Still on the Scent of the Perfect Fragrance

My latest tester bottles of perfume…

Jennifer Lopez ‘Glow’ — 2
We both loved this… strong and sweet without being heavy. Had spice in the heart of it. I suspect Mum liked it better than J Lo Live, but after all these perfumes I’ve tried, I can’t quite remember Live now and can’t make a direct comparison for myself. I see the pair as being neck and neck. Glow reminded me strongly of something, and it wasn’t till I was going round Woolworth that it hit me… rose and lemon Turkish Delight! The fragrance had stamina and was still Delighty much later (‘flowery’ to Mum).

Britney Spears ‘Curious’ — 2
At first Curious seemed a lighter version of J Lo Glow, without the spice. As time passed, it grew lighter, ending up as a sheen of sweet vanilla-y powder, whereas Glow never wavered in its Turkish sweetness. I liked Curious and would be happy to wear it, but it didn’t have a chance when compared directly to Glow (I had one on one wrist and the other on the other). Pretty blue bottle… would be a nice Christmas present for someone.

Katie Price ‘Besotted’ — 0
Light and pleasant in a pretty bottle, but it didn’t stand out at all. Finishes with a powdery scent, a bit dull. I would say it was a little girl’s perfume (at least that’s what it was like on me!) The tester bottle I tried was on a small island of selected perfumes in some pharmacy… it was teetering dangerously on a box at the back of the island (where anybody could sweep it off with a bag) and I said to Mum I didn’t think it would last out the day.

Christian Dior ‘J’Adore’ — 0 (my sister E stood in for Mum in the ‘sniff test’)
Before I say much about either of the Christian Dior fragrances here, I have to confess I put too much on… they came blasting out of their respective bottles and ran down my wrists. Enthusiastic products, the pair of them. J’Adore was the strongest to start with… E says it’s like soap, which is probably a fair comment. A nice light flowery soap that wafts everywhere with great gusto, but it didn’t interest me very much. I like it better as it cools, but to start with, it’s more overpowering than Pure Poison. Finally it slows and disappears, and Pure Poison takes over.

Christian Dior ‘Pure Poison’ — 0 (my sister E stood in for Mum in the ‘sniff test’)
Hmm… odd one. E said it smelled of nothing in particular. It makes me think of the inside of someone’s party-going clutch bag, or a pile of freshly washed laundry from the laundromat. At least one of the Christian Dior perfumes (I suspect J’Adore) made me feel a bit nauseous for a while, and my eyes smarted… it could just be that I put too much on. I’m still recovering from the Dizzy Virus, with a touch of the unsolicited ‘hangover’, so I won’t make too much of it. The longer I wear Pure Poison, though, the sicker I feel. It’s almost as though fluff from a tumble dryer is catching at the back of my throat.

I have a confession to make… I bought Paloma Picasso. (Chews lip guiltily). It had more of a ‘mark-down’ in price than some of the others (down from £35 to around £19), and I felt I owed Boots a little something after sniffing so much of their perfumes! I put J Lo Live in my Santa Claus letter so I’m resisting that one for now.

I would have got J Lo Glow, but it was locked away in the glass cabinet, and you know what I’m like about asking for things…! I was able to pick up a box of the Paloma Picasso from the special offer stand, which I was thinking about anyway, as it was such a good price, and there were only two boxes left (panic) so… I’m going to have to wear a lot of perfume to get through it all before it goes stale. I’ve still got my White Satin, and there’s the £1 Miranda, and Calvin Klein’s Euphoria. And now Paloma Picasso.

I would wash off this Christian Dior so I can make a start on my growing stash, but it seems a waste. So I won’t. For the rest of the day I’ll be a muddled mixture of J’Adore and Pure Poison (so what’s new?)

The following is my updated list of perfume (the original, older list is in All the Perfumes of the High Street). The score ’2′ means both Mum (or E) and I liked it. ’1′ means either I liked it or she did… if it’s low down in the list, it tends to mean she liked it but I didn’t!

