Reviews of Blue Grass by Elizabeth Arden
Blue Grass hasn't the glamour of other classics, It may be regarded as somewhere in between tomboyish and dowdy. I think this well-preserved version is wonderful to wear. It is one of those that has me convinced that I smelled it on a family member ages ago and its scent was imprinted deep in my memory bank. It elicits sensations of a distant past and an aching desire to relive it—knowing that it is impossible. Did my mother own this at some point? Did my grandmother? An aunt? A teacher? Maybe it was favorite teacher in elementary school, Mrs. Antaya, 2nd grade. I still remember her warmth and her grin. It is bottled up and bittersweet obsolescence.
There's something about the dusty, distant aldehydes rolling over grey lavender and geranium, like some peculiar fougère. It is spicy and herbaceous, but not in a terribly exuberant manner, which also intrigues me. It reminds me of a sad Old Spice, a pensive Bay Rum, but with some blurred flower arrangement in the periphery. Now I encounter a powdery carnation ghost. Further on, there is a point where it smells like braided sweetgrass in damp air, a certain sweet-musty coumarin hay-like quality. As it winds down, a pale sarsaparilla spill, a woody licorice, a fancy potpourri, a shell soap to the nose. It makes Youth Dew feel thoroughly modern in comparison, and I love it for that.
There's something about the dusty, distant aldehydes rolling over grey lavender and geranium, like some peculiar fougère. It is spicy and herbaceous, but not in a terribly exuberant manner, which also intrigues me. It reminds me of a sad Old Spice, a pensive Bay Rum, but with some blurred flower arrangement in the periphery. Now I encounter a powdery carnation ghost. Further on, there is a point where it smells like braided sweetgrass in damp air, a certain sweet-musty coumarin hay-like quality. As it winds down, a pale sarsaparilla spill, a woody licorice, a fancy potpourri, a shell soap to the nose. It makes Youth Dew feel thoroughly modern in comparison, and I love it for that.
Ahh, Blue Grass...This was my second perfume, after Love's Fresh Lemon (furniture polish...), early 1970's, teenager...so it brings back memories of middle and high school for me. Full disclosure, this review is tainted by memory, mostly good ones...
I think I bought my first bottle at JC Penny at the local mall because it had a cute bottle with a horse embossed in frosted glass, and because my mother recommended it as something I might like. I think she wore it in her youth. Plus, I think she was desperate for me to give up wearing Love's Fresh Lemon, which she hated!
So, I came home with Blue Grass, which was the start of my love affair with dry, woody, lavender and jasmine florals. There is a straight line for me from Blue Grass to my beloved Chanel 19, Nikki de St Phalle, 1000, Sublime.... I also adore Shalimar, but Blue Grass is NOTHING like that, but maybe a bit like Jicky? Blue Grass does have that Lavender/fougere barbershop vibe, and could be unisex.
I had BG in the 1970's, and bought a bottle again in @ 2000. I do think it was changed, or maybe my nose has just become more discerning - I did start off with Love's Fresh Lemon, so things had to improve. The newer version seems harsher, more chemical, and very strong compared to what I remember. The dry floral notes are still there, and it smells like BG, so not completely reformulated like so many scents these days (I'm looking at you, Miss Dior). It is a good daily scent, office-safe IF used with a light hand (Elizabeth Arden fragrances are all inoffensive and office safe, I think). Or, You can use it on your horses, as EA was said to do.
I think I bought my first bottle at JC Penny at the local mall because it had a cute bottle with a horse embossed in frosted glass, and because my mother recommended it as something I might like. I think she wore it in her youth. Plus, I think she was desperate for me to give up wearing Love's Fresh Lemon, which she hated!
So, I came home with Blue Grass, which was the start of my love affair with dry, woody, lavender and jasmine florals. There is a straight line for me from Blue Grass to my beloved Chanel 19, Nikki de St Phalle, 1000, Sublime.... I also adore Shalimar, but Blue Grass is NOTHING like that, but maybe a bit like Jicky? Blue Grass does have that Lavender/fougere barbershop vibe, and could be unisex.
