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I ended up loving Maison Margiela Replica By the Fireplace (though I haven’t enjoyed any other scents I’ve tried from the brand) and Le Labo Santal 33, both of which are very, very popular mainstream scents.
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I am unaware of fragrance “hype”, I think. I just sniff things and if I like them, I buy them – it’s entirely personal for me and not fuelled by anything else.
Loving these perfume posts, Christine. Maison Margiela Jazz Club has been my favorite fragrance for at least the past 6 or 7 years.
I love this one too! I just wish the throw was a little stronger a few hours in, but the scent is one of my favorites.
I adore this one too, at first I couldn’t believe that I like it that much since I always choose flowery scents, but for me Jazz Club is so unique, transporters me to New York.
I’m not interested in hype either.
I do love Santal 33 also, but the only MM Replica scent I like is Jazz Club.
Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille. It’s just so soft, rich, warm, and *smells* expensive. It never gets messy or ugly on my skin and rediscovering it on my winter scarves is a little like heaven.
I’m with you on Maison Margiela Replica scents. I liked my first bottle of Jazz Club for how smoky, dry, and semi-masculine it smelled on me. But the second bottle is heavy tuberose and has a more “wet” feel. By the Fireplace is lovely and, while straightforward and simple, wears well and smells universally nice – I’ve purchased several since its initial release and they all smell the same. I’ve found the rest of MM’s scents be….look, I don’t want to say “gross”, but they talk a big game about coffee shops and autumn vibes and I found those personally horrifying.
I wouldn’t want to say “gross” either, but when I read your comment that’s what come to mind.
Personally I wish Maison Margiela gave me coffee and autumn vibes, but I don’t get that. The Coffee Break one smells nothing like coffee, the lavender note makes it awful to me.
I wonder how much the pandemic will impact fragrance industry… people are definitely going to wear again more and more… but so many people report post-infection long term changes on how they perceived smell and taste. People hate notes they loved before, smell some scents but cannot smell other at all. Will there be another breakthrough like all those molecule fragrances in the past years? Some sort of universal or chameleonic lab made notes?
Don’t know, but nowadays when I smell fragrances I wander if I had asymptomatic covid, and somehow my sense of smell is wracked. 😅
YES! Coffee Break doesn’t smell like coffee, a coffee shop, warmth, or anything cozy. It was so weirdly astringent I knew I’d hate it in the bottle, skin tested it anyway, and it was nauseating (and LOUD) on my skin. Autumn vibes was also a weird choice and from what I remember it smelled like sour vanilla wood and very much like another popular fragrance that I can’t remember now, but found in Sephora’s travel perfume section. Vanilla Woods? Vanillle Insensee? …..something. I could find it again next time I’m in store.
I also wonder about fragrance industries – perfume, candle, lotion, dish soap, etc… So many reviews center around people not being able to smell the product. For example, a ton of candle reviews have complaints about throw. Is that because companies are constantly cheaping out on ingredients and especially during a pandemic when supplies are more expensive; or is it because so many people got their sense of smell all jacked up by Covid, or is it a combination of those things?
Was it Vanilla Woods by The 7 Virtues? 😆
I luckily just got a travel size as perk from Sephora, because it got me at vanilla + pear + caramel. I barely smell vanilla and caramel, I can’t find the pear… and it smells more like a spicy woody fragrance than the gourmand I have expected. To me it seems that the brand focuses more on the aromatherapy aspect, which is not necessary my vibe.
Having heard some really good things about Tom Ford Black Orchid, I got a sample to give it a trial run and I loved it enough to get the regular full-sized bottle. It hasn’t failed to delight me every time I get to wear it! Apparently, others love how it exudes a sophisticated, yet dark, sensuous scent on and around me, because I get many a complement and different ones asking me what I’m wearing.
Yes, it smells great!!
I love this scent, but unfortunately on my skin chemistry just smells likes a burning log. All other notes completely gone and I’m just left with the smell of ash. I have Autumn Walk which works better for me.
Edit: Autumn Vibes
I love Autumn Vibes! It’s my favorite, and only, MM. To me, it’s Le Labo-ish, which may be why I like it so much.
I’m getting a little into indie fragrances and I saw a lot about Black Baccara’s Joan of Arc scent when I was first looking into them. I bought a small bottle and it’s really as unique and coolly tough as I’d heard, though it’s definitely not a mainstream kind of scent.
