This Week at Elevated Classics: Perfume Icks, Chanel Obsessions, and the Past Calling Back
A weekly recap of the articles, videos, perfume thoughts, and scent conversations shaping Elevated Classics.
This week on Elevated Classics, I kept returning to the strange emotional life of perfume: the notes that seduce us, the ones that repel us, the classics that continue to feel alive, and the new voices trying to build something with feeling and identity.
I wrote about the underworld of perfume “icks,” revisited Chanel through Jersey, Allure, and 1957, spent time with Spoturno 1921 after my visit to Galerie Vivienne, and explored Investi Parfums as a new niche house with a Turkish connection and an emotional concept.
On video, the week moved through elegant perfumes for women, jasmine with grown-woman polish, Chanel 1957 obsession, and new launches worth noticing.
Here is what went live this week.
The Perfume Ick List: Notes That Turn People Off
Perfume can be beautiful, seductive, comforting, and transportive. It can also be weirdly divisive. This piece looks at the scent reactions people rarely organize properly: neroli that reads as “public bathroom,” blackcurrant bud that gets called “cat pee,” musks that move between clean laundry and body odor, and other notes that trigger strong reactions.
It is a guide to the strange language people use when perfume goes wrong on the skin, in the air, or in memory.
Read: The Perfume Ick List: Notes That Turn People Off
The Best 10 Perfumes for Women
After years of smelling, buying, reviewing, and collecting perfume, my taste has become very clear: iris, musk, orange blossom, jasmine, soft woods, powder, and light.
This list brings together ten perfumes I return to again and again because they feel refined, feminine, lasting, and emotionally right. These are the perfumes that have stayed with me through seasons, moods, and phases of my collection.
Read: The Best 10 Perfumes for Women
Modern Perfumery Pays Homage to the Past with Spoturno 1921
I had smelled Spoturno 1921 before I understood it. The perfume first came to me through a discovery set, but it changed after I visited the Spoturno boutique at Galerie Vivienne in Paris and met Véronique Spoturno Coty and Christopher Sheldrake.
This piece is about heritage, modern French luxury, family memory, and the delicate act of reviving a name without flattening it into nostalgia. Spoturno 1921 became more than a beautiful perfume to me. It became a story about continuity, place, and the quiet authority of a perfume made with real intention.
Read: Modern Perfumery Pays Homage to the Past with Spoturno 1921
Investi Parfums Review: A New Voice in Niche Perfumery
Investi Parfums first caught my attention through social media, in a post about Turkish-owned perfume brands. That beginning felt fitting because the brand itself sits at an interesting crossroads: contemporary niche perfumery, emotional storytelling, and a cultural connection that matters to me personally.
This review looks at Investi Parfums as a young house with a distinct concept, built around emotion, expression, and scent. It also opens a larger conversation about Turkish fragrance culture and how much more there is to say beyond the usual clichés.
Read: Investi Parfums Review: A New Voice in Niche Perfumery
Modern Perfumery Should Be Going Back to the Past
This essay began in the most unexpected way: I was spraying Chanel Allure and found myself singing “Going Back to Cali.” From there, it turned into a larger reflection on memory, glamour, structure, and why so many older perfumes still feel more recognizable than much of what is being released today.
It is a piece about Chanel Allure, California, perfume memory, and the parts of classic perfumery that still have something to teach the present.
Read: Modern Perfumery Should Be Going Back to the Past
Chanel Jersey: A Perfume for Focus, Calm, and Disappearing a Little
Chanel Jersey is one of the quieter perfumes in Les Exclusifs, but that is exactly why it stayed on my mind. It has the softness of lavender, the polish of Chanel, and a calm presence that feels useful in a world full of noise.
This piece looks at Jersey as a perfume for focus, restraint, and elegant withdrawal. A scent for days when you want to be composed, comfortable, and slightly unreachable.
Read: Chanel Jersey: A Perfume for Focus, Calm, and Disappearing a Little
On Video This Week
This week’s videos moved between discovery, curation, and full perfume obsession.
I introduced Investi Parfums as a new voice in niche perfumery, with an emotional concept and a Turkish connection. I also shared my current obsession with Chanel 1957, a perfume that has become one of those clean, musky, polished scents I keep reaching for.
I filmed a guide to 10 elegant perfumes every woman should smell once, focusing on refined fragrances with presence and beauty. I also shared jasmine perfumes for grown women, because jasmine can be sensual, creamy, green, radiant, and deeply elegant when handled well.
And, as always, I looked at new perfume launches worth paying attention to this week.
What connected everything this week was the idea that perfume is about taste, memory, culture, instinct, and emotion. It is the reason one person smells neroli and thinks of summer light, while another thinks of a bathroom. It is why Chanel 1957 can feel addictive, why Jersey can feel like a quiet room, why Spoturno 1921 needed Paris to fully open for me, and why a new brand like Investi Parfums can feel worth watching.
The bottle is the beginning. The real story is what it reveals.
More next week,
Hulya
Elevated Classics Magazine
Perfumes I Added to My Collection This Week
A few blind buys joined the collection this week: (not proud)
Profumum Roma Soavissima
A powdery floral amber built around amber, iris, and white flowers. This one has not arrived yet.
Profumum Roma Sabbia Bianca
A soft floral with coconut, jasmine, tiaré, tuberose, violet, ylang-ylang, and vanilla. Also still on the way.
Bon Parfumeur 102
A light floral green by Nathalie Koobus with bergamot, coriander, cardamom, jasmine, tea, mimosa, oakmoss, musk, and violet leaves. Pleasant and beginner-friendly, but very light for my taste. Regret but not hate
Bon Parfumeur 002 Cologne
A citrus white floral by Karine Dubreuil-Sereni with bergamot, neroli, violet leaves, jasmine, lily-of-the-valley, peony, musks, white amber, and honey. Easy and approachable, but softer and simpler than what I usually reach for. Regret but not hate
So much to try so little time… and money.