Only positive thinking today: we have enough negativity from all over the World, so let’s think of something nice and pleasant, even if slightly melancholic.
Saturday Question #37:
What Perfumes Do You Associate with Your Loved Ones?
Are there any perfumes that always remind you of one of your parents, grand-parents, siblings, close friends, etc.? We’re talking only about positive associations here, so please no evil stepmothers that killed the otherwise brilliant LBEV for you!
Name just one or all of them (well, unless your cool aunt was/is a perfumista) and tell us whether you like those perfumes. Do you own them? Do you wear them?
My Answer
I’m in a slight disadvantage here since it’s my perfume blog where I tell perfume-related stories, so in all the years I’ve already told most of the stories closely connected to people in my life (but not all yet – can you believe it?!). And many of you had previously read those stories and even commented on them. But I’ll link to the older posts for those who is newer to my blog or has missed my previous 10 linking back.
Those of you who read NST daily threads might have thought that this topic was brought by this week’s CP – Nostalgia Friday (“wear something that takes you back to a happy moment in your childhood”), but no. I’ve been so busy this week that the first time I read about the topic was only this morning. The CP just coincided with my Grandma’s “would-have-been-100” birthday on November 3rd. In her honor that day I wore my life-long perfume love – Lancome Climat, which she wore and to which she has introduced me when I was a child. I wrote about that connection four years ago in the post The Sillage of Rosa. I still love, own and wear this perfume.
The second perfume I want to mention is Dior Diorella. While the story I published almost 10 years ago First Love: Love (the title was a logical continuation to the title of my very first post on the blog – First Love: Perfume dedicated to the above-mentioned Climat) was about my childhood crush, I associate Diorella with my mom, from whom I got that perfume without asking permission to scent the “love note” to my future first boyfriend. Last week, thinking philosophically about the blessing of childhood selfishness and self-centeredness, I remembered that episode and wore Diorella thinking of my late mother and trying to evaluate whether, as an adult, I sufficiently “paid back” for the childhood shenanigans. I hope I did… but of course I wish I could had done more. I never loved Diorella, but I like it and wear once or twice a year.
Undina's Looking Glass 
Hey there Undina,
YAY I’m first!
Mum wore quite a few fragrances over the years but Shalimar, Samsara, CHANEL No 5 and Giorgio are the ones I most remember as hers.
Dad wore Tabac Original
Jin wears Bottega Veneta and Bombay Bling to great effect.
Kath mainly wears Queen and Tommy Girl
Phil is a Cool Water guy
Alice wears Coco and Tendre Poison
Aunty Tracey is Ellie Saab Le Parfum
That’s all I can remember right now.
Portia xx
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I see that you have your loved one well-mapped on perfume terrain :)
I presume you like most (if not all) of these perfumes. But do you wear any of them?
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Yes, I wear almost all of them semi regularly. The only ones I don’t really wear are Tendre Poison, Cool water, Tommy Girl and Bombay Bling. I have them all in the collection but they very rarely get a spritz.
Portia xx
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Mom wears Dana Tabu, her signature scent. I wear it once in while.
My youngest sister wears Givenchy Ysatis, her signature scent. I don’t wear it because I don’t like it, but it smells great on her.
My ex-husband wears Perry Ellis 360 for Men. It smells amazing on him and I own a mini just for nostalgic reason.
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I approached Ysatis more then once after reading someone’s praises to it, but it never smelled even pleasant to me. I haven’t smelled it though on anybody else, so I guess it might smell great on other people.
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My mother wore Cinnabar and sometimes Ma Griffe, my grandma had a bottle of Uralt Lavendel, which she rarely wore. And an artist, is was madly in love wore Aramis Devin. I still get nostalgic, but nobody seems to wear this now.
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I recognize the first two names only, but I’ve never smelled even them. Have you tried to find them? Are they expensive, just rare or completely unavailable?
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I got both as vintage bottles, Ma Griffe is a very bitter chypre and js often cheap on the *bay. Vintage Cinnabar is harder to find, the actual version is very tame. Both are not my style.
