You've got a complete outfit on: fitted jeans, sandals, cute blouse and various accessories. What's missing? Your signature scent.
Just as colors, cuts and different ensembles can convey a feeling or personality, so can perfume. Personally, I think perfume or cologne is essential to anyone and everyone's toilette.
Searching for a fragrance is not an easy task. You have to really put your nose to the grueling test of differentiating between ingredients, moods and, of course, the fifteen other scents you just sniffed. As you all know, the educated consumer is the best consumer, so I've piled together some helpful facts and guidelines.
Decide on the occasion. Figure out if you desire a scent for both night and day, simply for evening or uniquely for the daytime. From there, you can decide how strong your perfume will be, as well as how long you want your perfume to last. You probably want to keep an everyday perfume pretty light, so go with eau de toilette. For evening, choose eau de parfum, as it will last longer than the stench of beer and sweat.
Technically, parfum, eau de parfum, eau de toilette and eau de cologne are all "perfumes," but each carry varying concentrations of perfume oils. Parfum is the strongest, and the most expensive, whereas eau de cologne is a weak scent and cheaper. I suggest going with eau de parfum or eau de toilette just because they come in greater variety.
Ask yourself: How do you want to feel? What image do you want to convey to other people? Depending on your answers to those two questions, you will choose different ingredients and therefore create different moods. Citrus scents are younger, fresher and more energetic, like L by L.A.M.B. ($40 for 1 oz. EdP at sephora.com). Notes of musk and wood are sexy and commonly found in woody and oriental fragrances - perfect for evenings. My favorite family is the floral family. Hints of jasmine, roses and other flowers are especially girly. A favorite scent of mine is Eclat d'Arpege by Lanvin ($70 at nordstroms.com).
If all else fails, go by bottle design. Okay, so you've just spent an hour in Sephora transfixed and overwhelmed by the shelves of fragrances. Your nose just can't take it anymore, but you still haven't found a perfume. Next step, evaluate the packaging. Perfume shopping is subjective and depends on an individual's personality. Makers try to physically embody a scent by the packaging. Maybe Bulgari's Omania Crystalline bottle is just too architectural for your tastes. Issey Miyake's L'eau d'Issey Pour Homme's slight femininity doesn't match up with your extreme manliness.
I hope you now have an idea what to look for, and here are some simple tips when sniffing. First, don't spray on yourself. For example, after two spritzes on your wrist, freesia and cedar smell the same. Spray on sample papers, wave in the air, and then wave towards your nose. Like in chemistry, never ever deeply inhale the vapors. Waft the scent towards you. If you feel like your nose is going to explode, take a breather and smell some coffee beans (which should be present at every perfume department's counter). Needless to say, perfume shopping is taxing on the schnoz.
A short note about wearing perfume: People don't want to smell you before they see you. People generally spray the insides of their wrists, neck, and behind the ears. I like spritzing the inside of my coat, but that's just me.
Let your nose lead the way, and until then, stay fabulous!
Lumay Wang is a freshman who has not yet declared a major. She can be reached at Lumay.Wang@tufts.edu.
