Smelling the past

There are a lot of jokes about how romance novels describe scents and smells. You know, how the hero smells of “man, pine and bad decisions?”*

There’s a reason for that: engaging all five senses is one way to make your pages come alive, and it’s especially important when you are writing emotional or sensual stuff. Like, for example, romance novels.

For some reason, contemporary romance heroines rarely wear perfume. They always smell of some sort of wholesome fruity shampoo or body wash, like strawberry (very popular), coconut, or watermelon. I assume that this is because they are so pure of heart, unlike the heavily perfumed, willowy blonde Other Woman™ who wears a lot of makeup, has fake nails and boobs, and keeps a black chasm where her soul should be.

Heroines of historical novels often smell of lavender, rose or violets. This is probably because “historical” in romance equals Regency or Victorian and those kinds of scents were available in soaps and other beauty products early on.

Now, the heroines of my current series live in 1924 and do not have access to strawberry-scented body wash. And since they are glamorous movie stars, they aren’t going to settle for smelling like your Granny’s linen cupboard, either.** Hence, they will be wearing perfume.

So this brings us to the question: what did they smell like?

First, a word on terminology.

Today, we tend to use “perfume” for fragrances marketed to women, regardless of concentration, while “cologne” is applied to men’s fragrancies. But if you want to get technical, perfum, eau de toilette, eau de cologne etc. are all actually specific terms that describe a fragrance’s approximate concentration by the percent of perfume oil in the volume of the final product.

Cologne

In the 18th century, however, “cologne” referred to a family of fresh, citrus-based fragrances distilled from extracts of citrus, floral, and woody elements, intended for both men and women. These “classical colognes” were believed to originate in Cologne, Germany, hence the name.

Some of the early colognes that are still available today are 4711 by Mäurer&Witz, and Guerlain Eau de Cologne Impériale.

4711 has been produced in Cologne since at least 1799, and has notes of lemon, orange, bergamot, and other citrus fruits, with herbal and floral undertones.

According to Guerlain, Eau de Cologne Impériale was especially composed for the Empress Eugénie, wife of Napoleon III. The Empress enjoyed the exclusive use of this fragrance before giving her authorisation for it to be sold. Like all early colognes, it has bright and zesty citrus notes, mixed with the subtle floral undertone of neroli.

Both of these would have been available in the 1920s and could be worn by one of my characters, but they would likely have been considered a tad old-fashioned—after all, their grandmothers might have worn these (and their grandfathers too, in the case of 4711).

Florals

Floral perfumes were popular and still “on trend” during the 1920s, judging from magazine ads and other sources, even if many of them were launched earlier in the century.

One such classic floral fragrance was the one that launched the Coty business: La Rose Jacqueminot (1904). This is often described as the ultimate rose perfume. I even saw one reviewer say, “it’s got the flower, the stem, the leaves and even the soil as well, like a freshly watered rose bush.”

The first fragrance launched by Caron was Narcisse Noir (1911), a floral created in honor of the consecration of the House of Caron. It is a floral fruity fragrance with an orange note added to a flowery, fruity base that includes rose, jasmine, musk, vetiver, and sandalwood. Sound okay, right? But, according to The Perfumed Court, if you are new to perfume, you might instead feel that it smells “like a combination of motor oil, narcissus, and powder-infused muck.”

A slightly more accessible floral scent was Houbigant Quelques Fleurs (1912), which was relaunched later in the century and reportedly worn by Princess Diana when she walked down the aisle at her wedding. It’s been described as a romantic floral bouquet with notes of lily of the valley, rose, and jasmine.

Both Yardley and Caron released violet perfumes in 1913, so I suppose that must have had a surge in popularity around that time. Yardley April Violets had middle notes of jasmine, lily-of-the-valley and pelargonium with base notes of musk and vanilla, while Caron Violette Précieuse’s fresh, powdery violet was supported by iris, and rounded out with delicate raspberry.

One of the most everlastingly popular perfumes also had violets at its heart: Guerlain L’heure Bleue (1912). In this classic, which was reportedly the favorite of Queen Elizabeth II, anise, violet and tonka are layered with rich vanilla. Or, as one reviewer described it: “resinous, nutty, and sweet in a borderline confection-like manner.”

Chyphres

In 1917, Coty launched Chyphre de Coty which spawned an entire family of perfumes. The name, which is French for Cyprus, was inspired by the fact that its raw materials came predominantly from Mediterranean countries, and it was characterized by a combination of bergamot, labdanuma and oakmoss. Perfumes in a similar style had been created in the 19th century, but Coty’s 1917 composition was so influential that it ultimately became the progenitor of a whole family of related fragrances sharing the same basic accord, which came to be known as “chypres.”

Guerlain launched its own version of a chyphre scent in 1919: Mitsuoko. Mitsuoko was fruity chypre with bergamot in the top notes, a middle note of peach and jasmine, over a base of vetiver, oakmoss, and labdanum.

Orientals

Oriental perfumes were also very popular in the first decades of the 20th century and might be what a woman reached for in the 1920s if she wanted to project a sophisticated and sensual persona.

