To ask what was your first perfume and what memories it evokes?

[SmashingBIouse]

I've recently gone down a bit of a nostalgia rabbit hole, possibly because I'm turning 50 this year and I'm feeling a bit reflective. In a fit of said nostalgia I ordered a bottle of Body Shop White Musk which arrived yesterday. It was the first perfume I ever bought with money from my Saturday job in 1986 and oh my god the sucker punch of memories I was hit with when I opened the bottle! I'm 14 again and have huge hair and I tell everyone that the Smiths are my favourite band but really I prefer A-ha. I still live in my home town and I have ugly glasses and I'm starting my GSCE coursework. I'm in love with Jesse in the sixth form because he reads poetry and has a quiff but he would never notice me and anyway he's going out with one of the cool drama club girls who has a bob and smokes. She probably wears some dead exotic French perfume though, not White Musk.

I wore WM for several years and it brings back so many memories, including my first gig (obscure rock band nobody remembers)/kiss (not Jesse sadly)/drink (Taboo mixed with lemonade).

Who wants to join me on an olfactory trip down memory lane?!

(By the way White Musk is still lovely and I plan to wear it regularly!)

Apple blossom by Helena Rubenstein all of my friends had it reminds be of being so grown up being allowed to go into town shopping without an adult happy days

Givenchy Play was my first perfume. My mum bought it for me in duty free! It’s discontinued now but I still have a soft spot for citrusy scents!

Exc!amation!!

@Honeyroar

My first perfume was anäis anäis. (Unless you count a Parma violet one a neighbour gave me).

I’ve started using White Musk in the past few years as it is cruelty free. So many people recognise it.

Mine was Anais Anais too, @Honeyroar - I still like floral perfumes.

I remember how pretty the bottle was, and the smell would take me back to my university days.

@SmashingBIouse
Thanks I missed it!

Not my first perfume, but Body Shop Dewberry takes me back to when my first son was born. My sister bought me a BS basket (remember them?) for my birthday and I kept it for my hospital bag.
These were te days when you were kept in for 5 nights after having a baby, and I remember so well daring to move on day two and having a long soak in a hospital bath with Dewberry bubble bath while the nurses looked after my baby.
Those were the days - he's 29 this year and when my daughter was born just 11 years after him, it was give birth, quick shower and away you go!

@AnaVanda

My first perfume was Tramp, bought for me by my Auntie when I was about 12. Can't believe there was a perfume called Tramp!

That was mine too!! My mum used comment 'fancy calling a perfume Tramp! awful'.

I liked Tribe - the one in the pink and purple turquoise packaging
Think that would have been around 1992
Then moved on to Versace Red Jeans and Jean Paul Gaultier aged about 14 for the school discos and hanging around with boys
Then I think CK one was launched it was all the rage for a while but a bit too fresh for me , but absolutely everyone was wearing it , guys and girls

I'm 43, and have a few memories. My mum had Poison and I sometimes used to sneak some on when I was in my early teens and feel very grown up! I remember having Charlie Red and Exclamation, which I used to wear to school. My German exchange partner bought me Amarige, which I loved. I used to drown myself in it and spray it all over my school jumpers. It evokes lots of memories of a generally happy time, which was very much complicated by various boy dramas! My Granny bought me Eternity for my 18th birthday, which I adored. I had all of the black and white Calvin Klein perfume ads on my wall!

I remember Exclamation! Or Ex'cla'm'ation! Very sweet scent, funky little bottle. I definitely had that when I was about 10... then graduated to Eden by Cacharel... wore that one through most of my teens. I hated CKone and Sunflowers, which EVERYONE else had (I was a 90s teen). I also wore Omnia in my late teens/early 20s. Then the most gorgeous scent which was sadly discontinued - Theorems by Fendi. You can still find the odd bottle but it would cost hundreds of £ these days...! I hated my teenage years so even a whiff of Eden makes me depressed 😢 Would love to smell Theorema again though!

@mbosnz

Anais Anais, in the '90's, smelling it makes me remember being young and passably pretty.

Same!!

