Womanity (2010)
by Thierry Mugler

Can A Thierry Mugler perfume smell normal? Of course not. Fig is there in all its sweetness and sourness with a little bit of salty caviar.
If this is not dense and creamy I don't know what that is.

24th January, 2012.

This is a weird one. At its heart, it's a fake candy fig smell. It's not the standard perfume fig of Philosykos, but instead what you'd get if they made a fig-flavored Jolly Rancher - hyper sweet and artificial, and almost orange-ish. This is underlaid with a framework of weirdness, especially a strange salty iodine smell and hints of Grey Flannel violet leaf and weird eggy aldehydes.

I suppose Womanity fits an interesting niche, trying so hard to be not just another candied fruity floral, but I can't help but think that if it really wanted to be something unique, it should have ditched the candied fruity floral elements all together. That being said, it's not a bad scent, just a strange middle ground between an extremely common-smelling commercial perfume and an imaginative avant garde art experiment that doesn't really manage to satisfy me on either level.

16th December, 2011.

Strange fragrance, botanic and marine, harsh and sophisticated at  once. It is basically a fig fragrance under my apprentice nose. Despite many others Thierry Mugler this one is more carnal than hyper-modern, robotic, icy-creamy and  "interplanetarian".  I start writing that i don't know if the note of caviar is really inserted in the blend, however  the first blast transmits at me the perception of something animal and marine, deep and irony (though synthetic and slightly disturbing), together with a crisp and spicy  fruity feel. The impression is to inhale at once something salty-ozonic (to be related at the universe of seafoods) and something like fresh fruit with aromatic  greens and a dust of nutmeg or cinnamon placed over. The botanic vibe is present and is probably produced by the silvan, earthy , almost minty and mellow-sweet effect of the carnal fruit of fig and from fig leaves. Sorry but probably i really smell either caviar and fig together. The combination is not to die for but is interesting, something pungent and at the same time almost edible and sensual is in the air, furthermore i detect a whiff of green-aromatic air, some floral note (orange flower?), citrus-fruits (grapefruit?) and a woodsy base. I don't find this fragrance particularly controversial or revolutionary, just a modern and experimental kind of smell that plays the game of the juxtapositions. Not bad.

14th December, 2011. (Last Edited: 15th December, 2011.)

Oh my goodness, this is LOVE!!!!! I have/ had several of the samples. I HATED it at first smell, then it grew on me, just as most TM fragrances do. I have been so sick for over a month now, and a dab of the perfume lifts my spirits with that sweet yet salty, so unique, so oddly spicy yet floral. I cannot wait to have money to buy this one....

29th November, 2011.

An honest (though remarkably synthetic) fruity/woody composition with a generic flowery vibe (caviar? no way). Nice, very wearable but not as original as suggested by the fragrance notes and the marketing campaign.

If you're up for an avanguardist composition, you should better look somewhere else. Gimmick

8th November, 2011.

I finally marched over to [My Favorite Department Store] and gave this a try, right on my skin. After one hour Womanity was still going strong.

I first sampled test strips for several "new" fruity florals. This may account for my burst of laughter after the initial Womanity spritz. It was the laughter of mingled surprise and delight. I thought: Finally, something different. And then: But do I want to smell like this?

Like the pink and metal-chained bottle, the fragrance plays with contrasts. The top layer? Figgy and buttery. It's a butter note I associate with certain white florals. It's a fig that goes melony rather than sugary or candied, but is nonetheless quite sweet.

Caviar is supposed to be the edgy note. I would never have guessed it, having smelled quite a bit of caviar in my day. What I detect at the base is that bitter, dirty, dried-blood metallic note or accord (minus the fecal) from Sécrétions magnifiques . In comparison to that playful niche outlaw, Womanity is quite tame. But line her up with the rest of the bottles at the department store, and she's a force to be reckoned with.

The sweet, fruity fig notes dissipate after an hour or so, but the base notes have preternatural tenacity. I clocked over 20 hours. Close to the skin, Womanity wears chilly, slightly dirty (the dried blood note), quite metallic, not pleasant.

Not a vibe I'm going for, but well worth trying. In a "Would You Rather...?", I would select Womanity over something more generically sweet and pretty.

2nd October, 2011.