These are my favourite perfumes. The list may change slightly over the years to come, but given that the fragrances that I feel have come to define me are ones that have remained firm favourites of mine over almost twelve years of collecting (and curation), I don’t anticipate too much movement.
Why favourite? How favourite? Some of the reasons are rational and objective (a sort of recognition of ‘best in class’ on technical or boundary-defining grounds), while others form that rare, mutually exclusive bond between head and heart. If I am to honour the original aim of this blog and – finally – ‘take one thing off’, then, in the context of a theoretical declutter, these are the 50 fragrances that would remain. The rest, though I would mourn them, are not essential to me.
Note that these are perfumes I really love. I either wear them a lot or think about if I am not wearing them. My choices are the result of years of wearing and curating, with much thought given to the reasons why I love them. They are loosely ranked here in order of preference, and mostly (but not always) correlate to their frequency of wear. Also, whether deliberate or not, I realize that the perfumes I have put on the top 50 list are mostly perfumes that I can still buy, in one form or another – reformulation, like death and taxes, are inevitable, but in all but a few cases, I am confident of being able to wring joy out of wearing these perfumes even if in semi-bastardized form. For me, it is about the spirit of a perfume in the most Catholic sense – if that lives on, then the nuances of what changed where and when don’t really matter.
Some caveats. First, I will talk about my favourite oils and attars separately – these occupy a different scent category for me entirely. Second, I may follow this series with a list of 25 ‘runners up’ to talk about the perfumes that, while they didn’t make the top 50, are still beloved by me and would be greatly missed if I didn’t have them. Third, there are many standout perfumes that didn’t make the list purely because I categorize them separately in my head as ‘rare artisan’ or ‘indie’ perfumes that tend to be small batch, limited run, or now mostly unobtainium (to me at least). These I will rank and talk about in a later post.
No. 1. Shalimar (Guerlain)
Full review here. My true north. Golden, smiling, beatific Shalimar. The Ur oriental, mother of all ambers, the original leathery vanilla before leathery vanillas were a twinkle in anyone’s eye. To be generous, here I include not only the multiple versions and flankers of Shalimar but also the many perfumes she has spawned or inspired. And since Shalimar seems to be a bottomless pool of inspiration, there are a lot of relatives to invite to a family reunion. Therefore, gather round, you cocoa-drenched, musky Lei (Mazzolari), the cosmetic powdered and salty-skinned version that is you, Kohl de Bahrein (SHL Parfums), oh and also you, Opus 1144 (Filippo Sorcinelli), you Baroque-scaled, Italianate bastard spawn of L’Heure Bleue and Shalimar. You can definitely join in, Musc Ravaguer (Malle), as can you two, the candied orange blossom variant that is Kashnoir (Olfattive Studio) and the leathery incense richness of Le Lion (Chanel). I love any and all versions of Shalimar, whether produced by Guerlain or someone else.
No. 2. Mitsouko (Guerlain)
Full review, or more accurately, incoherent ramblings here. Spiced, unripe peaches over a bed of inky, slightly bitter-musty mosses and polished ambery woods. A dark and moody counterpart to the golden, giving warmth of Shalimar. I respect Mitsouko because it is a perfume that refuses to make it easy for the wearer to lean into it. I love Mitsouko because wearing it makes me feel gloriously like someone whose field of fucks to give has long grown barren. When Socrates said that a ‘life unexamined was not worth living’, he hadn’t conceived of introverts for whom this simply isn’t true, and who find their perfumed misanthrope soulmate in Mitsouko. Like many people, Mitsouko is my personal benchmark for the chypre genre. This means that I often think, ‘Well, this is great – but do I like it better than Mitsouko?’. The answer is invariably ‘no’.
No. 3. Shaal Nur (Etro)
Shaal Nur is my third most worn perfume after Shalimar and Mitsouko. I love it for its buoyantly bright, Italian treatment of materials that can be brackish or dour. The opening is decidedly masculine, all lemon and vetiver root, associating with a pinch of herbes de provence and the citrusy-peppery complexity of rosewood. The effect is brisk and pleasantly bitter, an artisanal herbal lemonade whipped into a sparkly powder by the benzoin and opoponax. Over time, the slightly cream-toffee-ish warmth of opoponax note tamps down the prickly sharpess of the pepper. Remarkably, there is no smoke, no dark shadows lurking here – you lift one of ETRO’s paisely silks to the sun and see the light streaming through. That’s what wearing Shaal Nur feels like, for me.
