Sunflowers
Elizabeth Arden (1993)

A lovely orchestra of notes to start. A good balance of fruits. Touch of green. Some creaminess. Very bright, with a hint of wood. It is definitely an Elizabeth Arden scent.

The middle reveals more greenish notes. Flowers are well-mixed, hard to pick out singularly. So far, I've enjoyed the top notes more than the middle. Now, it has definitely turned into a "mainstream" floral.

Lots of lily of the valley emerges over time. It becomes more woodsy and green. However, this one is gone from my skin in a matter of a couple hours. At least I finally got around to trying this one. I'd always been curious...

I bought this because a full 100ml bottle only cost me about $1.It's not my favourite and it's not even something I would buy if it was full price, but it's decent enough to wear when you don't want to waste your treasured scent on a normal day, or just want something to spritz on after shower.

I bought this one purely for nostalgic reasons, plus I found a 100ml for less than $10 so why not? It's funny to see how many of these reviews are memory/nostalgia based comments, because that's exactly my connection to this perfume. Does it smell cheap, plastic, and terrible? I don't know, I guess it does to some people, but not me. Personally, the memories connected to it are so strong that it's nearly impossible to be objective. I don't usually like (nor write) reviews that describe a memory/fragrance link, but because it seems to be a theme on BN for Sunflowers, here is mine:

The winter in the mid-1990's, I'm 11 or 12 years old and my friend took me along to the Florida Keys on a family vacation. His sister, 15 or so at the time, got to bring a friend too…and she brought Ann. Oh, Ann. I was still at the age where talking to girls wasn't easy (if not impossible) never mind talking to two older, gorgeous, tall, leggy high school girls who perpetually wore bikini tops and cut-off jean shorts. Ann and my friends' sister got tipsy one night and flirted with me…a lot. Ann wore Sunflowers. I know this because she sprayed some on her bare long neck and asked me to smell it. I was in heaven, pure bliss…it was more the situation than the perfume, but you know what they say about scent and memories.

It's my first strong memory of that cosmically powerful, burning desire towards the opposite sex, and Sunflowers played a lead role. How can I not still love it?

Innocuous enough, pleasant green floral from Arden.

It does have a plastic under scent that can give it a "cheap" feeling. I am most reminded of Arden's other paean to the fields, Blue Grass, which it resembles.

Nothing at all special, and therefore highly affordable.

Top notes: Lemon, Rosewood, Neroli, Mandarin
Middle notes: Cyclamen, Muguet, Rose, Jasmine, Orris
Base notes: Cedar, Musk, Amber, Moss

Nothing to go out of your way for.

Floral & fruityOrange, mandarin, bergamot and a bit of cantaloup start it off, to be followed by jasmine. Then Sunflower kicks in quite a pleasant way. Later in the drydown a bit of wood is added, but essentially this is and remains a medium-sweet yet never cloying floral scent that is clearly synthetic and linear on my skin, but quite nice. What is really decent is the projection and the silage, and the longevity of over six hours on me.

This is probably the worst fragrance that has ever been created. It smells cheap, smothersome, sickening, like those flowers we used to put in the garden to repel bugs and slugs (marigolds?). Any $2 fragrance from the bargain bin at a flea market would beat this vile mess. And all the toxic knockoffs that came along.....