One such fragrance was Coty L’Origan (1905), which was a classic oriental fragrance with notes of bergamot, orange blossom, and vanilla, known for its powdery and sophisticated scent.

Coty Emeraude is another Oriental classic that was launched in 1921. It has a top of bergamot-vanilla, with mid-tones of rose, jasmine and ylang ylang, and a base of sandalwood and vanilla. Coty still sells Emeraude, but it’s apparently nothing like the original. You can buy the vintage kind from various decanting sites, however, like The Perfumed Court, but 1 ml will cost you $39.99 at TPC. If you want a full teaspoon (5 ml), you’ll have to shell out a whopping $189.99.

Caron Nuit de Noël arrived at the scene a year later, in 1922. This one is sometimes called a chyphre, but while it has the oakmoss, it lacks the citrus-y notes, and instead has a floral, woody mix of sandalwood, rose and ylang ylang, meaning it’s half chyphre, half oriental. The original bottle was black with a gold band and the design fairly screams art déco.

Corday Toujours Moi (1924) is another Oriental 1920s fragrance. It’s based on a combination of exotic sandalwood, musk, labdanum, mosses and vetiver combined with orange blossom and jasmine, giving it a warm and rich and somewhat powdery feeling. It’s still produced by Dana, but it’s not the original formula and apparently not nearly as good. I saw a bottle of the vintage stuff on the net and the asking price was well over $500. It’s not that I want to hype it or anything, but composer Harry Revel was so impressed by this scent, that in 1948 he devoted several musical compositions to six Corday perfumes, called Perfume Set To Music. So if you have a few hundred bucks lying around and you don’t know what to do with them...

Synthetics

Another major trend in perfumes in the early 20th century was the use of synthetics and aldehydes.

Guerlain Jicky was one of the first scents created with the addition of synthetic materials when it was launched in 1889. It was also the first fragrance labeled a “parfum” extract with a high concentration of aromatic compounds, and is still in production today, making it the oldest continuously produced perfume in the world. Its perfume notes include spice, lemon, lavender, wood and vanilla. I used to have a small bottle of it, and it’s right up my street: a fresh top note with some sweetness and vanilla, but over a musky, amber base. But while it would have been the height of fashion in the 1890s, it was old news by the 1920s.

Today, when we think of iconic perfumes, one of the first that comes to mind is Chanel No. 5, which is, indeed, a child of the 1920s. It was launched on the fifth day of the fifth month in 1921, and Chanel used her marketing genius to push it in front of all the right people. No. 5 made heavy use of aldehydes, and if you don’t know what that is, it’s an organic compound in which the carbonyl group is attached to a carbon atom at the end of a carbon chain. Now, if that means nothing to you, you will probably live a long and happy life all the same. It’s enough to know that in perfumes, you could say that they add a sort of otherworldliness in that they make the perfume smell less like something real and more just… smell. Which sounds horrible, but it’s not, and that very thing was what Chanel liked about them.

Her intention was to create a perfume that was the smell of a woman rather than flowers. By adding so much aldehydes, the basically floral No. 5 turned out not to smell like flowers. Instead, it smells like an abstract, silky, soapy, powdery, flowery marvel (but if you are trying it out, make sure you get the eau de toilette, not the eau de cologne, which is sort of thinner and lacks the powdery sweetness that transforms it from old lady to sex).

By comparison, Chanel No. 22, which was launched a year later, is much more of an old-fashioned floral perfume, although it too uses aldehydes (but then, so does Houbigant Quelques Fleurs). It has notes of several flowers, including roses, jasmine, tuberoses, although some people think it actually has a hint of lilac.

Like I said, Chanel worked hard on marketing and her perfumes started selling in select places in New York in December 1924, making them a viable option for stylish American women too.

Another floral aldehyde fragrance was Lanvin My Sin, which was launched in 1924. It is a mix of aldehydes and rose and ylang ylang over a rather intense musk base. Sweetness masking the sweaty beast beneath, sort of, which makes sense considering the name. It was discontinued in 1988, but bottles aren’t all that hard to find online apparently, if you want to try it.

Masculine Notes

Finally, I am going to mention a perfume that, according to a friend of mine, is the white whale of perfumes and so wonderful that she’d happily give an arm and a leg for a vintage bottle of the stuff: Caron Tabac Blond. It was created as an homage to women’s liberation, and is based on the unique combination of leather, tobacco leaves and vanilla. The leathery top notes are usually found in men’s fragrances, but here, they and a little hint of smoke are combined with a feminine floral bouquet in a celebration of Woman’s emancipation.

Pick Your Poison

So, as you can see, what scent my heroines pick isn’t just about what smells good. Scent is characterization.

Is she a sweetly floral-scented good girl? Or does she project a mysterious, sensual persona, reeking of sandalwood and ylang ylang? Or is she cutting-edge, flaunting the sublimely worrying sweetness from Chanel that could, in the summer of 1924, only have been bought on a trip to Europe?

And this, friends, is how much I overthink stuff when I write.

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*I have no idea what bad decisions smell like, but I think it’s probably something like tequila

**Except for the heroine in Book 2, but then… Ah, well. It’s complicated.