No. 4. Borneo 1834 (Serge Lutens)
Borneo 1834 never fails to trigger a swell of emotion in me. Its dark, musty, camphorous opening reminds me of the day I bought it – a blustery day in Rome, walking in dark streets before they turned the streetlamps, still slightly drunk from the wine indulgently but unwisely ordered at lunch. The cocoa note here is the dust soldered off a black block of 97% chocolate, turned greenish at the edge by either mold or galbanum resin. It reminds me of the shut-up rooms and papers in my childhood home, a decrepit old thing built originally as a forge the year the Irish Famine began in 1845. My mum, a teacher, kept all her school papers and homework in a study, where it was left to gently decay over the years. Borneo 1834 smells powerfully of this noble rot – greenish-blackish spots of damp colonizing reefs of forgotten papers. An emotionally intense experience that I can’t imagine ever tiring of.
No. 5. Cuir de Russie (Chanel)
Full review here. I grew up riding horses, and because I came from poor, we’re talking the kind of horses that represent the cold, hard wheels of commerce in Ireland – racing – rather than the more genteel sports of hunting or dressage. By thirteen, I was spending my weekends riding out barely broken, jittery thoroughbreds along the golden sands of a near-by beach which was, cooincidentally, later used to film the D-Day landing scenes in Saving Private Ryan. Cuir de Russie smells horsey, vaguely dirty/sweaty in a clean sort of way, creamy Camay soap, warm horse flank, and the underside of English leather saddles freshly lifted off a horse who has run five kilometres up and down a beach in County Wexford, Ireland. No more, no less. I can’t imagine what secret recipe or magic is employed to get ylang, rose, iris, and birch tar to form the shape of a horse. But just like with sausages or laws, best not to enquire as to how, precisely, they are made.
No. 6. Bois des Iles (Chanel)
Bois des Iles is the first Chanel I ever tried that had that human warmth that I appreciate in the older Guerlains, and the first time I ever thought of a Chanel perfume as sensual. Though I am generally unbothered by the whole ‘reformulation’ conversation, this is one of the Les Exclusifs that suffered greatly when moved to the eau de parfum formulation in 2016. What it gained in volume and creaminess, it lost in that harsh, aldehydic sparkle that made it smell so vivid, like a slice of dark European-style gingerbread violently dunked into a glass of cold, lemony Vanilla Coke. Part of the pleasure of wearing the EDT is that transition – that sudden melting away – between the bright, effervescent sherbet opening and the fatty-rosy-green-soapy creaminess of the sandalwood. Still very good in the new format, better still in the parfum, but I am very glad to have my little bottle of the EDT for when I want to experience the rush of my first taste of what I think of as the real Bois des Iles.
No. 7. Une Fleur de Cassie (Editions de Parfums Frederic Malle)
What alien flowers were felled for this fragrance I do not know, not when I first smelled it and not now either. There is a stemmy, moist quality to the flowers here – jasmine and rose first, then the gluey-cement-hay weirdness of cassie and mimosa – that feels more like the condensation from three-day-old bouquets on the inside of a florist’s fridge than a living flower itself. The gippy, stamen-y aroma feels foggy and almost industrial in a way that is odd for what I presume to be an assortment of really expensive floral absolutes. It is a strange smell, not really floral at all, and in fact it reminds me a bit of wheaten flour with a streak of decaying plant stem juice flicked on top of it. Clove and cumin add a pleasantly sweaty feel. Someone once called this ‘bodies buried in a field of flowers’ and I get that. It is the contrast between alien and natural, flowery and flour-y, lush and mealy, etc. that makes Une Fleur de Cassie special. One of the most beautiful and emotionally affective perfumes I have ever known.
