I'm actually really saddened to read of so many people hating perfume or loving it but avoiding it because others can't tolerate it.
I have had allergies and asthma my whole life, and from my childhood through adulthood believed I was allergic to and hated all perfume. I dreaded getting on the train in the late eighties as some office worker would invariably get on in a cloud of sneeze-gas (mixed with the cigarette smoke some "wore" it was my nightmare).
In my late 20s I found one or 2 fragrances I liked, but after wearing them a while I started to get sick and get headaches, and basically lose the love.
3 years ago I happened to click onto MakeupAlley's Fragrance Board and read someone describing a fragrance that smelled like Tilda Swinton's favourite things - pumpkins, ginger, her fireplace at home. I was captivated. I read on. And my whole view of scent changed.
I began to order samples from The Perfumed Court, Posh Peasant, Indiescents, and many other fantastic vendors. Many scents I didn't love - some I hated! But on rare occasions I found something compelling, ecstasy-inducing and like nothing I'd ever smelled before.
I began to see perfume as the art form that it is, with diversity, history, tradition and anti-tradition (you won't get this from being olfactorily assaulted as you walk through a department store). I appreciate the scents I don't like as much as the ones I do, because it's all part of a fascinating and rich body of knowledge. (I have a friend who is a creative - composer, makes jewelry, sews, and it goes on; she's also a synaesthete. She discovered perfume in her thirties, late like me, and can't believe she ignored this medium for so long. Different scents often make her see different colours and "feel" certain fabric textures.)
Perfume, being something you can't see or touch, is very hard to describe. (In English we don't have much scent vocabulary; for example, I say I "listen" to a perfume.) This means that people writing about it tend to draw on all their literary skills, creating elaborate analogies and arresting mental pictures. I love reading about perfume, in books, and on blogs (and marvelling at great writing) as much as I enjoy wearing it.
I am saddened that in general, the tide has now turned against perfume to the extent that the artistry and history is not seen and perfumers' work is even heavily restricted. Just when I've learned to love it.
I learned that headache-inducing scents can be deliberately underapplied so I am no longer excluded from enjoying them - perhaps a dab on the stomach, or spraying into the air (in my home, not someone's workplace) and walking through the mist, or even a spray on the foot! As a red-eyed, hankerchief-carrying allergy sufferer, I can't tell you how liberated and happy this makes me feel. I wear so little that I am usually frustrated by the lack of anyone noticing what I'm wearing!
If I fall in love with something, the most important step I take is to NOT wear it on consecutive days. Wearing a "signature scent" is, for me, a path to building up intolerance, headaches, and worst of all, boredom and losing the love! Rotation, rotation, rotation is my cunning and effective strategy! So you could say I have signature houses and signature fragrance families, instead of a single signature perfume. (Plus I love too many things, and trying new smells, to just have one!)
(And by the way - I ended up hating Tilda Swinton's perfume! But I'm gladdened and fascinated that it works on other people's skin/noses. I'm happy that I learned about it and got to try it. Talking about what we don't like and why can be as much fun - if not more - than talking about what we do like!)
This is indeed a fantastic journey that I'm so grateful to be on.
