For those who were wondering how come I’m wearing so many summery scents lately, the reason is simply the relatively hot spring we are experiencing in British Columbia. This is a nice compensation for a long, murky winter that seemed to never leave (until I came back from Israel, and apparently, brought the sun with me!)

It’s interesting to note, particularly when looking back and remembering how the summer almost seemed to refuse to make room for autumn, but turned into winter ever so quickly before autumn was quite finished its speech. It seems as if spring has turned into a British Columbian summer pretty much skipping the nasty cold bit when spring feels like winter yet you know it’s not winter yet. But I am not objective here. I might have just been away for a month when that happened (and yes, it did rain all the time when I was away in April, so there you go).

Here are my “editor picks” style entry for scents that can seamlessly take you from spring into summer. Some are equally fantastic on cool, crisp early spring days (providing a cheerful floral warmth) and others are so deliciously refreshing that they are simply too good to resist even on a steamy hot day. For me this hot spring means a lot of fun: picnics on the beach every evening, dancing, hedonistic dinner parties with close friends, and lots of perfumes to boost and make every occasion even more fun and memorable! And now that spring cleaning and painting is over it's time to have even more fun than before.

Here is where my heart is right now – most of these are what I wear now on a regular basis, and a couple are simply noteworthy even though they are new to me:

Newly discovered floral note:
Ylang Ylang.
I have been wearing my Coralle a lot lately, and really enjoying the juicy, mouthwatering aspects of this humble tropical flower. So creamy, so smooth, and just perfect. You’ll notice it appears in several of my favourites for this spring as well (i.e.: Chamade, Samsara, Tamya and Songes)

Classic spring floral:
Diorissimo
No additional comments necessary...

Most Innovative Hot Weather Gourmand:
Cognac by Aftelier
With notes of olives, cognac and citrus, this may sound more like a margharita than a perfume. However, it is not boozy at all, rather – fruity, green and with that exquisite oily feel of just-picked olives and freshly pressed virgin olive oil, sans the bitterness. This is so surprising you must try it to believe it!

My very own favourite spring & summer scent:
Tamya
In person she is my favourite girl ever (she must be hearing this a million times a day). As a fragrance this is my favourite floriental and a staple in my purse to-go kit. Tamya being equally non-demanding and romantic, floral, fruity yet skin-like I find it easy to wear in any situataion or season. But hot spring and summer days are definitely her favourites, where the yuzu lifts the spirits and the white florals dance glitteringly on the skin.

Favourite lilac fragrance:
After My Own Heart. This is soft, fresh, green, sweet, clean and very easy to wear and versatile.
And it was made by a very rare breed - a Canadian perfumer (now residing in San Francisco), which might partially explain why I have a soft spot for it and a lot of room in my heart...

Floral that impressed me but did not win me over:
Lys Méditerranée
With the scent of Madonna lilies and orange blossom, and a sweet vanillic base, this makes a lady-like spring floral that I’m surprised I haven’t discovered earlier. It’s not quite “me” but is very enjoyable.

The most exotic of them all florals:
Fairchild by Anya’s Garden.
If you are looking for something truly different that nobody smelled before, the steamy-hot, humid floral from Anya’s Garden, including notes of pandanus, champaca tincture, jasmine infusions, ambergris, toasted seashells and seaweed. This is the most genuinely tropical scent that I’ve ever smelled, made from fresh raw materials by a true olfactory artist.

Funnest Body Mist:
Lovely by Sarah Jessica Parker
This is light and subtle, slightly moisturizing and layers well with whatever else you feel like wearing this day. I loved it paired with Spring Flower! Lovely Liquid Satin is also nice to use as an overall moisturizing spray, but it can leave stains on clothing (or so the packaging says), and has a slightly different scent. I love both, personally.

Flirty Scent for a Night Out:
Spring Flower.
This is so cheerful it sets me in a fun mood and is an extra boost for hot dates and daytime fashion expeditions. It’s classy yet modern, effervescent and never too cloying.

Favourite White Floral:
Songes EDT by Annick Goutal.
The eau de toilette is light enough to wear in the heat and a great accompaniment when Latin dancing…

Year-round staple that reminds me of spring:
Narciso Rodriguez for her EDT

Modern Citrus:
Sugar EDP by Fresh.
I didn’t used to think that I love citrus fragrances all that much, until I made my very own Fetish (which has an overall feel of citrus candy)... Now that these notes (read: citrus) are so endangered, their magic (on their own and as a fragrance family) resurfaced for me. I am picking this one (Sugar) because the rich lemony notes in it are really to my liking. At first I thought I wouldn't like it and was a bit worried about the base (once the lemon party is over...). But it is not overly chemical like most of the Fresh fragrances, and the base is soft and reminiscent of cotton candy. Lemon is underrated!

Cheap and Fun:
CocoVanilla by Alyssa Ashley. This can be had for a mere $15 at the drugstore and is a simple yet fun vanilla and coconut scent (surprisingly). Last year it was sold as an alcohol free scent, and the texture was somewhat funky once it dried on your skin. This year it’s alcohol based, and for that price it came with a tube of body lotion. The original price was $25 and probably did not reflect how unpopular this scent is. I am not sure why but I am can’t complain about the price reduction.

Scent for the beach and poolside:
Monoi de Tahiti body mist from Yves Rocher. This is delicious, and wonderfully layers with Songes as well as CocoVanilla.