No. 8. L’Air de Rien (Miller Harris)
L’Air de Rien is a perfume that I struggled with for years before finally giving in and learning to – if not love – then crave the very special thing this perfume does in marrying the ‘greasy scalp’ horror of costus to the inky, saline dust of tree moss, a hot metal spoon, a puffy plethora of unholy musks, the only neroli note in the world that doesn’t smell like citrus peel and soap, and an unsettlingly unsweet amber-vanilla. Old books and cranked up radiators at the start of winter have the same funk to them, as do the heads of children and small animals. Add clove and you edge closer to Fiore d’Ambra by Profumum Roma, another perfume that mixes the innocent with the foul until your brains scramble inside your skull. It smells like a freshly bathed human stuffed inside a three-day-old pinstripe suit, or being forced to participate in someone else’s kink for unwashed teeth. Unbearably intimate and yet utterly human in all its weirdness.
No. 9. Jicky (Guerlain)
Full review here. My fourth worn fragrance of all time. Fresh and sharp with citrus, aromatic with lavender, funky with civet, and resinous-creamy with a hay-like tonka bean. It is famously the base upon which Shalimar was later built. However, where Shalimar is smoky, ambery, and fully orientalized, Jicky is lean and sinewy – a well-worn pair of blue jeans to Shalimar’s ball gown. And you know, for a scent that is 136 years old, it has an impressive amount of hip thrust to it.
No. 10. Eau Lente (Diptyque)
Eau Lente is to opoponax what Shalimar is to golden, ambery ‘oriental’ perfumes, except with its barbershoppy vibe, it’s more Daddy than Mommy. From its vigorous loins sprang Imperial Opoponax (Les Nereides), Ligea la Sirena (Carthusia), Bengale Rouge (Papillon Perfumery) and Empire des Indes (Oriza L. Legrand). I love that opoponax is a resin that can’t decide whether it wants to be a spice or a herb, which is why Eau Lente’s searing topnote lurches wildly between the metallic, sweaty sting of clove and the aromatic camphor of bay leaf. The base reveals a rich toffee-like resinousness, with a boozy, almond butter tonality and a touch of Johnson and Johnson’s Baby Powder. It is this disjointed transition between the astringent spicy-herbal top and the almond taffy base that make it an interesting perfume to wear. A chunk of amber dunked into a cup of Old Spice. You get the honey of a resin and the soapiness of a barbershop fougère. What’s not to love?
No. 11. L’Heure Bleue (Guerlain)
The slowest of slow burns for me, L’Heure Bleue is the powdery blurple embrace into which I crawl when the world gets sharp-elbowed. It is incredibly old-fashioned and a bit too complex for its own good, so about 30% of the time, it fails to land in a manner that leaves me feeling like I am choking on chalk, bits of lace, Ms. Havesham’s wedding silks, sherbet, and globs of that bittersweet cherry-cordial scented antibiotic syrup prescribed for kids. But when it goes right, it is like sinking backwards into a billowing cloud of vanilla, balsamic powders and foamy musks into which an intensely violet floral syrup has been stirred. Spiced with a dash of breathy carnation and a rooty iris that feels like a cross-section of Knize Ten and Cuir Cannage, there’s a moment when L’Heure Bleue feels as raffish as a Caron leather. Though utlimately too frilly to be a truly me scent, I am drawn to it as a ‘cosseting’ immersive scent experience.
No. 12. Vanille (Mona di Orio)
Vanille is not only my favourite vanilla fragrance but one of my all-time favourite fragrances of all time, which is unfortunate as Mona di Orio has gone out of business and Vanille is now no more. It is an abstract representation of what a vanilla pod smells like, dry and barky, with a rummy, almost animalic topnote that hinges on a a clash of orange peel and clove. I love that it cross pollinates a pomander spice opening (reminiscent of Fendi’s Theorema and Frederic Malle’s Noir Epices) with a boozy, dark woods done Pirate style a la Lubin’s Idole, and follows it up with a long, creamy vanillic sandalwood dry down that recalls the gingerbread delights of Chanel’s Bois des Iles pure parfum, without once feeling derivative. Beautiful and satisfying from every angle.