I dislike most of the fragrances that have been hyped in the last years. Maison Margiela, Jo Malone, Tom Ford… couldn’t find one hyped scent / brand that smelled nice for me. Heck, I even hate the Sol de Janeiro Bumbum scent, and that’s supposed to smell like vanilla and caramel (it smell sour on me, not sweet).
I guess I like Skylar Vanilla Sky… but Skylar is hyped only in some circles (mostly vanilla lovers).
I haven’t liked an overly hyped fragrance since the Black Opium days.
Not being into ‘hyped up’ scents, it would be about how the perfume worked on me. I still love my golden oldies like EL’s Knowing, Lancome’s Poeme and D & G’s The One and Sciliy, Dior’s La Dolce Vita – to name a few. Plus my all time favourite Clinique’s Aronmatic Elixir – that is worth the ‘hype’.
Dior’s Feve Delicieuse perfume was very popular and not easily accessible. After reading multiple reviews I pulled the trigger and blind brought it off of Dior’s site. It lived up to all the hype for me. I love the vanilla, coffee, caramel and rose notes in it. Also it last all day.
I think Mon Guerlain is really beautiful.
(Oh, and I’d also say these are hyped up and often recommended, and are definitely beautiful for their different fragrance categories:
Chanel Coco Mademoiselle, classic.
Chloe Roses de Chloe, the queen of rose scents for a long time.
Narcisso Rodriguez For Her, musky musk.
Gucci Bamboo, clean, fresh.
To my nose, I didn’t think La Vie Est Belle lived up to the hype it has. I like it okay, but it wasn’t what I expected given the hype).
I love hype about new fragrances, I love everything about fragrance. A few of the Tom Ford; Au Wood, Black Orchid and Fleur de Portofino. Also Floral Street; Arizona Blume, and Chypre Sublime are winners for me.
1) Alkemia Perfumes As Dark Things Are Meant to Be Loved – I heard about this one a lot in various groups before trying it and the list of notes is long and intimidating but I find it super captivating and wearable.
2) Deep Midnight Perfumes Seven Veils – Another one I heard about fairly often as a vanilla lover. It’s just so lovely, I don’t know how to describe how pretty and feminine and alluring I feel wearing it.
I love both of these very very very much and they TOTALLY lived up to the hype.
I learned long ago I didn’t like designer perfumes. Very very few scents I liked Miracle being one. So I don’t pay much attention to the current buzz.
I remember a lot of hype around White Diamonds by Elizabeth Taylor. The ads were spectacular. I checked out a tester and sickening sweet. Yuck!! Stomach churning.
Weirdly I discovered niche and love a lot of them.
I don’t really buy into hype – I live a blissfully ignorant life free of most social media influence, LOL.
Did not like Le Labo Santal 33 at all, it was very one dimensional on me and Tom Ford I could take or leave in equal measure. I tried F**king Fabulous and it’s… different.
Jo Malone is either love or hate, there seems to be no middle ground for me – LOVE Grapefruit, Oud & Bergamot, Vetiver & Golden Vanilla, Jasmine Sambac & Marigold, Red Roses, DESPISE Iris & White Musk (I’m a fan of white musk generally but this is awful), Pomegranate Noir, Wood Sage & Sea Salt and all the orange/lime blossom ones are just sickly sweet.
I saw absolutely no hype around Floral St fragrances, but I really enjoyed the tester pack I bought, Ylang ylang Espresso was an unexpected surprise, Chypre Sublime was GORGEOUS and I’m still trying to get my hands on Arizona Bloom… I can’t explain it but Neon Rose actually does smell like neon 🙂
Byredo – Bal D’Afrique and Velvet Haze are stunning, Blanche is REVOLTING and G*psy Water is racist and I’m ambivalent about the actual fragrance, so.
MM I have mixed feelings on, most of them I don’t get excited about and I was VERY apprehensive about Music Festival, given that I react very badly to cannabis but I actually loved that one the most. Wanted to Love Under the Lemon Tree because I tend towards citrus over florals but it was just meh.
Amusingly, they released a holiday box here with 10x 30mL fragrances and a little booklet thing but it was extortionately priced considering you could buy all the individual fragrances for HALF of what they were charging and they got dragged hard for that. I don’t know if it was a genuine error or they were trying to pull a fast one on rich gullible folks but I lost a lot of respect for them as a brand. 2 weeks later the box was down to $990, which is still ridiculous.