The power of smell

[BeADinosaur]

This is completely self indulgent, but if I say this to anyone in real life they will think I'm insane, so please MN, indulge me for tonight!

For my birthday today, I got a bottle of my favourite perfume from my teens/twenties. My best friend and I used to wear it liberally on every night out (which was about 4 times a week!) for years.

It's fairly expensive (for me) so I haven't bought it for years. I put it on tonight after my shower and oh my god.

It smells exactly like I remember. But it also smells of drunken nights out and hangovers. Of dancing and bad decisions. It smells like my favourite high heels that had a sparkly dragonfly on and the pleated denim mini skirt I wore until it literally disintegrated.

It smells like pre-drinks at my best friend's house and walking home in the rain because we drank our cab fare home. It smells like I was 19 and had never heard of tax deductibles and pensions were something for old people.

I'm a lifetime away from that 19 year old, but just for a second, I was her again and it was oddly, overwhelmingly, moving.

The moment was broken by the teen and the cat fighting over pringles, but I never expected a perfume to bring on such a strong emotional reaction!

Please can you tell me your 'smells bringing back memories' moments so I don't feel like a complete weirdo having an emotional breakdown because of perfume!

(As a side note, I'm not going to say what perfume it is, mainly because I don't want people commenting 'oh that perfume is awful' or 'you call that expensive? My perfume is £4500 a bottle' and burst my happy bubble!)

Atrixo hand cream. One sniff of it and I'm back in my grandparents' house...

My mum has worn 3 perfumes on rotation for forever. I am fortunate that she is very much alive and kicking but whenever I get a whiff of them as someone wearing it walks passed me it reminds me of her. I'm comforted by the fact that when she dies (hopefully a long time in the future) that it will remind me of her.

Oh, also blue Nivea, my nan applied it twice a day and sends me straight back to sleepovers at her house as a child, sat playing cards with her at the kitchen table with a hot chocolate.

I have lots of perfumes, but CK Eternity will always be my favourite. I wore it for both of my kids weddings years ago, and it brings it all back to me when I smell it

There's a perfume that only old ladies wear and every so often I'll catch someone wearing it. It takes me back to being really young 4-7ish and feeling safe and content. I have no idea who wore it, guessing a teacher or childminder and I have no idea what it is because the only random old lady I was brave enough to ask couldn't remember as she has so many! I only catch it every few years.

Lynx Africa - teenage/young adult boy bedrooms. Less said the better.

I bought a cedar wood and pine candle this Christmas and it smelt exactly like Christmas when I was a kid because my parents insisted on a real tree. It was exactly the same and took my right back.

My mum always wore Chanel no 5 when they were going out so to me it’s the scent of my mum looking really young and pretty in a nice dress kissing me goodnight before going somewhere with my dad.

I love scent memories. For my wedding day I chose a specific scent so it would always remind me of the day (it does)

Also sometimes you just get hit with a smell that brings back an immediate memory. Castrol x engine oil is the smell of my dad as he used to race cars. I went into the loo at my son’s school and was immediately taken back to my infant school. The smell of honeysuckle is going to bed on a summer evening while it’s still light and hearing birds and distant lawn mowers as there was a bush under my bedroom window.

The smell of jasmine is when I first moved to Sydney, kind of excited and nervous at the same time.

The final one is New West - the scent of turning 15, I went to America and had an amazing holiday and kind of realised that soon I’d be a grown up and get to do loads of things without having to ask anyone. Wish I could find that scent again!

Coco Chanel, I wore it throughout my twenties. Reminds me of the 90s.

It's hard to describe but there's a certain bathroom smell of soap and damp that reminds me of my grandmother's house.

Fresh cut grass reminds me of summers as a child.

The smell of fairy lights on a real fir tree. Reminds me of Christmas as a child.

Love this @BeADinosaur and could see 2 friends enjoying their 19 year old life ❤️

For me, it’s my mums fave perfume that takes me right back! She passed 25 years ago but I smelt it on someone recently and cried inside

smell is soooo emotive and powerful!