I had BG in the 1970's, and bought a bottle again in @ 2000. I do think it was changed, or maybe my nose has just become more discerning - I did start off with Love's Fresh Lemon, so things had to improve. The newer version seems harsher, more chemical, and very strong compared to what I remember. The dry floral notes are still there, and it smells like BG, so not completely reformulated like so many scents these days (I'm looking at you, Miss Dior). It is a good daily scent, office-safe IF used with a light hand (Elizabeth Arden fragrances are all inoffensive and office safe, I think). Or, You can use it on your horses, as EA was said to do.
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Long before the Elizabeth Arden company became a juggernaut of brand portfolio management, they were actually known for quality well-composed perfumes that sat in the same upper-middle class market space as Coty or Revlon. Those other cosmetic companies also grew into portfolio management firms too and seldom put out their own house-branded fragrances these days, so in another conversation there could be something said about there being no money in marketing proper perfumes to the middle classes anymore, but I'll spare everyone the hypocritical socioeconomic injustice rant because this is a review about perfume, a luxury good that symbolizes decadence. Blue Grass (1934) is one of the earliest perfumes from the house, and was composed by Georges Fuchs who was on loan from Fragonard for the task, a task he fulfilled rather ably. For obvious reasons Blue Grass is an aldehydic perfume created in the wake of the monstrous Chanel No. 5 (1921), a perfume which made popular the heavy use of aldehydes, a note that had otherwise been powering the openings of perfume to a lesser extent since the dawn of the chypre, but Blue Grass is surprisingly not a chypre. Instead, Georges Fuchs cleverly infuses the aldehyde floral with the base of a fougère, a rather neat trick considering the fougère had yet to be fully-pegged as a masculine style at this point. There is the typical lavender/tonka/oakmoss fougère structure in Blue Grass, but it is obfuscated with white florals and chypre-like arrangements of woody notes to hide it, and ultimately the perfume is rendered rather clean and safe compared to its contemporaries.
The opening of Blue Grass is the expected huge push of aldehydes and bergamot, with orange blossom and powdery notes similar to D'Orsay Etiquette Bleue (1908) coming into the fore. From this opening a bit of that lavender peeks into the accord, easy to miss if you don't know to look for it, but serving the purpose to round off the otherwise harsh opening into the floral heart. Jasmine, rose, and carnation make a very classic floral combination in this heart, something which many have smelled countless times in other old 20th century perfumes shilled to women, and it honestly never gets old if you're a fan of florals from an age before the use of synthetic-adulterated "absolutes" taking the place of honest-to-goodness oils. The powderiness remains into the heart, with narcissus and tuberose joining the jasmine to add a tiny bit of fleshy musk-like virility, but it doesn't stay. Blue Grass is still mostly a "proper lady-like" scent, but not without its flirtations. The base is a nice sandalwood the likes of which you won't see again due to over-harvesting, and coumarin does more rounding and building of the indolic musk that starts in the heart, with sweet benzoin and oakmoss serving as skin retention. Blue Grass finally succumbs to its own powderiness at the skin level, reminding me a bit of D'Orsay Intoxication (1938) in the final moments, sharp, resolute, and serious. The fougère accord softens and pads what would otherwise end up a really rather cold floral experience, and that's perhaps the magic in the method of Georges Fuchs, since this accord instead makes Blue Grass soapy, clean, and welcoming, just not sexy even by standards of the day.
The person wearing Blue Grass in the 21st century is someone with an immense appreciation for classic styles of perfume and wearing it for personal enjoyment only, as something like this is so far from the norm now that it's amazing Elizabeth Arden even still bottles it in whatever reformulated version exists on the market today, but here we are. Wear time for my sample is over 8 hours with moderate sillage, but there are so many permutations of this I can't speak authoritatively on it. I imagine the reverence for this is on a much more minor scale to that of Chanel No. 5 or Jean Patou Joy (1930), as the perfume "my mom and her mom wore so I wear" kind of deal. Men could easily pull this off if they like powdery white florals, and enough of that fougère accord underpins it all that this could easily sneak in as a post-modernist barbershop kind of scent like Caswell-Massey Jocky CLubs (1840) once the aldehydes and indoles burn off. Likely there is more respect for Blue Grass in middle America than in Europe, since Elizabeth Arden was the brand bought by many Midwestern girls who dreamed of Chanel someday but tired of Avon from Mom, using their first bit of spending coin to grab a bottle from the local general store and "smell like a lady". As for me, generations of time and shifting gender paradigms have rendered Blue Grass as rather unisex in tone to my nose, and it's a real gem of "the old ways" that smells slightly atypical for the era but is clean enough to hang with "younger" styles, so long as it hangs in the back of the room on someone bookish enough to make it work. Thumbs up.
