Your perfume heartwrenchers: smells from another time

[GoldfishParade]

I'd like a thread about two types of perfume:

• The ones you wore "back when" that you can't smell without feeling your heart wrench, and
• The ones that were pulled. RIP, favourite fragrances.

Mine:

• That turquoise Ralph Lauren one. I was 14 and my gran bought it for me as my very first perfume. I remember loads of us wore it as young teens.
• Anna Sui Classic: I remember my mum gave this to me one christmas maybe when I was 16 or 17, but the scent of it now is just beyond my reach. I'm tempted to buy a bottle just as a reminder.
• JPG Classique: I bought this for myself aged 19 when I emigrated and got my first grown up job. I cant smell it without being taken back to the girl I once was.
• Next came a few trashy Cacharel perfumes: Amor Amor and Scarlett. I was 21 or 22, carefree, working in the south of france. I like how back then I just chose what smelled good to me, without thinking about effect or complexity or anything.
• Heure Bleu: when I was a child, my best friends house smelled of something, something sweet and comforting. It wasnt until I was in a perfume shop three years ago and smelled this that it hit me in the heart. Her mother must have worn this perfume. I smelled my wrist as I walked home, the power of the memory was overwhelming.

My RIP favourites:

• Sicily by Dolce and Gabbana: I thought this smelled amazing, glossy and quite glamorous but not aggressive. Why the hell did they pull it?! And they said they were bringing it back, so where is it?!
• Love Chloe: this was quite a weird little perfume. It was somehow rice-like but also not sweet. I loved it. As usual they put it out there for 3 years or something and then pulled it, replacing it with some other sweet floral thing.

My mum wore Clinique aromatics elixir. She died 20 years ago, I still have a bottle of it that she had. Every few years I dig it out and give it a spray, it takes me right back.

My perfume became Chanel 19 as soon as I met it. Doesn't smell the same now (think it's been redone) but I stick with it as the new one is better than nothing. Sigh.

I also loved Sinan (first found it in a free sample in Marie Claire). There's an Agent Provocateur perfume that is pretty similar (or at least similar in my memory of it).

Charlie - my older cousin wore it
Anais Anais and Rive Gauche , whilst my mum and aunties wore Estée Lauder Youth Dew and White Linen - which puts my teeth on edge!
I wore amy 'signature' Ysatis and the Poison (still love it but my DH said it made him feel sick)
Moved on to Obsession (that gives me a headache)

Tommy Girl
Escada
Charlie Red
Body Shop White Musk and Dewberry
Various Exclamations

Ghost Deep Night reminds me of a friends wedding approx 15 years ago and I love it

Mens Cool Waters? Reminds me of my first boyfriend

Armani Diamonds makes me sick literally from my first pregnancy

Anais Anais reminds me of my Mam

Tresor - Back in the 80s I used to love it and would wear every day.
It's too heavy for my liking now and gives me a headache.

Aqua de gio reminds me of travelling the world and Christmas in Australia. One of the happiest smells ever. They discontinued it. The bastards.

Aramis reminds me of an on/off boyfriend I had for years. I was sure we would end up together. I last saw him on Boxing Day 1990 and never saw or heard from him again. I used to wear Cinnabar - you could probably smell us coming before you saw us.

My Mum used to wear Hartnell In Love. My Dad wanted to buy her Chanel no. 5 but it was too expensive!

Nostalgic: Youth Dew; Samsara; Chloe; Obsession; Poison; Wrappings; Sun Moon and Stars; l'Eau d'Eden; Chaos; Black Cashmere

Heart hurts: Magie Noire; Blue Grass; Cristalle; l'Aimant; Escape; Tresor; Azuree; Aromatics.

Lovely thread

Anais Anais first proper purfume age 14

Rafinee and Ysatis in my teens.

Chanel No. 5 - my grandma gave me the empty bottle when she had finished it. It smelt so sophisticated and grown up.

Anais Anais - this probably dates me precisely, but my first boyfriend bought me this for my first Christmas with him. Up to then, I had never worn perfume.

The main scent that has the power to catapult me immediately back in time is not a perfume, but the smell of Alberto VO5 green apple shampoo.
Cue song from Radio Caroline chart show:
'Alberto VO5 brings your hair alive
And leaves it shiny, shiny, shiny as an apple
Oh yeah.
With that crazy apple smell,
VO5 cleans extra well
And leaves hair shiny, shiny, shiny
as an apple
Oh yeah'.
I currently have a Sainsbury's apple shampoo which has a faint echo of that tart apple smell, but it is not the same. It takes me back to a summer day in France in the hot summer of 1977, in a garage, looking out to a lunch table being set under an almond tree for my birthday, and recognizing that I was perfectly happy at that moment.

@MarthasGinYard Cross post and snap! Except I was 15.

And that first boyfriend wore Hai Karate aftershave. Thankfully discontinued for about 40 years, although I loved it at the time.

