A summer guide to perfume?
How can there be such a simple choice? There isn’t.
Most women I know have a love for fragrance and a particular one. Some of us wear the same scent all throughout our lives, others change with every waking mood.
My affair with perfume started at an early age and has always been very particular. I have a sensitive relationship with smell and know exactly which perfumes I like and those I don’t. Perfume is personal and I have come to understand the scent on one will not resemble the same on another; that is the beauty and the unique quality to wearing a fragrance.
Perfume becomes your own with the first spray.
How to choose the right perfume?
To choose a perfume requires trial and error. I try many and wear few. I have come to understand the notes that resonate and the mood I wish to emulate through scent. I wear florals, fragrant, natural and not heavy. They generally will be reminiscent of jasmine, tuberose and orange blossom; that is where my tastes seem to fall. I want a scent to keep me guessing or to remind me of a precious memory; I don’t wish to be overwhelmed or for the perfume to be stronger that I feel.
Perfume is not a fashionable buy but a considered one.
How to wear perfume?
I like to wear perfume the French way. I dab a little behind the wrists and the rest I spray in front and walk through. This way, the body is cloaked evenly. I have come to look forward to this ritual as part of my dressing and it is always my final step in getting ready for an occasion.
I was shown this method years ago in an Annick Goutal store in Paris, on the rue Castiglione and I have never forgotten.
I have 5 favourite summer fragrances; I wear them all and I love them equally. Perhaps Gardenia Passion and Fleur d’Oranger hold a little edge in my heart but I spray them all evenly and often.
Do you have a summer fragrance of choice? xv
A Summer Guide To Perfume
route du thé // chai de robert piguet // escentric molecules 01 // gardenia passion // fleur d’oranger
image, serge lutens
