The Favourite
Penhaligon's (2020)

One of a box I received as a Christmas present, and a scent - and company - I've never experienced before. And if this scent, "The Favourite", had been the only one, I would have binned it and written off Penhaligon's as not for me. The problem is the overwhelmingly sweet and suffocating powdery notes, probably coming from the freesia, which stifle any other impressions and made me immediately need to scrub it off. I am so disappointed, especially as I love violet, but I could not detect any violet at all, so dense was the powdery-sweet freesia. There are one or two other samples in this box that I like a lot, but this one just smells cheap and nasty to me, like someone piling on the talc to hide an unwashed body. If I could give a minus mark, I would.

I bought blind, having rejected a few testers of “portraits” and Halfeti variations but absolutely loving Constantinople. Quite a gamble, £160 for the 100ml EdP, as a Christmas gift for my daughter-in-law, so a bit risky. Well, I was not dissatisfied or disappointed with this. Perfect floral fits right in with the very best. Curiously I am “freesia blind” I can’t smell them, my wife’s favourite flower fragrance, when I smell the actual flowers, I just get top quality black peppercorns. So, trying a sniff of this on Christmas morning was challenging. The whole group was instantly impressed, a classy floral, I loved the violet and citrus top notes but that’s just me, the jasmine pulls through and that’s another top favourite floral of mine, the musk/sandalwood base is perfect for me. In short if I was designing a fragrance for a timeless feminine standard. A very lucky choice for a gift.

The top notes of freesia have a captivating aroma, with bergamot and citrus notes almost overwhelmed by a strong lipo flower. The middle-note iris taste is very light, so it does not smell like the sweetness of iris, but the slightly bitter taste of orris root, which is combined with the light fragrance of mimosa. Although it looks very light, it is actually a bit heavy. People seem to be in a pile of powder all the time. I can hardly smell the musk and sandalwood at the end, a perfume with a very short lifespan, and I can't smell too much layering. A fragrance that is acceptable but would not repurchase.