Shalimar is my mum and Mitsouko is New York in the early 2000s.

Me too!

I feel the way you do about Lancǒme Miracle. It’s a wonderful feeling but also makes you ache to live in that time again.

Lacoste Touch of Pink…reminds me of university days, discovering hair straighteners, thinking 4 hours of lectures was a heavy day…

one of my best friends moved away years ago and every now and again someone walks past wearing her perfume; I always turn. It transports me to the best time of my life; young, happy and beautiful.

Lancôme O de L’Orangerie takes me straight back to my wedding day. One whiff and I’m back in the room getting ready with my bridesmaids. It’s discontinued now and I have none left. I’m gutted as I really eked my last bottle out.

I've had that reaction from plants

There's a shrub in the local park that smells a bit like curry (?). Odd I know

But when I smell it I am transported back over 60 years to being a toddler again..
It must have been in the garden at home.

Cider and/or blackcurrant. After several pints of the stuff as a student, and having projectiled it all up out of a car window in front of the lad I fancied, the mere smell of either makes me want to puke with shame. I still can’t eat forest fruits or red/black sweets, almost 30 years later.

Omg I love this. Mine is strawberries and champagne cream from Victoria secret.
My old school friend used to wear it. Her family lived in Florida- we were at boarding school here.
So every summer I used to visit her in Florida from the age of 17-25 and my god the fun we had. The clubs, the beach, pool parties, long night drives with the windows down and the warm air blowing. The meals out the theme parks, I could go! It was the absolute happiest time of my life and I mourn for it.
I bought the cream on my last trip and I still have it. I don't wear it as it's quite a strong smell but every now and again I'll smell it and I'm taken right back. Oh the nostalgia 😩

@Ozgirl76 - New West was my absolute favourite. I used to buy it from Debenhams - then they discontinued it.
I searched for it recently, and someone had commented on another forum that a good dupe was Bulgari Aqua (or the weird spelling they use).
DH brings freebie smellies back from long haul flights, and there was a tiny bottle in his flight bag. It's not quite right, but it's the closest I've come across.

By the way, it was the Aqua (for men)

I walked into a shop in a little village in Devon a few miles away from where we live and it smelled exactly like my uncles shop in a different part of Devon did in the 80s when I was a young teen and spent all my holidays there. It was the mix of the off licence smell of alcohol, the fresh fruits and veg.

It took me right back almost like a physical thing. Memories of my parents being alive, the great holidays we had staying there above my uncles shop.

Wright's coal tar soap - the smell I most associate with my maternal grandparents' house and the wonderful times I had there.

Creosote - an evocative smell reminding me of helping my dad creosote his chicken houses every summer.

Hot roofing felt in the sun - lying on top of dad's pigeon loft, every sunny day, reading my book, in those long ago, halcyon days of early teenagerhood.

So many memories!

I wore Clinique Happy on my gap year.

Bought a bottle on a whim at an airport a few years later and when I sprayed it I was right back at a beach party in Mexico, high on MDMA, hooking up with a hot Israeli guy.

So I know what you mean.

Vanilla extract reminds me of the vanilla perfume the Body Shop used to make. My best friend used to cover herselfuse it when we were trying to hang around boys as teens.

What a lovely thread!

The smell of Wrigleys original gum brings me back to a summer when I was 16. A group of us would buy a family bus & rail ticket for a fiver and spend the day at the seaside. We could have a great time with just a couple of pound, and had no worries.

When we were house hunting I nearly put an offer on a completely unsuitable bungalow because it smelled like my grandma's house. The smell of Persil, age, and cleanliness, a house where everything in it was old, but carefully looked after.

I was given some Body Shop White Musk for my 40th, took me straight back to the 90’s!
The smell of bacon and eggs frying reminds me of my nan cooking breakfast, especially the mornings I got up early so it was just the two of us. There’s also a smell that reminds me of the cupboard at my grandparents home where the board games and jigsaws lived, not really musty or damp, maybe just cardboardy.