The opening of Blue Grass is the expected huge push of aldehydes and bergamot, with orange blossom and powdery notes similar to D'Orsay Etiquette Bleue (1908) coming into the fore. From this opening a bit of that lavender peeks into the accord, easy to miss if you don't know to look for it, but serving the purpose to round off the otherwise harsh opening into the floral heart. Jasmine, rose, and carnation make a very classic floral combination in this heart, something which many have smelled countless times in other old 20th century perfumes shilled to women, and it honestly never gets old if you're a fan of florals from an age before the use of synthetic-adulterated "absolutes" taking the place of honest-to-goodness oils. The powderiness remains into the heart, with narcissus and tuberose joining the jasmine to add a tiny bit of fleshy musk-like virility, but it doesn't stay. Blue Grass is still mostly a "proper lady-like" scent, but not without its flirtations. The base is a nice sandalwood the likes of which you won't see again due to over-harvesting, and coumarin does more rounding and building of the indolic musk that starts in the heart, with sweet benzoin and oakmoss serving as skin retention. Blue Grass finally succumbs to its own powderiness at the skin level, reminding me a bit of D'Orsay Intoxication (1938) in the final moments, sharp, resolute, and serious. The fougère accord softens and pads what would otherwise end up a really rather cold floral experience, and that's perhaps the magic in the method of Georges Fuchs, since this accord instead makes Blue Grass soapy, clean, and welcoming, just not sexy even by standards of the day.
The person wearing Blue Grass in the 21st century is someone with an immense appreciation for classic styles of perfume and wearing it for personal enjoyment only, as something like this is so far from the norm now that it's amazing Elizabeth Arden even still bottles it in whatever reformulated version exists on the market today, but here we are. Wear time for my sample is over 8 hours with moderate sillage, but there are so many permutations of this I can't speak authoritatively on it. I imagine the reverence for this is on a much more minor scale to that of Chanel No. 5 or Jean Patou Joy (1930), as the perfume "my mom and her mom wore so I wear" kind of deal. Men could easily pull this off if they like powdery white florals, and enough of that fougère accord underpins it all that this could easily sneak in as a post-modernist barbershop kind of scent like Caswell-Massey Jocky CLubs (1840) once the aldehydes and indoles burn off. Likely there is more respect for Blue Grass in middle America than in Europe, since Elizabeth Arden was the brand bought by many Midwestern girls who dreamed of Chanel someday but tired of Avon from Mom, using their first bit of spending coin to grab a bottle from the local general store and "smell like a lady". As for me, generations of time and shifting gender paradigms have rendered Blue Grass as rather unisex in tone to my nose, and it's a real gem of "the old ways" that smells slightly atypical for the era but is clean enough to hang with "younger" styles, so long as it hangs in the back of the room on someone bookish enough to make it work. Thumbs up.
I've been wearing this since the late 70's, early 80's. Has it changed? Yes. Do I care? No. It is still one of my "go to" aldehydic perfumes. It comes on strong, for the top and middle notes. The base is sweet and mellow.
I like the lavender and lily, on top. The spices, carnation, and rose fill the middle. The base of Tonka, musk, benzoin, and cedar, are just right.
I am taken back in time, to more innocent times of my youth when I wear this. I'm old now -- I can get away with wearing this.
I like the lavender and lily, on top. The spices, carnation, and rose fill the middle. The base of Tonka, musk, benzoin, and cedar, are just right.
I am taken back in time, to more innocent times of my youth when I wear this. I'm old now -- I can get away with wearing this.
A very dry and fresh combination of lavender, neroli and bergamot, fading with the gentle support of carnation, rose, jasmine, tuberose and narcissus, to a warm powdery base of sandalwood, benzoin, musk and tonka.
This took me by surprise as what I read about it did not form an olfactory premonition in my head. It is quite singular and a refreshing splash for spring and autumn.
One of the greats from 1934. Highly recommended for both men and women. I think men would particularly like this for the dryness of its floral notes.
This took me by surprise as what I read about it did not form an olfactory premonition in my head. It is quite singular and a refreshing splash for spring and autumn.
One of the greats from 1934. Highly recommended for both men and women. I think men would particularly like this for the dryness of its floral notes.
