so let’s help each other!

To make this thread easier to read, when you reply to someone, please click on the blue “reply” link under their comment.

Photography by Bois de Jasmin

From the Archives

Latest Comments

  • Alexandra in Recommend me a Perfume February 2024: Thanks, Aurora! I was mixing up my London niche perfume shops. Thanks for setting me straight. March 18, 2024 at 5:43pm

  • Mari in Recommend me a Perfume February 2024: Hello all. I hope I’m not too late for this thread. I am looking for a perfume that is a photorealistic take on spring blooming trees/shrubs/flowers. I love the scents… March 17, 2024 at 1:07pm

  • Camille in White Winter Opulence : Floral Perfumes: I recently read an article (sorry I forgot where and by whom) that described the white florals as old fashioned, granny fragrances. Do you agree? I love the big white… March 16, 2024 at 12:28pm

  • Kylie walker in Guerlain Apres l’Ondee : Perfume Review: Thanks to your beautiful descriptive writing, i am enticed and feel I must try this fragrance of yours. You make it sound so interesting, like a well kept secret. Thank… March 15, 2024 at 11:59pm

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