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Define green fragrances

post #1 of 44
11/9/06 at 10:56am
Thread Starter 
Hi there!

My hunt for a "green fragrance" has led me into several winding roads of surprice. My first conception of a green fragrance was something like Polo Green; smells like a forest. Later I realized that the smell of autumn leaves like that of, say, Rocabar is also a green fragrance for me. I connect green with the smell of the forest.
A green fragrance traditionally would probably be more of a hay-coumarine-smell in the same vein as MGP Parfum d´Habit. Unfortunately that smelled like green peas, urin and make-up powder to me... sorry if I offended someone but that was my initial reaction of it. Givenchy Greenergy sounded like a sure thing for a green fragrance but smelled like sweet fudge, marine notes and grass. Slightly cloying and heady-sweet.
Trying to sort out if a fragrance is a chypre or fougere is also a tough call in some cases.
If it has too much lavender or herbs instead of moss it goes away from traditional terminology and if it has too much woody or herbal notes it is defined according to these notes.

So, ladies and gentlemen, what is a green fragrance for you? A definition, a self-made description or a number of fragrances would be interesting to read about. For me grassy (not the hay scent necessarily), piney, leafy, mossy, slightly earthy and a little herbally, lavendery are notes that combine to make a green fragrance. Not by definition but for me emotionally.

Go ahead; "talk amongst yourselves" / Tobbe
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post #2 of 44
11/9/06 at 6:03pm
When I think green, I think of Mugler Cologne and Givenchy Greenergy. It also helps that these too juices are green. They are grassy, fresh, and not ozonic. I would say Polo Green is woody, and not really green per se.
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post #3 of 44
11/9/06 at 6:57pm
I thought it meant smelling a bit like grass, maybe even hay.
Calvin Klein's Truth and Guy Laroche's Horizon seem pretty green to me, even though they don't have "green" in the name, nor a foreign language translation of the word green.

Then there's the green-mossy scents like 212, Fahrenheit, Emporio Armani.
Renato
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post #4 of 44
11/9/06 at 7:33pm
Miller et Bertaux - Green, Green, and Green... strange fragrance, but I loved it at first sniff. Not talked about much, but very unique I think. The packaging is pretty sweet as well. Shrubs and Bay Laurel. I smell a fig note too, but my nose it not very good on notes I guess.
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post #5 of 44
11/9/06 at 8:15pm
Green fragrances smell like green things: grass, moss, crushed leaves, etc.

Yes, there's a lot of room for variation there.
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post #6 of 44
11/10/06 at 7:11am
Here is an unusual suggestion:
Theorema Uomo by Fendi
http://www.basenotes.net/ID26121581.html
This should carry the definition of the word "forgotten"...

But one of the greenest scents around is the original Paul Smith Men.Extremely poor longevity though.
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post #7 of 44
11/10/06 at 8:29am
I think these posts sum it up well. Green runs a pretty big gambit. It can include various herbs and greens (mint, rosemary), different grass smells, and lighter less woody woods (bamboo leaves). More foresty woods would classify as woody.

Green also at times can incorporate some tea notes and citrus notes (very common) to give it a robust smell.
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post #8 of 44
11/10/06 at 9:48am
Thread Starter 
I can dig!

I agree with all of you according to the definition. Green tea, bamboo, Paul Smith, moss. leaves and so on constitutes a green fragrance. I just wanted to know if the confusion regarding the cathegorizing of scents as green is something that I wrestle with due to my own ignorance or if anyone else can relate to it. Apparantly so, in some cases. GIT though isn´t a green fragrance to me due to it´s marine feel.
I also wanted to know what your favourite green fragrances are. So keep your darling green ones coming.
Nature Millianere or however it is spelled is often mentioned as a green scent and I totally agree though only having smelled it once. Mugler is also kind of green but Creeds Original Vetiver smells very similar but ever more green. The grassy ones are nice but if there is too much root scent from a vetiver-prominent fragrance it goes away into a woody-earthy-smoky fragrance instead of my conception of a pure green fragrance. I know that Polo Green is a rather woody one but the green pinecombo, the herbal elements and the color makes it green for me.
Gucci Nobile is from my memory a rather green fragrance to me with a leafy touch to it.

