Welcome to Perfume Guide
An online resource to perfume and fragrances from around the world, past and present. Use our extensive descriptions and resources to find your perfect perfume.

The Language of Perfume
Perfume is a sensory experience and this has influenced the language used to describe the different layers of aromas present in a perfume.

Perfumers and Fine Fragrance experts often use language associated with music and the pleasure associate to the listening to music. The different layers of a perfume, the top middle and bottom, are often described as the different chords of a fragrance; evoking images of a classical symphony. Other musical terms commonly used include notes and tones; these are often used to delineate individual scents evident in a perfume that define each layer or describe the totality of the fragrance. This means of classifying perfumes was popularised by the famous Perfumer Charles Piesse in the 19th Century who attempted to arrange perfumes in the same manner, as a composer would describe a musical arrangement. The project failed but his use of musical language engaged the generation in how they thought about perfume as a pleasurable sensory experience and ensured that the terminology stuck.

Connoisseurs have begun to describe fragrances in terms of a visual pyramid, to engage people’s visual imagination when choosing a scent. William Poucher was one of the first to be credited with inventing the visual image of the ‘fragrance pyramid’ to denote the top, middle and foundations of a perfume and visually delineate the relative lasting power of each layer. Poucher designed this image by measuring the evaporation rates of perfume ingredients, and arranging them on a scale of 100, with the fastest evaporating ingredients ranking closer to the top.

Finally, fragrances are often linked and described to the sensory perception of touch ‘feelings’ and thoughts. Perfumers will often describe a fragrance in terms of its warmth, coolness or softness in order to convey general thoughts about a fragrance.

The culmination of these sensory terms often allows the Perfumer to convey an impression about a fragrance and helps them to improve the quality of service. However, more interestingly, this language explores and exposes how people think and view the pleasure of purchasing and wearing a fragrance.