I’ve always been drawn to bold, unabashedly synthetic scents—those heady aldehydic rushes and ambroxan-rich drydowns that make your head spin, leaving you demanding another hit. But as a teenager, I had a problem: the only perfumes that made me feel something—those sharp, metallic, animalic things—were filed under masculine. My favourite scent, in fact, was literally called Masculine. I bought it but never wore it. I kept it hidden in my bedroom and sprayed it in the confines of my home, breathing it in like a secret indulgence. I daren’t wear it out. I couldn’t smell like a boy. Not because I didn’t want to—but because I didn’t think I was allowed to.
So I did what all the other girls my age did. I wore Lacoste Touch of Pink and Prada Candy, both suitably saccharine and perfectly pretty—both fragrances that didn’t challenge or confuse, but conformed. Back then, scent was not yet something I used to express power or identity. It was something to fit in with. Something to please others. Something—let’s be honest—to attract boys.