More thought are always welcome! Which is the greatest of the greens????

/Tobbe
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post #9 of 44
11/10/06 at 9:53am
Green: herbal, leafy, galbanum;
Chypre: citrus topnotes with oakmoss in the base;
Fougère: citrus, lavender, spices, and woods.

The thing about lavender is that it can come across as either green-herbal or floral (or both). It is a kind of "pivot" fragrance that can affect a composition radically and alter its character, depending on the blend and the relative proportions of the other ingedients.

Many green fragrances nowadays list violet leaves or ivy or "bamboo" in their top- or heartnotes. I find all these very appealing. After the citrus-based fragrances (including traditional eaux de colognes), the green scents are the freshest in my opinion. I vastly prefer them to "marine" concoctions. A question of personal taste, of course!
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post #10 of 44
11/10/06 at 10:30am
Bulgari pH was one of the first ten or fifteen scents I tested, and it was the greenest of the lot - I have since smelled much greener, but sniffing it straight from the bottle is forever associated with my initial attempt to categorize it.
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post #11 of 44
11/10/06 at 3:26pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tobbe

[snip]

More thought are always welcome! Which is the greatest of the greens????

/Tobbe

My all-time favorite green is Angélique Noire by Guerlain, but (alas!) people think it's only for girls.

Check out Fresh Tobacco Flower. It's hella green and everybody thinks it's for boys. Other good ones are Herrera 212, and a new one, Billy Jealousy Illicit, just out at Nordstrom.
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post #12 of 44
11/10/06 at 4:36pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by JaimeB

Other good ones are Herrera 212, and a new one, Billy Jealousy Illicit, just out at Nordstrom.

I'll second 212 - the greenest I've encountered.
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post #13 of 44
11/10/06 at 4:43pm
I'll mention Bond #9 - Central Park. It was almost a sweet green gourmand to my untrained nose.
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post #14 of 44
11/11/06 at 3:35am
Thread Starter 
Thanks everybody!

This is all very interesting to read. I hwoleheartedly agree with JaimeB:s first post. Great info on separating the differant types. The lavender is very tricky for me. I love the lavender note and if I smell a fougere I often would like it to have more oak moss and if I smell a chypre I´m missing a stronger lavender note. Hence my frustration. But if you up the lavender in a classic chypre does that make it a fougere? And if you up the moss note in a fougere does that make it a chypre. I know I´m just being silly but sometimes it´s fun to take things to the egde. The most important thing is if you like the scent or not. But since this forum is designed to facilitate the talking about frangrances then it is still a semi-legitimate and for me interesting question.
I also agree about the Bvlgari PH. It is very green, for me again due to the pine note wich is a woody-resinous note and not a green one per definition. With time it grew too synthetic for me and thus loosing the natural aspect that I search for in a green fragrance. Still sniff my decant of it quite often though and wear it at home. Could it be that there is a musk-note in there that pushes it over the edge sometimes and makes it too much. I sometimes compare Bvlgaris fragrances to their jewellery; very well-crafted, exclusive and unique but sometimes just a bit toooo much. It´s a bit like Guerlains Vetiver; sometimes it´s hypnotically interesting and sometimes headache-inducingly tonkaoverloaded and powdery-sweet. But when the grassy drydown remains it is also a nice green fragrance to me.
Actually Bvlgaris thé verte regular and extréme are good green fragrances.

What are your thoughts on vetiver prominent fragrances? Are they green TO YOU or woody or earthy or.... again like with lavender vetiver is kind of a pivot note too.

/Tobbe
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post #15 of 44
11/11/06 at 4:00am
Tobbe mentioned the resinous note, and I do tend to think of it as green, though it could border between green and woody.

One of mine that I like is Crown Marquis, which actor Gary Cooper supposedly said is "The best green fragrance ever," though I find the citrus stands out just as much as (if not a little more than) the green notes. The bold citrus is a bit sour, which I think goes well with the green, sappy part.

But one I find has more of a resinous quality is Nino Cerruti pour Homme. It has a "green note" and galbanum among top notes, pine as a heart note, and fir among the base notes, so it's layered green, or green-woody.