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Undina, I love that photo of your mother — so beautiful! I’ve recently become acquainted with Diorella and I like it VERY much. My own mother mostly wore Chanel No. 5, but I remember her also having Opium, Norell, White Linen. She also bought the original Poison when it first came out, but quickly decided it wasn’t for her and gave me the bottle (I was in my 20s). It wasn’t really me either, but I felt very sexy wearing it!
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My mom was very attractive. When I look at her pictures from when she was young, she reminds me of actresses from those times.
I understand the sentiment with Opium :) I wonder: have you ever worn it since then?
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My mother wore Perfumers Workshop Tea Rose. I remember being with her at Marshall Fields in Chicago when she bought it. For a little girl from small town Iowa shopping there was very glamorous – tea room, food hall and all. I still have her bottle (she passed in 2011) which I don’t wear but pull out to sniff from time to time.
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I love this story – it’s as if I’m watching an old movie. I wonder for how long the B&M stores survive. The way it goes, in several years we’ll be trying things on virtually, getting them delivered by drones on a monthly subscription base. Or will mostly wear CG outfits for Zoom meetings ;)
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Wow! Your mom was GORGEOUS! Since this question is about perfume association with loved ones, I will say that I have no perfume associations with my mom as she was a scent-phobe and as for dad, he was an Old Spice man although e pretty much stopped using it when I was in my teens. I have an aunt who went overboard with many things, one of which was accumulating perfumes which she kept in a full-size refrigerator dedicated to perfumes and make-up 😍.
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WOW at your aunt keeping full sized fridge full of perfume and make up X
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I see… So, my joke about an aunt was too close to home, so to speak :)
Since I know that you have good relationships with your siblings, I’ll assume that none of them wears perfumes. I wonder how you got to be that different from your family when it comes to perfumes.
You’re right: my mother was very beautiful. I wish I had more pictures of her.
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My great aunt wore White Linen, which I can’t stand. Mom wore Jovan Musk and wears Alfred Sung now (also don’t like). Dad wore stuff only on holidays, usually Brut or Old Spice or Bath & Body. But I wore Raghba when he died and associate it now with him. He did not like it!!! LOL. An ex from high school wore Fahrenheit. I still think of him when I smell or wear it.
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I remember liking Brut years ago… I wonder if it still smells the same Fahrenheit has been reformulated so many times that I don’t remember any more how it smelled when I smelled it first. I wonder: do you still recognize the current version?
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It is a pale shadow of its former self. I have the vintage.
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My mom did not wear perfume, but she used a Charles of the Ritz moisturizer with a rosy violet scent that I recall. My only perfume wearing relative (yes, my family is boring!) was my fabulous aunt Ruby who always had drawers of red underwear (scandalous in the 50’s and 60’s!) and wore Dana Tabu. I always have a bottle of vintage Tabu to remember her by. I have wonderful memories of shopping with her and going out to lunch in the city. She didn’t drive so we would take the city bus downtown to shop and dine. It was a big adventure for a country girl like me. Even if the ‘big city’ was Knoxville, Tennessee…
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Your aunt sounds like a cool aunt every girl should have :)
I’m not sure I’ve ever smelled Tabu, but I know that it used to be very popular.
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I wish I have had an aunt like her, mine were boring
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I am really enjoying this thread :) Your mom was a stunning woman-her hair is so beautiful. I think we probably all idolize our moms a bit-mine was stunning too. She had a slender build, and she reminded me of Audrey Hepburn-but with he sensuality of Sophia Loren’s face. My mom loved Je Reviens (and she chose arpege for me-sorry to keep repeating my stories:)). Later she loved some of the things I bought her-24, Faubourg, and Jo Malone’s 154, which smelt divine on her. We shared my Carons and at first she thought participating in slips was a terrible idea but then she smelled Poivre, which reminded her of a glamorous women she idolized, and she lost her mind over En Avion. My younger brother loves Sisley’s Eau de Campagne, and Bigarade Concentree. One year I bought him Aube Pashmina and he keeps asking me to buy him more :) I work with my father and he’s a very very good sport about trying fragrances-he loves everything. Hermes Rhubarb Ecarlart, Xeryus , and Mona Di Orio’s Dojima is fantastic on him. And one man I worked with who was probably the kindest person I ever met wore Brut, so now Brut has a special place in my heart. My mom’s mother wore lots of glam fragrances-when Opium came out my uncle was in Spain and he brought it back for her. She liked it but was concerned it was a bit vulgar. I once tried some Bois des Iles and was stunned to feel like she was right next to me-my aunts say they don’t thing she wore it-they don’t remember it, ever. So it’s my very own scented ghost story.