Re-discovered Summer Floriental:
Samsara EDT (I am almost ready for another bottle!)

Most Exciting Purchase this Spring:
Orchid and Boronia solid perfume duo from Aftelier. Orchid has become one of my favourite orange blossoms scents, and my most favourite natural perfume that was not made by me ☺

And to finish this lineup, it won’t be complete without a...

Classic Chypre:
Chamade, the galbanum-green floral chypre from Guerlain, with the tropical notes of Ylang Ylang the juiciness of cassis and the sweetness of vanilla.

Now it's your turn - What are your spring favourites that lead you gracefully into summer?

If a spring of glacier water could be bottled in a perfume flacon – I think it will smell like Spring Flower. It makes me wonder if “spring” refers to the season or to the body of water. I would say it’s a little bit of both.

With its fresh and simple beauty, Spring Flower is sheer happiness in a bottle.
Fresh, optimistic and tranquil with no unnecessary ambition – Spring Flower is nothing short than beautiful. It’s just that – beautiful. The fresh fruity accents are crisp and complement the floral tones that are at the heart of the composition – rose and jasmine. They give off a feeling of water lilies floating above glacial freshwater. The base holds only a tad of sweetness like a soil that promises a longer blooming time.

It’s nothing too deep or serious, just pretty, charming, effervescent and bubbling with vivacity. Spring Flower has surprisingly become one of my wardrobe staples, which is quite surprising – considering the fact that I have hared time with pure and sheer florals, particularly fruity florals. One main reason is that unlike most other fruity florals, it does not quickly transform into a powdery, nose-stinging chemical mess on my skin. Rather, the fruity notes stay fresh forever (a very unnatural characteristic, but in this case most welcome!). As if this is not enough, Spring Flower is the only Creed that truly captured my heart so far!

Spring Flower starts off with a blast of fresh, citrus-fruity notes of lemon, bergamot and peach. There is also a hint of herbal note, almost minty. It is charmingly refreshing and positive. The thing is, that this fresh beauty lasts for a long time!
The heart and base notes still maintain this luscious fruitiness, along with delicate flowers that are neither heavy nor heady, but simply reminiscent of fresh, dew-laden blossom in an early spring morning. Though officially the notes are of jasmine and rose, to my nose it smells like waterlilies. Perhaps it is the combination of the rose and jasmine notes with the crisp apple and watery melon notes that create this light, bright and fluid impression.
The feeling is of inviting cool spring water, so inviting you absolutely have to drink them!

Later on notes of lilly of the valley and a citrus floral note emerges – it is not orange blossom, but actually smells a lot like lemon… Perhaps it is lemon blossom…
The drydown is a tad powdery, with the lilly and melon notes lingering on a base of cedarwood and perhaps a hint of orris as well as musk. It is only slightly powdery, but still has the fruity floral notes persist while maintaining an extraordinary freshness.

Top notes: Peach, Lemon, Bergamot, and I suspect a hint of peppermint!
Heart: Jasmine, Rose, Water lilies, Melon, Apple, Lilly of the Valley, Lemon Blossom
Base: Cedarwood, orris, perhaps benzoin which adds a tad of sweetness without overpowering the top and heart notes, and very subtle musk, amber and vanilla notes.

As cliché as it is, Spring always means flowers to me. Especially wildflowers. And flowers are very hard not to love. I am yet to meet the person that doesn’t like flowers in some form – in the garden, in a vase, as a floral print on textile, or their scent (bottled or not).

I am also yet to find a perfume that truly captures the scent of wildflowers in the springtime. So I revert to associating more civilized flowers in the perfume context. My trials of tincturing wildflowers did not bear any satisfactory results. So I will stick to the traditional jasmine, rose, orange blossom, tuberose et al for now, and indulge in exotic scents such as champaca, osmanthus, boronia, kewda and other aromas that I wasn’t exposed to until I became a perfumer.

For a long time, Diorissimo has been my favourite perfume, and was the essence of Spring for me. Although I don’t think any less of it, I have grown to love other scents and feel more comfortable wearing them in the Spring or otherwise – when a flowery mood dawns on me. I am hoping to be able to review some of them here before the Spring turns into Summer!

It seems like I have skipped the chilly, brisk moments of Spring here in Vancouver when I was away on my holidays. For a few days it was indeed rainy and grey and needless to say – not particularly warm. But the sunny days are significantly outnumbering the grey ones now, and you can see the immediate effect on the people around – they simply look more energetic and cheerful, and I am amongst them. A nice continuum to a vacation, I must say, so I am seriously considering an annual pilgrimage to the blooming orchards of Israel!

From the innocent lily of the valley of Diorissimo I have grown to admire the intoxicating orange blossom (as in Fleurs d’Oranger), which is perhaps the one single note that brings Spring and happiness to me in an instant. I also love the youthful cheerfulness of full-bodied and seductive jasmine, the soft fresh petals of roses. For a fresh and green feel – I have extended my affection of the floral lily of the valley to freesia, boronia and most surprisingly – to the cucumber smelling violet leaf and to the even more obscure iris.

Neither soliflores nor floral bouquets been my main interest – both as a perfumer and a wearer. I am a known as a chypre junkie and oriental lover, and generally speaking I seek complexity and evolution in my scents, which isn’t often satisfied by florals. But in the few reviews to follow, I will pay a tribute to some of my favourites that I are really special to me.