To paraphrase Gordon Gekko in Wall Street, "Green...is good."
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post #16 of 44
11/11/06 at 4:15am
Jock_With_Scents

1 vote for Best username

When it comes to defining what is a green fragrance.. what JamieB said.


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post #17 of 44
11/11/06 at 5:32am
Thread Starter 
I´m with you all the way Spicemeister!! Resins ishe divine link between a green and woody fragrance and this is the place for me when it comes to green scents.
Haven´t tried the Marquis so that one goes directly on my wishlist!
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post #18 of 44
11/11/06 at 10:26am
CdG Calamus is very green to me. It's a watery, grassy green, not a resious, herbal, piney green. Paco Rabanne pour Homme is green, too. It opens with an herbacious blast of what smells like rosemary to me, but is no where near as milky and transparent as Calamus. PR is a bit mossy too, before drying down into the soap smell. Polo is straight up conifers: don't like it. Halston Z-14 is along the same kind of green as Polo. Kouros is another green scent, well, at least for a while before it turns into an animal.

I don't own many green scents: two or three. I like dark smokey stuff, but occasionally will go green.


S
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post #19 of 44
11/11/06 at 11:52am
Quote:
Originally Posted by JaimeB

Green: herbal, leafy, galbanum;
Chypre: citrus topnotes with oakmoss in the base;
Fougère: citrus, lavender, spices, and woods.

Many green fragrances nowadays list violet leaves or ivy or "bamboo" in their top- or heartnotes. I find all these very appealing. After the citrus-based fragrances (including traditional eaux de colognes), the green scents are the freshest in my opinion. I vastly prefer them to "marine" concoctions. A question of personal taste, of course!

I Agree with all of this.When I think of green frags i would think of: Creed's Feuille Verte, EA's Green tea, Lancôme's Ô pour Homme and Miracle L'Aquatonic, R&G's Eau de Thé vert, Fujiyama Green, and lots more...
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post #20 of 44
11/11/06 at 12:29pm
When I think of green fragrances I think of grass, leaves, the smell of broken fresh stems, ripped leaves, or any type of fresh vegetation that has a scent.
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post #21 of 44
11/11/06 at 5:05pm
The greenest scents for me are Calvin Klein Truth & Carolina Herrera 212.
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post #22 of 44
11/27/06 at 3:39pm
I wont try to define it, but I know what it smells like. Try Paul Smith and you will also. Paul Smith is plant-like. I was on a "green" kick at one time. Ive tried Greenergy, 212 and Horizion amongst others. I heard that 212 h20 was a good one , but have yet to run across it.
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post #23 of 44
11/27/06 at 4:35pm
Gray Flannel.
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post #24 of 44
11/27/06 at 6:32pm
Paco Rabanne: Herbal, resinous green (rosemary,thyme)
......then a soapy drydown.


Calamus (CdG): Fresh, sappy, transparent, watery green. Not piney, sprucey or resinous in anyway. I love to wear Calamus in the summer. It's kinda against my religion since I like dark, resinous type frags all year around!
The tangy green note does'nt last very long like I wish it would. The drydown is sorta vanillic, but I always live through it.



S
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post #25 of 44
2/9/10 at 4:03am
When I think about green fragrances, Cafe Green come to mind. It starts off as fresh and light and you can smell the green tea and cedar in it and then it transformes into a sweet oriental scent on my skin.
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post #26 of 44
2/9/10 at 5:24am
Anything with a chunk of galbanum is green to me. My no .1 green galbanum scent is ...Bluebell by Penhaligon's . Right out of the earth, torn green leaves kinda green.
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post #27 of 44
2/9/10 at 2:06pm
What about the classic "green" chypres a.k.a. Y by YSL and JL Scherrer and Mon Parfum by Paloma Picasso? Delicious.
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post #28 of 44
2/9/10 at 3:01pm
I think about leaves when thinking about green. But I dont like the grass green smell, for example the Creed GIT.
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post #29 of 44
2/9/10 at 11:14pm
Everyone else has done a great job of describing green in terms of fragrance notes. All I can add is that the greenest fragrance that I have EVER smelled is Tactics by Shiseido. I have no idea what the green note is in this ultimate green-smelling juice, but Tactics is the perfect representation of "green" to me.
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post #30 of 44
2/9/10 at 11:26pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tobbe View Post

Hi there!