My list is a little eccentrically arranged; for instance, I gave Miranda 0.5 from each of us, but I put a 0-scoring perfume (Besotted) ahead of it. There are explanations, I guess; sometimes I quite liked a perfume but it didn’t suit me or I was reacting to it slightly… and we gave Miranda the score we did because it wasn’t as bad as we expected from a £1 bottle of perfume. It doesn’t mean I would stop using Miranda (now that I have it), and it doesn’t mean I would buy Besotted. Life is never that straightforward.

The perfumes in places 1 to 9, I would buy.

1. Calvin Klein ‘Euphoria’ — 2
2. Jennifer Lopez ‘Live’ — 2
3. Jennifer Lopez ‘Glow’ — 2
4. Paloma Picasso — 2
5. Cacharel ‘Noa’ — 2
6. Marc Jacob’s ‘Daisy’ — 2
7. Britney Spears ‘Curious’ — 2
8. Mango ‘Delirium’ — 2
9. Monsoon ‘Monsoon’ — 1
10. Katie Price ‘Besotted’ — 0
11. Ricardo ‘Miranda’ — 1
12. Givenchy ‘Amarige’ — 0.5
13. Police ‘Wings’ — 1.5
14. Vera Wang ‘Princess’ — 0
15. Christian Dior ‘J’Adore’ — 0
16. Dolce & Gabbana ‘The One’ — 0
17. Britney Spears ‘Fantasy’ — 0
18. Cacharel ‘Anais Anais’ — 1
19. Christian Dior ‘Pure Poison’ — 0

PS J’Adore had faded by the time Mum got home, but I tried the Pure Poison on her, and she said “I don’t like it.” I said E said it didn’t smell of anything, and Mum said “if you offered her a sniff of pure cat pee, she would say ‘mm… very nice’.”

Seems a bit unfair, but E’s got more cats than we have! I’d feel more at home with Eau de Cat Pee than Pure Poison — I wouldn’t feel so unwell. Sorry. I’m going to wash it off.

All the Perfumes of the High Street

I haven’t stopped trying new perfumes in Boots. I’m keeping tally… for everybody the experience would be different, of course, especially as I’m told perfumes smell different on different people. If a perfume on the list has 2 points, it means Mum and I both liked it.

I hope none of your favourites are at the bottom, but it will just mean that they smell great on you but not on me. Favourites of mine might be at the bottom of your list. In addition, I might change my mind later and decide something is quite good, and something else not so much. If I can do that with Anais Anais, I can do that with anything…

In approximate order of the fragrances I liked best:

1. Calvin Klein ‘Euphoria’ — 2
I bought this and wrote about it here. This perfume has real tzing! Warm and lively.

2. Jennifer Lopez ‘Live’ (known as J Lo Live) — 2
I loved it the moment I put it on. It was a fresh, fruity blast. A friendly scent which faded slowly into sweetness, but was so long-lasting that there was still a trace of it when I tried to soap it off 48 hours later. Wouldn’t have tried to get rid of it normally, but was planning to test more perfumes that day! We asked Superdrug if they had J Lo Live, and they said it was sold out. “It must be popular,” said Mum, raising her eyebrows. Disappointing… I mean, the more popular it is, the less likely they are to stop making it, but I don’t want it to be sold out when I try to buy it. Back off, girls — Diddums coming through.

3. Paloma Picasso — 2
Wow, what can I say? Very bright and unusual. It’s the second most Christmassy perfume on the list. I decided to put it above Noa because Paloma Picasso impressed me immediately, whereas Noa took a few minutes to grow on me.