No. 13. Vol de Nuit (Guerlain)
This is the type of green I love in perfumery. It feels like late afternoon sun going into and out of clouds over a field of clover. Its galbanum is dewy and soft, the homely smell of winter greens simmered long and slow on the stove, enlivened by the toothless bite of nutmeg. When I wear Vol de Nuit, I imagine myself shelted within the shadow cast by an oak tree in the middle of a forest. It is all softness and collapsing warmth. Oakmoss adds an inky, salty character but doesn’t dim the glow of that shimmering joinquil heart, whose scent is earthy, green-gold, and slightly animalic. I see what Luca Turin means when he says that Vol de Nuit is a boneless fragrance, because it seems to be drift, rise, and fall on one single breath. That it is neither decisively a chypre nor an ‘oriental’ but both at once makes love it even more.
No. 14. Le Parfum de Thérèse (Editions de Parfums Frederic Malle)
Everything in this perfume is is in perfect balance, and, with a whole host of tricky elements to manage – melon ripe with incipient rot, sour tangerine, salty plums, grassy vetiver, and leather – this is no small feat. The bitter tangerine tames the acqueous sweetness of the ripe melon, while the black pepper tempers the boozy purple plum. The sherbety violet note gives the perfume the lift and fizz of a Sweet Tart, a girlish note that doesn’t take away from its womanliness. Despite the white flowers, the perfume never loses that watery, citrusy, green-yellow timbre that relates it to both Diorella and Eau Sauvage by Dior. Most alluring to me, though, is the faint aroma of salt grass wafting through its structure. It brings to mind a woman reclining on the reeds after a tryst with an illicit lover. Le Parfum de Therese is the smell of her nape as she drowsily pulls her loose hair up into its habitual bun – salty droplets of moisture that have gathered there during intimacy, as well bits of crushed grass, flowers, and the imprint of her lover’s plum-stained mouth.
No. 15. Lyric Woman (Amouage)
I didn’t think very much of Lyric Woman until I spilled a sample vial of it on some paper in my office one day and was met by this most incredible aroma of real Indian sandalwood – creamy but dry, rosy but as sturdy as a table. But if the sandalwood was the hook, I stuck around for the lush rose and smoky-buttery-banana ylang, floral shapes in the air carved out and defined by the spices jostled in the air – mostly a prickly, piquant green cardamom, which gives the rose a beery-like dimension and a fiery black pepper that sharpens the custardy ylang. Luca Turin talks about a fruity-woody damascone note in Lyric Woman that turns it from a nice perfume into a masterpiece. And yes, there is a raisiny, dried plum quality to the rose that makes you think of rot at the heart of an otherwise perfect-looking apple. But the piquant cardamom and incredible sandalwood are also key players. Without them, this might be a nice fruity-woody-incense rose – with them, Lyric Woman becomes an accomplished translation of the traditional rosy-sandal attar motif of Arabian perfumery to a format more familiar to Western Europeans.
No. 16. Epic Woman (Amouage)
Stylistically an aromatic twin to Lyric, but one so entirely its own thing that I couldn’t imagine having to choose between them. Every part of Epic Woman is as satisfying as a good meal – the lip-smacking savor of kimchi leading into a meaty, smoked rose and finally a few spoonfuls of thin crème anglaise, just enough to sweeten the tongue. After much thought, I’ve come to realize that the head space Epic Woman occupies for me is the same as for Tom Ford’s Plum Japonais and YSL’s vintage Nu EDP, i.e., smoky incense perfumes with a phenomenally sour streak of flavor running through them. Epic Woman balances the hot and the sour and the sweet as masterfully as a delicate Chinese dish. There is heat from the black pepper and cinnamon, aromatics from the green pickling spices (caraway), and sourness from the soft but vinegary oud, all of which rests serenely against the sweetness of a pink rose and what feels like a mixture of powdered cinnamon and vanilla. I will never get tired of smelling this.
No. 17. Helmut Lang Eau de Parfum (Helmut Lang)
Maurice Roucel takes his Musc Ravageur out of the bedroom and into the nursery. If Musc Ravageur is lying spread-eagled in the boudoir, spilling out of its red lace teddy and trying to disguise its Adam’s apple, Helmut Lang EDP is the tender gripe-water exhalation from a baby sleeping in its cradle. The opening reminds me pleasantly of nightly bath time rituals with my children when they were small: Chicco calendula and lavender baby wash, the smell of plush cotton baby towels fresh from the drier, and the innocent smell of the skin at the nape of their necks. Helmut Lang EDP smells milky and warm and fresh and innocent to me. Later, it strikes me that the musk and vanilla is on the knife’s edge of being not-so-innocent after all. But then, I like musks that dance on that sometimes razor thin line between clean and smutty. I cannot buy this in Europe, so once my bottle’s done, I may switch to Carnicure by Marlou.
