But that's not to say that I don't like it. I do - I like it very much. It's big, and friendly, and sweet. The word that comes to mind is "affable". The image that comes to mind is a big, fluffy, friendly, but perhaps not-too-bright cat.
The official notes are tuberose, gardenia, jasmine, rose, green notes, and peach. It doesn't have any of the aldehydic or shrill aspects that I expected from that list - instead, it's mellow and buttery, very comfortable. There's just enough sour to balance the ample sweetness, like doctoring your iced tea with far too much sugar and then getting the lemon just right - you know that it's all too much, practically syrup, but it tastes so good.
I can see why this is so well-loved, and why it brings up so many happy nostalgic memories for so many women. To them, it seems to be about teenage sunburned beach afternoons. I don't have that association, so I read it as, well, furry, rather than beachy. Mink stoles or feather boas or, again, that cat.
It's linear, or essentially linear. It does shift a bit in the first twenty minutes or so as it dries, but that beginning doesn't feel like planned top notes so much as an inevitable phase that you have to wait to, to get to the "real" fragrance. Then it's all sweet, thick, flowery buttercream.
Review Roundup: Scentzilla! and Perfume Posse and Perfume-Smellin' Things (very brief mention) and Scentzilla! again and Now Smell This (brief mention) and Perfume Posse (brief mention) and Perfume-Smellin' Things (one line) and Fragrantica and Basenotes and MakeupAlley.
Photo: By Halved Sandwich. Wikimedia Commons.