Green with elegancethe relaunched version:Orange, lavender and aldehydes in the opening blast settle down quickly into a traditional floral drydown dominated by jasmine and rose. At this stage I get a strong indolic component with benzoin admixed in the background. Some green notes emanate, and in the base a tonka with wood impression forms the finale. Less green that its name promises, not intrusive and at times not without elegant restraint. Four hours longevity.
I always wanted to be able to wear this one. We've all heard the stories about Elizabeth Arden, her farm in Kentucky, and her race horses. Unfortunately what may smell like lovely blue grass on my friends and relatives smells on me like what Elizabeth's race horses have unloaded on that beautiful blue grass.
I've been looking for a new lavender fragrance recently and I realized just the other day that this one has a fairly dominant lavender note so I decided to go to my local drug store today and spray a little of it on myself. I have to say, it's actually pretty nice! It goes on mostly smelling like lavender (on me) and when it dries down it gets a somewhat spicy smell that reminds me of some men's body washes. It also vaguely reminded me of fragrances like Cachet by Prince Matchabelli or Halston by Halston. When I got home I sprayed some Cachet on myself just to check. There is a definite similarity in the way the two fragrances come across, but cachet definitely seems light and subtle by comparison. Blue Grass is stronger for sure. It says here that it's marketed toward women, but I would say that this one is actually unisex, at least, based on the way it smells on me. I mostly like it, but I keep thinking that I'd love to have a bar of soap that smells like this. I'm not sure if I'd actually wear the perfume. Plus, I noticed that the longevity of this fragrance isn't great. I also tested Touch of Pink by Lacoste on my other arm and I noticed that Touch of Pink, even though it's an extremely light, subtle scent, actually has greater staying power. I could still smell that one clearly after washing my arm with soap and water, but Blue Grass mostly washed off! So..it may as well be a scented soap as opposed to a bottled fragrance. That's the only real negative thing I have to say about it though.Aside from that, it's pretty nice.
Well I must be an odd-ball, because I've always loved this one. It's one that comes and goes, I pick it up, use it, then don't use it for ages, then rekindle it again. I'm currently in a rekindle phase, and I still love it. It is powdery, and powdery fragrances are usually ones I avoid, but this has something unusual and genteel about it, certainly a 'granny' fragrance in some ways, but I find that depends who is wearing it. I wore this when I was in my late teens and early twenties and now I'm in my 50s and still love it. It's comforting (to me) and warm, and safe. Also, it has longevity like you wouldn't believe. I always appreciate a perfume that lasts and lasts...
Smells like smoke and disinfectant. For a similar experience, attend a barbecue in a public toilet. Actually the base notes are okay, but still smell like cheap hand cream. Sorry, but have no idea why anyone would want to smell like this! Big thumbs down.
I really wanted to like this one but I couldnt, I liked the smell from the bottle, very clean and fresh, but it smelt so peculiar on my skin, and I normally like old fashioned scents.It smells very nice on my friend so I gave it to her. The lavender in the fragrance I think put me off.
This is a very simple and pleasurable creation, only marred by a brief but unpleasant phase in the opening, and an uninspired base. The aldehyde presence is not pronounced, yet it gives the top notes a cleansed, somewhat astringent feel. Some minutes in, an excessively dry and bitter note is discernable, that is slightly jarring and out of place. This strident accord seems to be a combination of rose and carnation, but it is only at the peak of its intensity that it feels excessive. Thereafter, Blue Grass softens considerably, and the emergent tuberose is allowed to provide a slightly sweet,almond hue. I would have preferred a more robust and woody base, but the notes beyond the heart offer very little of interest. For me, this is on the cusp of thumbs up and neutral, but the weak finish ensures that I should probably mark it down.
Aww, I WANT to love it, the whole package is so charming. It opens with lots of powder and aldehydes and jasmine, and pretty much continues in this vein, minus all the aldehydes, and growing all the more powdery. I get only jasmine, and I suppose tuberose, no other flowery notes. The first 15 minutes are too powerful, then there's a grace period of minutes where it's charming, then it's too powdery all the way. It is in the Je Reviens style, but Je Reviens is WAY more successful and refined. This one seems... hmm... well, 'cheap' in the sense that I'd prefer it diluted as a refreshing spray. But diluted a LOT.