No. 18. AL02 (Biehl Parfumkunstwierke)
A spiced Jamaica Cake oriental that sits halfway between the piney mulled wine of Bois de Paradis (Parfums Delrae) and the perfumey amber of Coco (Chanel). A slice of Pierre Hermes’ famous pain d’epices made liquid. AL02’s opening mixes the hallucinogenic aromas of a pan of plums, pears, apricots, and raisins simmering in a tannin-heavy red wine with the dusty sting of cinnamon sticks and cloves. It would almost be a gourmand were it not for the aromatic bay leaf shifting beneath the stewed fruits. AL02 has the same interesting dichotomy that dried figs or prunes have, a sort of intense jamminess or stickiness combined with a bitter, leathery edge that makes it possible to eat more than one at a time without feeling sick. In the base, a creamy, almost smoky combination of vanilla and incense kind of creeps up on you, with what feels to me like a touch of ambergris. Always an interesting wear, and since I don’t like Coco, I’ve decided that AL02 is my Coco. To wit, a stone cold classic, a 10 out of 10.
No. 19. Iris 39 (Le Labo)
Full review here. Despite the advertised iris and violets, Iris 39 doesn’t smell sunlit or even particularly floral. To me, it smells like a nigh-on impenetrable wedge of industrial cement and toner ink mixed with mud-caked flower bulbs, fuzzed up at the edges with a carbolic soap (patchouli-musk) accord that wears on you like a rain-soaked wool sweater. Part of this perfume, therefore, makes me feel like a hippy who’s spent the afternoon planting out tubers in a wet garden, while the other part makes me feel like I’m getting a semi-high from hanging around the office printer while they’re changing the cartridges. I think it’s just one of those thick, murky ‘soups’ of a perfume that are vaguely resistant to analysis, like Mitsouko or Kintsugi (Masque Milano) – perfumes that are simultaneously harsh and organic. Wearing Iris 39 gives me a physical jolt akin to being so hungry for the first bite of something that, even before it’s fully tasted, your mouth waters so suddenly it’s almost painful.
No. 20. Sycomore Eau de Toilette (Chanel)
Sycomore is both velvety and dry, the richness of cool, damp, moss-covered roots mingling aimably with the aroma of a freshly lit joint. The piney fizz of the aldehydes is all agressive energy, and probably something that scared the Chanel executives, as this was later cleaned up in the eau de parfum. But, don’t you know it, it was this kinetic sparkle that gave Sycomore its witchy-green magic in the first place. The drydown of the eau de toilette, though not as creamy as the eau de parfum, still provides an adequately milky-soapy sandalwood base for the lightly peated, campire-smoky vetiver note to sink into and uncurl its toes. But the idea here was always to provide an answering softness to the slight harshness of the vetiver, rather than to pander to the modern taste for the sweet and the creamy. If No. 18 reminds me of a martini, with bitter vermouth and juicy olives pitched high enough to suck your mouth dry, then Sycomore is a cold gin and tonic. The only time I truly feel elegant is when wearing this or Mitsouko.
No. 21. Nuit de Noel (Caron)
Full review here. Unlike modern perfumes front loaded with enough legibility and immediate appeal to walk your wallet to the register, Nuit de Noel plunges you into the second cycle of Der Ring des Nibelungen, blindly trusting you know enough German to get by. The top notes are intensely bitter, full of powder, wood polish, and gray-green lichen. Soon, a soft licorice-like accord creeps in, a feature of the famous Mousse de Saxe. And it is Mousse de Saxe, a pre-made base used in the older Caron perfumes, based on anise (or fennel seed), vanillin, geranium, and isobutyl quinoline (smoky, tough leather notes) that gives Nuit de Noel its melting softness reminiscent of marrons glaces. The leather, powder, and geranium facets of the base connect Nuit de Noel to other hard-to-categorize fragrances like Habanita and Vol de Nuit. Mysterious and cool-toned, it leaves behind a lingering impression of moss, face powder, leather, and half-smoked cigarettes. This is perfume that is not just an extension of a personal grooming ritual but a statement of personality. Or intent.
