From first sniff to firm favourite: nut-filled scents that are perfect for the party season
For decades, I was turned off by nutty fragrances. Nuttiness is such a trademark of the gourmand fragrance family – all vanilla, chocolate and nut-brittle that make you whiff of Ferrero Rocher – that those of us resolutely outside of it can feel robbed of its wider potential. It wasn’t until I first sniffed Frédéric Malle’s exquisite almond-milky L’Eau d’Hiver (now one of my favourite and most worn perfumes; £79 for 30ml) that I truly appreciated how quiet, tasteful and clean nutty aromas could be. Take Guerlain’s Après L’Ondée (£79.20, 100ml), for example. The original (and to many minds, the best) of the nutties, it’s as far from that “mechanically frosted cupcake” genre of modern gourmand as one could imagine. Light and powdery, like wet blooms dusted in ground almonds, it’s far too elegant and restrained to clash with pudding course, and feels clippy enough for a professional setting.
“Nutty” is just an overall impression, of course – it doesn’t mean a perfumer has been within miles of the real thing. In fact, what you may assume is almond is often the heliotrope plant or its synthetic counterpart, heliotropin, both of which have a tendency to smell like marzipan. It’s deployed to great effect in Dior’s quietly filthy Hypnotic Poison. (I know many of you will stop reading here because Poison – understandably but mistakenly, in my view – is so widely disliked. But I promise that this variant, £48 for 30ml, does its own thing.) Stronger, spicier, blowsier than those above, it has a sort of soft, boozy but uncloying creaminess that feels sexier for party season. It gets even better by the hour.
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