My guesses as to the notes were- jasmine, gardenia, tuberose and powder. It is quite sweet and powdery and smells like my 80+ year old granny's White Shoulders. I like it on her, but could never pull it off. It actually has a pleasant drydown, clean skin. Still, its quite old fashioned and the first sniff may knock your socks off.
I used Blue Grass in college, but not much. I bought it again at Marshall's this past fall and remembered why it wasn't worn much. It makes my throat sore and my nose itch and burn. It might smell good, but I can't get past the allergic reaction. Don't know what aldehyde or tonka are, so maybe one of those is the culprit! All of the Elizabeth Arden scents bother my nose and throat. It would be interesting to see if they share a common base.
I did love blue Grass a few yrs ago, but one winter I had a respiratory infection and wore perfume a little too soon, yes, it was this one. I couldn't wear it again. Was at a college orientation in january and all the people in the room... me being sick... Blue grass perfume permeating my breathing space.... just couldn't wear it again although it was a pretty scent.
With Blue Grass I get an herbal / floral opening with lots of aldehydes. I enjoy the aldehydes and the indoles. There already is a strong powder in the opening accord. It's quite nice in a rather old-fashioned way. The jasmine and tuberose from the heart accord come rather strongly a bit too strongly for me. It is probably the tuberose that I find gets rather cloying I never have trouble with jasmine. Between these two florals, there is certainly some serious indole action happening. I don't smell the rose or the carnation at all, just the white florals. After the aldehydes and indoles wear off and the white florals settle down, I become aware of why the fragrance was named as it is: The drydown is quite grassy and a bit floral with some sweetness, wood, and musk. The grassiness contributes a very nice rustic herbal / green feel to the floral drydown but I don't enjoy it because there's just too much powder in the mixture. The powder is extreme, and while I didn't mind it at first, it eventually gets disproportionate. I enjoy this fragrance except for the excessive powder. (Edit of 21 December 2008 review.)
I had read about this scent and was intrigued. It was for sale at Marshalls for under ten dollars so I decided to give it a try. When I got into the car I greedily ripped open the box and sprayed. While I thought it smelled like the sanitizers used in a public restroom, my husband declared that it smelled like urinal cake. We were both reminded of public restrooms.
My grandmother used to wear it - and I'm afraid this is where this perfume belongs - in the past. I don't think it has weathered well and now sits rather uncomfortably next to the modern array of scents on offer.Blue grass is almost suffocatingly powdery and aldehydic. It's also floral and herbal, but those qualities are drowned out. There's a story that Arden used to spray this on her beloved horses and that does sound rather believable.Whoever said this smells like Shalimar hasn't tried this, or Shalimar. The two scents are not even slightly alike.
This was my mother's favorite as a teen. She says she used to finish detassling corn in the Iowa fields, take a shower and spritz herself and nothing smelled as wonderful. I'm not sure how truly wonderful it is but it IS a nice 50's midwestern farm girl kind of fragrance. Actually, the jasmine is quite overpowering in the beginning and a little strong, but the drydown is nice and soft. There is definitely something like sweet grass about it and that is not at all bad, but personally I prefer the sweet grassiness of Dior's Dune. Still, it's nice to have a bottle of history around.
Sorry, but meh. I had been built up to expect a good classic.Smells like a "just acceptable" run-of-the-mill everyday chores-around-the home and going-to-do-the-groceries scent.Just very "bleh"...Does remind me feintly of L'air du Temps, and the largely white floral heart dominates too loudly and too proudly.This perfume would be a greatd deal better, had it been more oportunely balanced.
I have to say I love this on others, on me it just doesn't smell like anything at all...seems to sink into my skin or just float away within minutes. My best friend wears it all of the time and I can tell when she is around because I can smell her coming??? Go figure??? I do think that on average, women like Blue Grass (at least the ones who still remember it :))
This smell is from the natural spray perfume mist, white horse enamel bottle. Opens with a minty lightly herbal lavender with heady jasmine tuberose combo. The jasmine tuberose is joined by lemony rose. Only later in the drydown do I smell orange along with mildly fatty, sweetish sandalwood. The lavender is present throughout, although by the end it has more softness like hay. A light floral with herb tea like notes.
Classic Thirties scent -- reminds me of my grandmother's dressing table. Like Miss Dior and L'air du Temps, this inexpensive fragrance is among the "must-haves" for any young woman who wants her first "grown up" fragrances.