I recently got into fragrances (perfumes), and it’s been an interesting journey. I never thought I’d get into something like this, but I’m enjoying it – it’s been a form of character development, especially for the better.
Throughout my life, I’ve received many comments and exhortations from people close to me about how I groom myself or the lack thereof. As a young man, I went through an “I don’t care about how I look” phase, wanting to be authentic and stick it to societal norms. That phase was great while it lasted. However, I prefer natural progression rather than being coerced or forced into change. And that’s where I find myself now – I can’t believe I’m starting to care about personal grooming.
I still love being apathetic about how people perceive me based on my outfit choices. But that mindset has felt tiresome for quite some time. I think part of natural progression is understanding the need to progress because stagnation can be boring, unenriching, and unfulfilling.
What’s That Smell?
One day, I encountered someone wearing an intriguing scent that reminded me of aging wet wood. Initially, I had a negative impression because aging wet wood isn’t something people typically get excited about smelling daily. But as the days passed and this person consistently wore that scent, it grew on me. I realized it was an actual fragrance they were wearing, and I associated that scent with their persona. That’s when I understood the concept of a trademark scent – someone who wants to be associated with a fragrance that relates to their desired personality, mood, and impressions.
To me, that’s a fascinating proposition: a trademark scent that speaks for me as a person, much like how my clothing choices apparently speak for me, regardless of how I put them together. I had already been contemplating having a typical style, a capsule wardrobe (another intriguing concept), that also reflects who I am or how I want people to perceive me. Having a signature scent beyond my mom’s fabric conditioner seemed like a good addition to this exercise.
Up until that point, like many grooming aspects, I didn’t care about fragrances. It was an enigma to me, something I thought only women cared about. In my family, the women were in charge of selecting fragrances for me before I cared about it myself. So, I examined a dupe fragrance they had gotten me, something I had been using without much thought, and deliberately sought to appreciate its characteristics for the first time. It was an Aqua Di Gio copy, and following an Internet-backed heuristic, I asked myself if it was consistent with the personality I wanted to project to my colleagues, friends, family, and social circle. I became set on the idea of having an all-rounder, everyday scent.
As far as my nose could tell, Aqua Di Gio was okay, but it wasn’t “me.” And that’s how I went down the rabbit hole I’m currently in – the whole reason I’m writing about this experience of finding my fragrance.
Rabbit Hole 101
I realize this isn’t really different from other niches or interests. There seems to be both a technical and social aspect built around a framework for each interest. I’ve seen this in music, music-making, audio, etc. Unsurprisingly, you get the same sorts of people: picky ones who are a bit snobby and won’t entertain things considered “mainstream” or too widely used. Then, there are the typical “centrists” who seem more focused on bridging the gap between sheer geekery and mere mortals like me when it comes to making sense of “notes” and whatnot.
“Leathery, citrusy, sweet, floral, musky…” These descriptors remind me a lot of coffee connoisseurs; it’s been a challenging thing for me to get into, but I’m becoming more confident. I’m guessing the key is to keep smelling things – the same way I would try out more types of coffee, music, food, wine, and so on. Eventually, I seem to understand what I like more (or less) of and become more confident in identifying what “works” for me or what I want to achieve with it.
That’s cool to me: taking the time to learn how to appreciate things until you can pick out the differences and wield them in a way to come up with (hopefully) better things for yourself or the world around you. It takes patience to find the “right one” for you, but I feel like it could be worth it.
I’m not always a nerd on things, though. I was never an audiophile, but like in my search for a signature scent, I also wanted to determine my preferred “sound signature.” Is it going to be a V-shape? U-shape? Bright? Warm? Mid-rangey? What’s a “shouty” pair? An “anemic” bass? For me, that was just a bit too much to get into (and a ton of money to spend on, unsurprisingly). I opted to refocus on just getting a pair that I like and sticking to it. With the help of Crinacle, I settled on the CCA CRA for my universal in-ears. I had no other choice but to stick with my AV32 studio monitors at this point. And an ATHM40x seems well-respected enough for a pair of cans when making music; they don’t suck. My bespoke INM customs are what they are; they get the job done decently: not too much bass, not too much treble, and I get the noise isolation I need for what I’d use them for. Done.
When it comes to music gear, my current electric guitar uses the cheapest components that many gearheads would raise eyebrows at: basswood, stock pickups, whitelabel, and China-made. Yet it’s refreshing to see a huge pushback against that sort of behavior, especially when it starts going overboard, into a more fulfilling, efficient, encouraging, and less daunting way of going about it; to simply go for the ones you find an emotional connection with while still working and playing like the instrument that it takes its form as (which is where actual technical know-how comes in handy).
I’m thinking there can be a balance here: knowing just enough to navigate through rabbit holes but staying practical and focused enough on what you want to achieve without getting stuck in the resource-intensive labyrinth of geekery. In the case of fragrances, collecting originals is simply prohibitive for me for the overwhelming majority, and even just going for an array of dupes or decants to definitively identify the smell I want becomes daunting.
Right Under My Nose
And I say that having already spent a considerable amount of time hopping from one mall to another over the course of more than a couple of weeks, asking for and smelling samples of the stuff a lot of people talk about on the Internet (because it’d be quite ridiculous to just ask for samples of every single fragrance on display). This yielded a tiring yet meaningful experience on top of an expanded knowledge base (plus the vocabulary that it comes with), and two fragrances: Dior Sauvage and Davidoff Cool Water.
Many people say that these fragrances are quite far apart; they don’t belong to the same category. Many also say that Dior Sauvage is tired at this point as it has become associated with young playboys, while Cool Water has simply been out of style for the most part. Not new enough, not unique enough, ergo not desirable enough; shouldn’t wear them.
If there’s a final takeaway here, it would be the most recent thing I learned about fragrances after having been at the brink of pulling my hair out due to growing frustration: layering, which means exactly what it implies – spraying one fragrance over another to create your own signature scent, something new and uniquely yours. Of course, this is provided that the combination actually performs for all stakeholders, myself included.
I haven’t tried layering yet, but tiring as this rabbit hole has been, I somehow managed to hold onto the belief that falling into it would be worth it after all if only for the prospect of – what do you know – having the knowledge to create better things for yourself and the world around you.
Photo by Christin Hume on Unsplash
Disclosure: Fully drafted by me and used Claude for minor clean-ups.