A Personal History of Fragrance

Why do we wear fragrance?  How do we choose one that is right for us?  Is it based on memories of how people we love smelled?  Is it based on how we want to feel on a particular day?  Or who we are trying to attract?  Even those people who can’t wear perfume in spray form (allergies or irritation) find a way of fragrancing themselves, maybe with a solid perfume, an oil or a scented lotion.  Perfume has a long, interesting and sometimes even disturbing history (Parfum a la Guillotine, anyone?).  Mary and I have been discussing her love of perfume and its history and we have decided to share a few things with you over the next few weeks that we have discovered.

  

For this post, I used the wonderful fragrance directory from BaseNotes.net to take a look at the fragrances I associate most with my parents and if they are at all responsible for the scents I have chosen to wear over the years.  

My mother wore Yves Saint Laurent Opium throughout my childhood.  At some point, she decided that she didn’t like having a “signature scent” and started collecting perfumes, but I can catch a whiff of Opium anywhere and instantly link it to her, even though I don’t think she’s worn it in years (she told me that she does still have a bottle, though). 

Opium is defined as a feminine fragrance in the floral oriental family.  It has top notes of mandarin orange, bergamot and lily of the valley; middle notes of jasmine, carnation and myrrh; and base notes of vanilla, patchouli, opoponaux (also known as sweet myrrh) and amber.

My father rarely wore any fragrance, other than what his soap left behind, but when he did use it, he chose Procter and Gamble Old Spice.  Such a typical dad fragrance, isn’t it? 

Old Spice is defined as a masculine fragrance in the oriental woody family.  It has top notes of orange, lemon, spices, clary sage and aldehydes; middle notes of cinnamon, carnation, geranium, jasmine, heliotrope and pimento berry (smells like Cuban cigars); and base notes of vanilla, musk, cedarwood, frankincense, benzoin, tonka, and ambergris (you do not want to know what this was made out of before it was replaced with synthetics).

It surprised me that these two fragrances have some common notes:  Both have citrus in their top notes, carnation in the middle and vanilla in their base notes.  But I don’t think of them as being similar, just the same.

So how common are the notes from each of their fragrances with the ones I have loved most?

Coty Wild Musk (note the awesome 80s ad in the embedded link): This was the first perfume that I bought for myself (with my dad's money, since I was a tween).  It has the bergamot and amber from Opium and the jasmine and vanilla from both Opium and Old Spice, but it was certainly meant to be a feminine fragrance. It is in the oriental floral fragrance family, so I went in the same direction of both parent fragrances.  I mean, it could have been Jean Nate, right?  And maybe it was, for a little while...

Kiehl’s OriginalMusk, Blend No. 1: I wore this in my late twenties and through the first part of my thirties.  It has the bergamot and patchouli from Opium and the tonka and musk from Old Spice.  It is a unisex fragrance, but most reviews I’ve read think it’s too manly – I don’t agree, obviously.  It is in the fougere fragrance family, but they started calling it “aromatic” after 2010.  The musk on this is very “creamy,” which reminds me of Old Spice, but I believe the aromatic title comes from the bergamot, ylang-ylang and neroli.  To note, these are three fragrance notes that I was completely unaware of until I worked at The Body Shop in my teens – all three were offered in the aromatherapy oil section, so I had a chance to smell them individually and liked all three.  But when I purchased this musk, I had no idea what the notes were – I just knew I liked it.

And finally, Acqua di Genova:  This is the fragrance that my mother brought me as a gift after her last trip to Genoa before she moved there, so obviously it’s close to my heart.  My bottle has survived a fire and three moves so far.  It is funny that my mom picked a fragrance from the oriental woody family, since Old Spice belongs to the same fragrance family, but Acqua diGenova smells nothing like either fragrance to me.  It does  share Opium’s top notes of citrus but in a stronger way, and a base note of musk like Old Spice is present, but much weaker.  Acqua di Genova also has neroli (which I believe was left out on the Fragrantica entry) as a middle note, which isn’t strong, but does change the overall impression of the fragrance.


In the end, and though there have been other perfumes in my life that were very different from these, it looks like I do owe some of my preferences to my parents.  I am a sentimental person, so it's entirely possible that I'm in the minority for being influenced by my family members when it comes to the scents I prefer.  Which is where you come in:

Do you know where your preference for a certain scent came from?  Or has this post got you wondering?  Leave us a comment below.