L'Aimant (1927)
by Coty

This review is for an uncertain vintage extrait version. From the bottle it certainly smells "retro". On the skin there is a very loud arrival of old fashioned aldehydes. Then things settle into a very dense powdery woodiness. It could be apricots or peaches and sandalwood, maybe amber. It has a backbone and density of character that are similar to Arpege and Chanel5. I find it supremely comforting and sort of meditative. I love the richness of it. My bottle conveys the same experience as the one reviewed below by millascent

29th April, 2010.

This review is for the vintage extrait, found for pennies on Ebay: what a joy! Extraordinarily pretty and -- as many have already observed -- a dead ringer for No. 5, but with a bit more "oomph". A full-bodied aldehydic floral, and very long lasting, too. Beautiful. The current drugstore iteration of the EdT is so unpleasant as to not warrant a review, in my opinion.

18th February, 2010.

This was the first scent I ever wore, I think I first smelled it on my grandmother. I recently tried the spray but found it wimpish and sickly but the pinky cream in the wee black bottle was much warmer and softer on my skin. I bought one ( while waiting for a promised new (to me) Serge Lutens to come in to my local dept store) and would recommend this above the sprays. Still sits somewhere close to and between Arpege and Chanel 5 to my nose.

26th September, 2009.

This is a wonderful, old fragrance that no matter how much other companies have tried to duplicate, they just can't. It's soft, feminine and wonderful.

3rd September, 2009.

Whatever happened to the REAL Coty perfumers? L'aimant (alot like Chanel No 5, but with more punch) was a great perfume. Maybe it wasn't for everyone, but there was a real quality to it. Now it just screams, "I'm cheap and strong". Same for Emeraude, which was similar to and almost as beautiful as Shalimar. I never had the pleasure of Chypre, but I can only imagine the quality of a perfume that defined an entire new classification of scent! Four stars for the old: no stars for the new.

28th December, 2008.

It must be special, to have been in production for almost 100 years without going extinct! According to the online e-tailers, it is a shimmering floral perfume with notes of bergamot, neroli, peach, jasmine, rose and vanilla. I am lucky to have a very fine perfume strength vintage version of this, which I find to be very smooth and buttery aldehyde rich. Yet the citrus open of bergamot and almost shrap neroli gives this a hint of brightness, an attitude... very classy retro and it makes me think blonde all the way. The peach, I do not smell overtly, but it gives a fullness, a freshness... it is a glimmer of peach skin only, there is no fruit. Of the jasmine and rose, the former is the more prominant. The whole golden cloud rests on a bed of vanilla and (in the vintage version I have, I am certain), civet. It is a tame kitty though, and the dry down leaves you with a warm-glowy-soft-powdery-something-better-than-skin scent that really does make you feel like how Marilyn Monroe looked, wrapped in nothing more than a mussed bedsheet.

12nd September, 2008.