Seven Categories of Fragrance

Choosing a perfume is a complicated process that is more than merely sniffing the contents of a pretty crystal bottle. You have to consider chemistry—your own and the perfume tester's. All perfumes can be classified into certain basic categories, according to their chemical compositions. Some types will react beautifully with your skin oils, others may not. It's this unique relationship that makes you decide on one scent and not another.

It will save you a lot of time at the perfume counter, and helping someone asks you about perfume—if you know the fragrance types and which one is best for the request.

Traditionally, perfumes categorized into seven main divisions. These divisions still hold true but, the late of, leather and tobacco scents have been making a comeback. They were popular as long ago as the 1700s, then lost their standing. You should also know that the world of perfume is so complex today that categories often overlap and blend one into the other. You can have a mossy spicy fragrance, for example, or a floral mossy. But. the basic types are still these:

Single Floral:
Captures the scent of a single flower, such as rose, gardenia, jasmine, or lily of the valley, as the dominant fragrance note. Many women who feel strongly about a particular flower choose this fragrance type. It's easy to wear and to identify.

Floral Bouquet: An intricately blended bouquet of individual flower scents with no one flower predominating. This group includes some of the leading "name" perfumes.

Woodsy Mossy: Sometimes referred to as a "forest blend," a perfume of this type is a mixture of sandalwood, rosewood, cedarwood and balsam, combined with oak moss, fern and herbs, and resulting in a fragrance reminiscent of the forest. If you like fresh, outdoorsy aromas, you'll like this type.

Fruity: Conjure up the smell of orange, lemon, lime or a mellow hint of apricot or peach, and you're on to this fragrance type. Fruity scents are usually blended with a citrus base. Their impact is clean and refreshing.

Spicy: These fragrances have pungent spice ingredients like cinnamon, clove, ginger and vanilla, or spicy flower aromas like carnation. The long lasting results can be haunting.

Oriental: Oriental blends are a mixture of musk, civet, ambergris and other exotic ingredients that provide warm, sophisticated over tones. They can smell sultry and exotic or "heady," according to your body chemistry.

Modern Blend: Perfumes in this category combine aldehydes or synthetic compounds with natural ingredients. The result may be floral woodsy, spicy or fruity, but an indefinable top note always predominates with brilliance. Some of the most costly of currently popular perfumes are classified among the modern blends.