Whew-sorry for talking so much. for me perfumes and the people I love are closely related and I cannot stop talking about them. I hope everyone has a great weekend :)
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I loved your stories, please never feel like you need to limit yourself!
As to repeating anything, believe me, you’ll need to mention something 4-5 times before most people would remember that you’ve previously talked about it… maybe :)
I thought it was quite an unusual perfume ghost story. It’s amazing how scent memories can transform in our heads.
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Carole has nailed the precise resemblance of your gorgeous mother to film stars…I was hovering around Bardot / Britt Ekland / Ursula Andress but a mix of Hepburn and Loren is better.
Well, I think my mum (who like your grandmother would have been 100 this year too!, making me feel very old…;)) may have worn Lentheric Tweed, but I am not sure. She had the talc for sure. And when she died I found a bottle of Opium in her wash bag, but have no idea if she wore that either. I would have thought I’d have noticed!
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I can see the resemblance to these stars as well!
My loved ones generally didn’t/don’t wear perfumes, so there aren’t many that I would recognize and associate with someone. A good friend in my teens wore Chanel Allure all the time, in heavy doses, so I think of her every time I smell it randomly (but a few times now, I’ve thought I smelled it only to ask and have everyone around deny it!)
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These days many perfumes copy other perfumes or just have something in common that seems similar when you compare from memory (but in side-by-side comparison it would have been clear that those perfumes are different).
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Interestingly, I’ve never thought about my mother looking like an actress – probably because when I was little I couldn’t mentally do an identikit :), whereas my father had a strong resemblance to one actor famous in my native country, and I even heard stories about him being mistaken for that actor (not sure if those were family legends or reality). But mom was very attractive indeed (and had me when she was quite young – so, your mom’s age gives only approximate measure of your age ;) ).
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Your pictures are beautiful. And that Climat is a treasure.
I associate my mum with Molyneaux Fete and Paloma Picasso and her sister wore Ma Griffe. My dad was a fan of Sergio Soldano for man perfume. My grandma wore the classic 4911 cologne. Though none of the mentioned perfumes are among my favourites, they bring back cozy and lovely memories.
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Thank you, Neva. From time to time I decided to release some of the pictures of my relatives who lived in pre-Internet times into the universe: it can’t harm them in any way, but their images would stay “out there” even if the paper pictures would disappear.
I think it’s great to be able to connect nice scent memories with people we love.
I think I could wear Paloma Picasso. Not familiar with other perfumes you mentioned though.
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My mom is 94 and has lost her sense of smell in the last couple of years, but she still wears Organza, because “the PSW’s at her nursing home like it.” When I was little, she wore Evening in Paris and I expect that if I were to smell it now it would bring back a flood of memories.
My first husband and the father of my children wore Eau Sauvage, and I keep his last bottle in the drawer of the armoire for whenever the kids and I are overwhelmed by missing him. Scent is so evocative.
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Thank you for sharing, ScentSpirit. I agree: scents are very powerful memory conductors, that’s why we should be very careful with our favorite perfumes when we’re sick (or in other unpleasant circumstances).
I like it that your mom still wears perfumes, even if she herself cannot enjoy it. My Grandma wore perfumes almost until the end, and it pleased me that I could send her a gift of perfume from time to time.
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Scent Spirit, There ‘s a wonderful film with Catherine Deneuve and Gerard Depardu. They play former lovers, and when they meet up again they hug, and the CD character inhales deeply, like she hasn’t taken a proper breath in years. “You still use Eau Sauvage” she says. It”s nice you and your children have a way to still connect with your husband.
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