Tabu, by Dana, thanks to this thread I've just ordered some! It's MY perfume, I've been in situations with people I've not seen for 20/30 years and they've told me I smell exactly the same.
Aramis circa 1975, worn by my brother. I'll never forget him and this takes me back instantly to a better time.
Givenchy for men, 1985 and the man who broke my heart.
Cacharel pour homme. DH, when we first met. Love them all.

Gucci Rush and Hugo Boss Deep Red remind me of uni
Chanel No 5 reminds me of my darling Grandmother who asked for her bottle when she was in hospital at the end of her 99 years.
I still mourn Gucci Envy. My dad took me into Gucci on 5th Avenue in 1997 when I was 16 and bought me my first bottle of it. I wore it constantly and my first boyfriend by coincidence wore the men's version.

@BestIsWest

Aqua Manda -Christmas as a young teenager. Oddly my dog smells of it if I sniff him closely, an orange peel scent.

Poison - I never wore it myself but it always makes me think of lunchtime shopping in David Evans in Swansea with my friend from the office who loved it. It will always make me think of her.

Diorella - my husband bought me this and I wore it for years. It’s what I wore on our wedding day. Sadly doesn’t smell the same any more.

An aftershave - Dior’s Jules. Long gone from these shores but DH wore it for years and I loved it.

I’ve found the vintage stuff on eBay. Lovely!

Unpleasant perfumes for me are lavender based after being pg with DS (who is now 20) I still cannot smell it without my stomach gripeing

Scents from days gone by - Nirvana Impulse . All my mates wore it when we went out .
Liz Earle 15 is pretty near in smell if I wanted a nostalgia hit

I had BodyShop Al-Sabah oil

RIP was a M&S Formula one . Oval shaped frosted clear glass bottle then they changed to a tall cylindrical frosted bottle ..then it went

I have some perfumes , but I really don't wear them.
Maybe this will be my New Month Resolution?

When I was nearly a teen we all wore It! By lentheric. It probably smelled vile, but it was the parfum du jour for my friends and me!

In my later teens I wore poison.

In my 20’s I loved Eternity. I couldn’t wear it now, but it has great memories.

L’instant by Guerlain always takes me back to the first holiday I had as a single Mum - we toured northern France and I bought it in Galeries Lafayette in Paris
RIP Estée Lauder Brasil Dream - always reminds me of summer - can still buy occasionally on eBay
RIP poison tendre in the green bottle

Givenchy - Hot Couture.

Would be far too strong and sweet for me these days. My friend once bought a bottle and wore it on a night out, she bumped into my ex who said “where’s QueenOfPain, I can smell her”.

@QueenOfPain

You might be surprised...I also used to wear that and bought a bottle just for nostalgia. I was really surprised to find it smellt much more sophisticated than I remembered. It's actually a beautiful perfume IMO

Fendi Theorema - heaven! I still have a third of a bottle, which I am trying to make last as long as possible.

From the seventies, Yardley Sea Jade and Revlon Jontue. You can still get Jontue, or at least you could until a couple of years ago, but it doesn't smell anything like it used to. Anne Klein Blazer, with the lion's face on the label. Seventies perfumes were somehow completely different from anything you can get today. Even the cheap ones seemed to have more depth and character somehow.

I might have a bottle in my perfume drawer with a couple of last sprays in there, I’ll go and investigate later. I always save the last few sprays of any significant fragrance so I’ll always have the memories to go back to.

Yes, a really beautiful perfume and quite unique. I always get those few first notes of berries and then can’t really place the rest.

There's a gift set of Sea Jade on eBay that I've been hanging my nose over. Yardley very much underrated in the perfume department. Their "Jade" is a dead ringer for Chanel Cristalle.

@70isaLimitNotaTarget, I wore Impulse Nirvana too- my smellalike is a perfume parlour dupe of Tom Ford Sahara Noir.

I was in a store near a ski resort that specializes in old things (Vermont Country Store if you are in the US). They have a wall of old perfumes--Yardley, Tabu, Windsong, etc. I was smelling away and I picked on up and immediately started to tear up. I suddenly felt such sadness and emptiness and could not understand my visceral reaction. The perfume was about $60 and I did not love it, but my reaction was crazy. I thought maybe my mom likes that perfume. Should I buy it? I could not reach my mom (bad reception) and so I left the perfumes. As I wandered I kept coming back and I was tearing and feeling so emotional. I decided to buy the perfume because I felt like it must have meant something. When I finally did get my mom I asked if it was hers and she got quiet and said no, that was the scent my grandmother wore on big occasions. I was very close to my grandmother, but she had been gone for over 20 years and I had zero recollection that she wore perfume, never mind that one (White SHoulders). My reaction was missing my grandmother. I could not identify it, but my body felt it, remembered. Scent is SO POWERFUL. I still have that perfume and smell it from time to time just to feel closer to her. Crazy, right?

Aw @blisstwins.....lovely story... agree with you that nothing sets off a nostalgic reaction quite like a long lost smell...