No. 22. Bois d’Armenie (Guerlain)
As a long-time papiers d’Armenie afficionado, I want to say two things. First, the pleasure of papiers d’Armenie is all in the gauzy manner with which the smoke from the lit paper hangs in and on the air. Neither the benzoin resinoid itself nor its essential oil possesses this quality. When the papers, impregnated with the benzoin oil, are burned, they release into the air an accord that I imagine heaven might smell like – roasted chesnuts, sweet paper, powdered sugar, a slightly sour, fermented woodpulp, and a fine incense dust that sparkles as the light catches the mica. Second, Bois d’Armenie is the only benzoin-based fragrance in existence that manages to capture the scent of the papers on the air. Others – Benjoin Boheme, Petit Papiers, Indochine, Candy, and so on – are doughier, emphasizing the honeyed amberiness of the essential oil or the resinoid. Bois d’Armenie is not a perfect perfume, not by any stretch of the imagination. But its faults of (extreme) vagueness and quietness are also the qualities that allow it to corrall the butterfly wing-like essence of one of my favourite smells in the world into a bottle.
No. 23. Ormonde Woman (Ormonde Jayne)
For years, I wasn’t able to smell all parts of Ormonde Woman, partially due to a sensitivity to either Iso E Super or another musky material. When I smell Ormonde Woman now, though, I smell the whole forest, the sugared smoke of gingerbread crumbs thrown onto the fire, and the inky mass of woodland violets and hemlock rolled out underfoot, and Scarlett O’ Hara’s dark green velvet gown made out of curtains and fury. At heart, Ormonde Woman is a nugget of amber surrounded by tall conifers and hemlock, but its mysterious appeal can’t be explained by its notes or even how we think they all hang together. Woman is one of those perfumes you submit to, body and soul, without much hope of ever picking it apart. It took me years to be able to smell all parts of it but now when I wear Ormonde Jayne Woman now, I smell it all, and what I smell makes me breathe deep and easy.
No. 24. Timbuktu (L’Artisan Parfumeur)
It is a seemingly simple composition – dry woods, incense, vetiver, and a fruit note – but Timbuktu haunts me. My nose perceives it as simultaneously dry and juicy, smoky-bitter and sweet, dusty and earthy. Its cold, shadowed mien sets it in direct opposition to another vetiver incense favourite, Shaal Nur, above, which is sunny and extroverted. One of my brothers used to live in Chad and before the birth of my first child, he trekked out to a nearby village to buy a beautiful tablecloth that had been hand-embroidered by a cooperative of women from that village. When his thoughtful present got to me in Montenegro, all the way from Chad, I unfolded it and out of the corners of the folds fell this red, earthy dust. Whenever I smell Timbuktu, I think of this dust, and now, living in Africa myself, it feels even more evocative.
No. 25. Chypre Palatin ((Parfums MDCI)
I love Chypre Palatin with the unthinking part of my brain. As a Henry James fan, I know, on a purely intellectual level, that it is a Golden Bowl type of scent – overly grand, complex to the point of being overworked, full of moving parts clicking into place. The sort of thing you have to read with your eyes at half-mast so as to perceive its entire shape at the corner of your vision. But it feels easy to me. I slip into it with a shiver of unadulterated pleasure every time. It is one of those strange hybrids between chypre and oriental that manage to combine the formality of the former with the opulence of the latter. I smell a brief pop of sour bergamot stretched over a greyish, creamed oakmoss accord that goes on forever, and a bouquet of rich, indistinguisable flowers (gardenia, rose, iris), accords that are married to a rich vanilla and a warmly animalic castoreum in the base, ensuring that the whole thing feels comfortably sensual. Chypre Palatin is a one of the rare niche perfumes whose charms have never palled for me, despite the passage of time (a decade!) and exposure to other bloody good perfumes.
Cover Image: AI-generated.
Read more: My 50 Favourite Fragrances: Numbers 1-25
