Fleur d’Eau by Rochas

A lover gifted it to me when I returned from France in my teens; I loved both the bottle and the scent, though I didn’t wear it much. I still keep it with fondness.

What a beautiful perfume. I had it in my youth. Very fresh, aquatic, summery, and invigorating. Typical of the 90s, yet it broke with the norm. A scent that stays etched in your memory.

I have such fondness for this perfume! Rochas was so potent in the 90s. This was my first expensive perfume. I don’t know how long I saved to afford the 4,600 pesetas for the 50ml bottle when I was 16. It’s the scent of my adolescence and early adulthood, so I can’t be objective. I do recall people being surprised because it was a little unusual. I’ve never heard anything like it. What a pity what happened to Rochas and those magnificent perfumes that were lost.

Fleur d’Eau is one of the most strangely beautiful perfumes I have ever enjoyed. I had it in my youth; it belonged to my sister, who bought it like Tocadilly to experiment, even though it wasn’t her comfort zone, but she was convinced because it was by Rochas. Over time I don’t remember it well; she decided to give up and gifted it to me. I feel happy to have been the faithful custodian of all those perfumes that never passed her lips, she kept everything like a pygmy squirrel. It is the most exciting, strange, and uneven aquatic floral I have owned. It was a marvellous powdered aquatic, both cold and warm. Its opening was a spring, yet a little strange, like those described by Jules Verne in Journey to the Centre of the Earth, attractive precisely because of its strangeness… As if it were powdered ice water. It enveloped you in an iridescent mist of heliotrope with aquatic flowers and gave it a stark touch with the strength of the mimosa, and what a mimosa. Its trail competed with a very substantial Mugler. I had this daydream while testing a sample of White Tubereuse, a barely perceptible whiff but enough to recall the experience of trying a different floral, a true Rochas floral with personality.

It was my favourite from that era, very soft and feminine; now it’s hard to find.