Have you ever wondered what makes a fragrance smell of sandalwood or lavender? The answer is the note. Notes are the individual, specific odors that make up a perfume’s scent profile or ‘accord.’ They can be divided into three categories: top notes, middle or heart notes, and base notes.
Top notes are light and volatile, evaporating quickly to reveal the heart notes. This means that fragrances with strong top notes don’t always last long on the skin. Heart or middle notes emerge after the top has dissipated, lasting longer on your skin than just two minutes after application (the average time for top notes to disappear).
Base notes bring depth and solidity to a perfume, contrasting with the lighter top and heart notes. They also play an important role in developing the fragrance since they are often what remains on the skin after all other top and heart notes have dissipated.
Fragrance Families
Perfumes are categorized into families based on shared characteristic scent notes. Different compositions of notes on a perfume and its interaction with your skin makes the perfume unique. Now that we understand how essential note categories are for differentiating between fragrances. Let’s look at five major families: woody, floral, oriental, fresh, and fruity.
· Woody/Earthy Notes
Sandalwood is one of the best-known woody or earthy scents. Like other woody smells like cedar and patchouli, it gives richness and warmth to any fragrance. Woody notes also feature heavily in some popular fragrances.
· Floral Notes
A delicate perfume that is predominantly floral with gentle scents is classified as a floral fragrance. Rose and jasmine are two of the most common floral notes in perfume production alongside lily of the valley and lilac, though other flowers may sometimes be used to create unique combinations. Florals notes are often used as a top or heart notes and can be mixed with other notes. These scents are soft and can boost your moods depending on how you react to them. When selecting a fresh-smelling perfume, it would help if you choose one that doesn’t contain too many florals, such as lavender, because it could end up smelling like soap.
· Oriental Notes
The oriental notes are the combination of ambergris, vanilla, tonka bean and patchouli. This is the most mysterious and complex scent. It’s also one of the oldest, having been used for centuries as incense. Oriental notes are warm, rich, and somewhat sensuous, with a deep influence on your personality. In terms of perfume ingredients, it contains some of the most expensive due to its concentration of Ambergris
· Fruity Notes
What makes fruity perfumes so attractive is their simplicity – sweet notes are immediately appealing on the right skin. Anyone can wear Fruity perfumes regardless of age or gender, but they’re usually most popular with women who favor light and youthful scents. Notable fruity notes include peach, raspberry, strawberry, orange blossom, and mandarin.
· Fresh Notes
A fresh perfume will contain mostly green notes such as grass and citrus fruit notes like lemon and grapefruit to produce a refreshing effect that’s perfect for spring or summer use. It is also ideal for people who don’t want anything too heavy or overpowering when it comes to their perfume choice.
If you want a unique perfume and don’t want to choose the wrong fragrance family with an unpleasant result, start your olfactive diagnostics and find the best perfume that suits you. To make it easier, here’s a shortlist of the most popular Alexandre J signature fragrances in each category of notes:
- Woody/Earthy: Black Muscs, The Majestic musk, The Majestic Vanilla
- Floral: Rose Oud, Morning Muscs, Iris Violet, Mandarine Sultane, Altesse Mysore, Rose Alba, The Majestic Amber
- Oriental: Silver Ombre, Zafeer Oud Vanille, Rose Oud, Golden Oud, The Majestic Jardin, The Majestic Oud
- Fruity: Mandarine Sultane, Iris Violet, Morning Muscs, Rose Alba, The Majestic Vanilla, The Majestic Amber
- Fresh: Silver Ombre, The Majestic Vetiver, The majestic Oud
Things to Remember when Finding a Perfume
When choosing your next luxury fragrance consider its intended use, (day or night?), seasonality (summery floral? potent woodsy concentration? etc.), and the notes that you love in it. The key when choosing a scent is to choose what works best with your body chemistry, but when in doubt, lean towards classic scents with Oriental notes because they are full-bodied, warm, and have the most allure.
You may also want to use aromatic notes which make use of fresh herbs to give you a unique scent that truly stands out. To determine which type of perfume will work best for you, try smelling great perfumes after taking a short assessment test at musky, floral, oriental, and fresh.
