A vocabulary for your own taste
Find a direction.
Keep an open nose.
Scent families make a large perfume counter easier to navigate. Our eight plain-language tags are an editorial browsing tool; they are not a reproduction of a licensed fragrance wheel.
Citrus
A direction built around the impression of peel, zest or citrus juice. Bergamot with flowers differs from lemon with salt and woods.
Examples in the library: Essential Parfums Nice Bergamote · Imaginary Authors Saint Julep · Essential Parfums Rose Magnetic
Green & aromatic
Leaves, herbs, grass or a tea-like impression. Compare freshness with sweetness: mint beside sugar creates a different idea from herbs beside peppery woods.
Examples in the library: Imaginary Authors Saint Julep · Etat Libre d’Orange You Or Someone Like You · Essential Parfums Bois Imperial
Floral
Flowers can be fresh, fruity, powdery, rich or green. Name the flower and its supporting notes instead of deciding that you like or dislike every floral.
Examples in the library: Essential Parfums Nice Bergamote · Etat Libre d’Orange You Or Someone Like You · Essential Parfums Rose Magnetic
Woody
An umbrella for different textures, from spare and dry to creamy or earthy. Sandalwood with tea and patchouli with Iso E Super offer different comparisons.
Examples in the library: Escentric Molecules Molecule 01 · Escentric Molecules Molecule 01 + Patchouli · BDK Parfums Gris Charnel
Warm & ambery
A warm, resinous or enveloping direction. It is a descriptive family, not a guarantee that a perfume contains a literal piece of amber.
Examples in the library: Escentric Molecules Molecule 01 + Patchouli · BDK Parfums Gris Charnel · Hiram Green Slowdive
Gourmand
An impression connected with food, such as coffee, caramel, vanilla or rice. Gourmand does not always mean very sugary.
Examples in the library: Hiram Green Slowdive · Theodoros Kalotinis Coffee Addict · Montale Intense Cafe
Soft & musky
A broad soft or musky direction, sometimes described as close or minimal. A musk label does not certify quiet projection or particular ingredients.
Examples in the library: Escentric Molecules Molecule 01 · d’Annam White Rice
Marine
Salt, sea air and aquatic impressions. It can overlap citrus or woods and need not suggest sweet beach drinks.
Examples in the library: Heeley Sel Marin
A family is a starting question
If you enjoy one woody fragrance, use that as a clue. Ask whether you liked its dryness, warmth, spice or a specific note. The next sample can keep one feature while changing another. That gives you more useful information than treating every woody scent as a match.
Different classification systems use different groups. Michael Edwards’ Fragrances of the World explains its own classification work; Diptyque describes four main fragrance families. Our library’s tags help navigate this small selection and do not claim agreement with either system.