Report: Women’s perfumes containing ‘masculine’ notes are having a moment

By

Barbara Santamaria

Published
Jul 10, 2017

Whilst women have traditionally opted for floral notes when it comes to their signature scent, a new survey has unveiled that British women are now opting for woody or spicy notes - habitually regarded as ‘masculine’.

According to research by bath and shower experts Showerstoyou.co.uk, some of the world’s most popular perfumes contain ‘masculine’ notes, including Tom Ford’s fragrant hit Black Orchid.

Showerstoyou analysed the favourite fragrances for more than 66,000 participants using perfume encyclopaedia site Fragrantica and found that 70% of women’s top-voted perfumes have masculine woody or spicy notes.

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Women’s current favourite fragrances include Coco Mademoiselle by Chanel, Hypnotic poison by Dior, Alien by Mugler, D&G Light Blue by Dolce and Gabbana and Lolita Lempicka by Lolita Lempicka.

With the global fragrance and perfume market now worth over £31 billion, these new insights can be powerful and help companies drive growth. But it’s not just women who like heady male aromas in their fragrances as the research has revealed that 63% of men seem to like them on women too.

After consulting academic research from universities around the world, Showerstoyou.co.uk found that smell has a heavy impact on human sexual behaviour. Aw woman’s natural smell around ovulation has proven to be preferred by men, compared to at other points in her cycle, and smell also raises a man’s testosterone levels.

Additionally, perfumes have an impact on our judgment of others, with a study conducted by academics from Scotland, Austria and the Czech Republic revealing that people were rated as more attractive when they had perfume on.