Lust by Lush. I was 21 and at uni.its a very strong jasmine. I still wear lush perfume but alternate between junk and I'm home. I have never really worn any perfume by another brand, I have no sense of smell and can't really smell other perfumes on me ..but I guess lush is so strong smelling that it's the only perfume I thought worth buying for myself.

My grandma once gave me miss Dior but I only liked the bottle. It was mostly untouched until I threw it out years later.

Gift set of Blase eau de parfum and talc. I loved it. I was 14 years old and felt so grown up. It was bought for me by my older sister and her boyfriend.

Progressed from Blase to Cabochard

My mum gave me her Diorella when I was a teen as she didn’t like it.
I still wear it and have yet to find a scent that I prefer (I turned 50 last year).

@Lemonweightloss

I loved Avons Odyssey. But I think my first proper grown up purchase was Ysatis. The best smell for me is Flex shampoo. Getting ready on a Saturday morning ( 80s teenager), going into town, hair freshly washed and donning my 80s outfit. Buying records on the market ( Depeche Mode, Soft Cell), then eating fish n chips. It wasn't long til we progessed to sitting in pubs ( probably aged 15), drinking halves of lager n Black!

Flex Shampoo!! That's a blast from the past, it smelled gorgeous

My Mum used to wear Charlie and let me occasionally put a bit on, it was in a small bottle with a foam dabber to apply, the main feeling it brings back is not liking the fact she was going out, she wasn't a party animal or anything, she only went once a week to her friends house across the road but being a kid I wanted my Mum to be in the house.

At College I wore Exclamation and that smell reminds me of many fun, drunken nights in the college bar.

Throughout my 20s I wore CK One, that smell takes me to the fantastic rock nights, dancing away and lusting after the gorgeous Tony who had hair longer than mine!

@Nanny0gg

1970s. Aqua Manda- pure orange.

Ooh that brings back memories! My elder sister had this and I used to go into her bedroom and sniff it when she wasn't there. On special occasions she would let me put a little bit on my wrists and I felt very grown up!

Not really a perfume but my friends and I used to douse ourselves in Boots Natural Collection vanilla body spray. Smells like the early 00’s 😆

LouLou takes me straight back to being at sixth form and dressing in grungy clothes, woolly tight & DM boots before heading off out to the 'alternative' night at a local dive. Smoking Marlboros lights, drinking cider and blackcurrant, dancing to Nirvana and Pearl Jam and snogging boys with long, curly hair.

MissDior or L'Air du Temps were mine in the 80s.

There was a Miss Selfridge one I loved too but can't remember for the life of me what it's called.

When I was 14 my lovely mum was given a bottle of Je Reviens for Christmas. It was a special treat from her brother to thank her for a kindness she had done for his family. I had just started to take an interest in clothes and my appearance (late starter). My mum gave me the perfume and I wore it on Saturdays meeting friends in town in the afternoon. Off and on over the years she bought it for me. It remained a favourite scent. My lovely mum died in July and my dad bought me a bottle of it for Christmas (having checked I’d like that). It reminds me of her so much. Her generosity and kindness.

Alberto Jojoba shampoo takes me straight back to the 80s. Gorgeous smell and left my hair lovely and shiny. Shame you can’t get it any more.

White musk from the body shop and heather shimmer lipstick was what all me and my friends wore at 15 ish at 17 i moved to rive gauche as Inwas obviously so more sophisticated then although the heather shimmer lasted a few more years
Also went through a phase of using body shop vitamin e cream all the time , now it seems so expensive

@LadyMacbethWasMisunderstood

When I was 14 my lovely mum was given a bottle of Je Reviens for Christmas. It was a special treat from her brother to thank her for a kindness she had done for his family. I had just started to take an interest in clothes and my appearance (late starter). My mum gave me the perfume and I wore it on Saturdays meeting friends in town in the afternoon. Off and on over the years she bought it for me. It remained a favourite scent. My lovely mum died in July and my dad bought me a bottle of it for Christmas (having checked I’d like that). It reminds me of her so much. Her generosity and kindness.

Oh this has made me quite emotional. How wonderful that you have such lovely memories (and such a thoughtful dad).

I'm sorry for your loss