4. Cacharel ‘Noa’ — 2
At first I thought it was an ordinary but pleasant floral scent… then the spice kicked in! It’s the most Christmassy of all the perfumes on this list. I said that to Mum, then looked it up on the internet and found it’s got incense in it. As it grabbed my attention so much, even after falling in love with J Lo Live, I had to place it fairly high on my list. I checked for it on the Superdrug site and it said ‘noa results for Noa.’ Just kidding… about the spelling!

5. Marc Jacob’s ‘Daisy’ – 2
Very, very nice. I don’t know for sure if I like it better than Delirium or not, as I’ve tried so many perfumes by now that I can’t remember Delirium. Daisy is a light, unusual, summery scent which lasts reasonably well, but it doesn’t have the bite that I’m beginning to realize that I’m looking for in my most favourite perfumes. (I wonder if that says anything about me?) I loved it anyway, and would buy it any day.

6. Mango ‘Delirium’ — 2
Extremely light, fresh and floral; reasonably long-lasting and didn’t go stale. Would be happy to find it in my Christmas stocking.

7. Monsoon ‘Monsoon’ — 1
Mum didn’t like it but I thought it was brighter and more ‘party-going’ than Delirium. It didn’t last as long, though… faded quite fast. Very pretty packaging. It’s mentioned and pictured here but there isn’t much information on it as yet.

8. Ricardo ‘Miranda’ — 1
100 ml bottle for £1 from the Pound Shop! I didn’t get to test it first but who can resist purchasing a perfume for £1? When I tried it at home, my first impression was that it was like a fizzy sugary drink for children… Creamola Foam came to mind. It wasn’t as bad as we feared, quite light and not overpowering, and faded not too quickly (gone before bedtime) leaving — uh — a warm vanilla scent. Maybe half a point from each of us, resulting in a score of 1. Does this prove I have horrible taste…. that I’ve rated it above certain expensive scents? I’m using it as my ‘everyday staying at home perfume’, so that can’t be bad.

9. Givenchy ‘Amarige’ — 0.5
I liked this at first, and can easily imagine it being another person’s favourite perfume, but it was too cloying on me. Mum didn’t like it at all. I said it’s like Anais Anais without the headache, but Mum said “no it’s not”. I’ve read that those who wear it have learned to put on just a little.

10. Police ‘Wings’ — 1.5
Not as floral as Delirium or Monsoon. It’s quite sharp at first blast but settles down. Potentially overpowering if you were to put too much on — I have a sensitive throat and it was a touch irritated. Mum liked it; I quite liked it too, but there are others I like more.

11. Vera Wang ‘Princess’ — 0
Very vanillay. It made my eyes smart, but at least it didn’t bring on a headache, so it stays in the ‘wearable’ section of my perfume list. Mum said it reminded her of a perfume she used to know, but she couldn’t put her finger on what. I suggested it was because of the vanilla. It fades into a warm and comforting aroma.

12. Dolce & Gabbana ‘The One’ — 0
Mum tried this. Wasn’t really our type, though there was nothing especially off-putting about it.

13. Britney Spears ‘Fantasy’ — 0
Very pretty bottle, but this one didn’t smell good on me… it’s probably lovely on others. I will have to try the Midnight Fantasy some time, maybe I’ll fare better with it.

14. Cacharel ‘Anais Anais’ — 1
I described it as a family staple, but I reacted to it the other day! Headache, nausea, giddiness… I had to scrub it off and use an unperfumed moisturizer to help subdue any traces. I gave the atomizer to Mum, docked a point and put it at the foot of my list. I used to wear it but you can’t maintain a liking for it when you feel as though you’ve just been mobbed by lilies in hobnailed boots.

I nearly tried Mango ‘Adorably’ but held it to my nose first, and thought “gack!” Hurriedly replaced the cap. I think I’ll leave that one as a last resort.

I will continue to add to this list… there are plenty more I’m looking forward to try, such as Paul Smith ‘Rose’ (I love rose scents), Dolce & Gabbana ‘Light Blue’, Lancome ‘Magnifique’, Diesel ‘Fuel for Life’ etc.