My hunt for a "green fragrance" has led me into several winding roads of surprice. My first conception of a green fragrance was something like Polo Green; smells like a forest. Later I realized that the smell of autumn leaves like that of, say, Rocabar is also a green fragrance for me. I connect green with the smell of the forest.
For me grassy (not the hay scent necessarily), piney, leafy, mossy, slightly earthy and a little herbally, are notes that combine to make a green fragrance.

Many different green smells.
Pine/conifer
mossy
leafy/grassy
herbals
seaweed/seagrass (aromatic aquatics)
Green florals (geranium leaf, sweet pea, violet leaf, etc.)
green citrus (lime, various unripe, petitgrains)
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post #31 of 44
2/10/10 at 4:11am
Usually the smell of wet or fresh cut grass, along with some herbals and citrus give a good impression of green. However I'm not sure I ve ever smelled something green in a totally linear way (I can imagine how boring this could be!). A green scent (with a twist) I recently smelled is Bel Respiro by Chanel.
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post #32 of 44
4/13/12 at 7:23am
Edwards lists Angelique Noire as an Oriental. But, I do think it would be very interesting on a man !
Quote:
Originally Posted by JaimeB View Post

My all-time favorite green is Angélique Noire by Guerlain, but (alas!) people think it's only for girls.

Check out Fresh Tobacco Flower. It's hella green and everybody thinks it's for boys. Other good ones are Herrera 212, and a new one, Billy Jealousy Illicit, just out at Nordstrom.
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post #33 of 44
4/13/12 at 7:42am
Quote:
Originally Posted by evinick View Post

Usually the smell of wet or fresh cut grass, along with some herbals and citrus give a good impression of green.

To me also.
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post #34 of 44
4/13/12 at 7:55am
In my strictly personal opinion, scents with a strong emphasis on herbaceous, under-ripe fruit/citrus, mossy, even slightly resinous notes
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post #35 of 44
4/13/12 at 8:10am
Something reminiscent of crushed fresh plants.
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post #36 of 44
4/13/12 at 10:58am
vetiver and oakmoss Calvin Klein's CK1 and Guerlain's Vetiver come to mind!
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post #37 of 44
4/13/12 at 11:19am
Green Water from Fath is one of THE green fragrances
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post #38 of 44
4/13/12 at 11:27am
green to me is a grassy, herbaceous, sharp smell.

Diptyque - L'ombre dans l'eau
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post #39 of 44
4/13/12 at 11:34am
Hermes un jardin sur le toit comes to mind
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post #40 of 44
4/13/12 at 1:08pm
Green = Vetiver

Vetiver Extraordinaire - can't be more green than this!
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post #41 of 44
4/13/12 at 2:40pm
The Edwards wheel calls many vetivers Woods (when they are paired with aromatic woodsy notes). And Vetiver Pour Elle is not really a green fragrance, even though it has vetiver in it. So, sometimes a vetiver perfume is not a green one .
Quote:
Originally Posted by limaaa View Post

Green = Vetiver

Vetiver Extraordinaire - can't be more green than this!
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post #42 of 44
4/14/12 at 12:11am
Vetiver as a note is very green. Off course that not all vetiver fragrances are green but vetiver as a note is green
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post #43 of 44
4/14/12 at 3:34pm
my greenest smelling fragrance is annick goutal ninfeo mio, which smells like boxwood, green fig trees and crushed lemon leaves
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post #44 of 44
4/14/12 at 10:44pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tobbe View Post

I connect green with the smell of the forest.
A green fragrance traditionally would probably be more of a hay-coumarine-smell

traditional green notes are galbanum, cis-hexanol (and related chemicals, smells like cut grass/green apples), and violet leaf abs. coumarin isn't green. leafy is green. but moss isn't green either, neither are earthy or herbal. these are descriptors in their own right. elements that have a note in virtually any category can have a green note as well.

if you're interested, look up http://www.thegoodscentscompany.com/odor/green.html to see what fragrance ingredients are considered to possess a 'green' note. they are categorized in order, so the ones that are primarily green come first, the ones that just have a tiny green nuance are listed last.
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