Best Of
7 Perfumes That Smell Like Cherry
Cherry turned into one of perfume’s biggest notes on the back of a single bottle, Tom Ford’s Lost Cherry (2018). These seven cover every kind of cherry you can wear: liqueur, smoke, fresh fruit, praline, blossom and a cheap and cheerful body spray. Start with Lost Cherry if you want the reference, Electric Cherry if you want it fresh, and Black Cherry Merlot if you want to test the idea first.
Why Does Cherry Perfume Smell Like Almond?
Because the “cherry” smell most of us know isn’t the fruit at all. Fresh cherries have a faint, watery smell. The cherry of maraschinos, cough syrup and cherry cola is mostly benzaldehyde, the same molecule that gives bitter almonds and marzipan their smell. Cherry pits contain amygdalin, which breaks down into benzaldehyde (and a little cyanide, which is why cherry stones aren’t for eating).
So a perfumer building a cherry starts with benzaldehyde and then decides where to take it: fruity esters and lactones for juiciness, vanilla and tonka for dessert, smoke for a cigar bar, flowers for a blossom. That’s why every pick below smells of cherry and none of them smell alike.
| Perfume | The cherry | What’s around it |
|---|---|---|
| Tom Ford Lost Cherry | Black cherry liqueur | Bitter almond, rose, tonka, Peru balsam |
| Tom Ford Cherry Smoke | Dark cherry | Smoked woods, osmanthus, olibanum |
| Tom Ford Electric Cherry | Fresh morello | Ginger, jasmine sambac, musk |
| Kayali Lovefest Burning Cherry 48 | Cherry and raspberry | Praline, palo santo, patchouli |
| Kilian Black Phantom | The almond side | Rum, coffee, sugar cane, sandalwood |
| Escada Cherry in Japan | Cherry blossom | Jasmine, tonka |
| Bath & Body Works Black Cherry Merlot | Black cherry | Black raspberry, red wine |
7 Cherry Perfumes
Tom Ford Lost Cherry
Tom Ford’s Lost Cherry pairs black cherry and cherry-liqueur accords with bitter almond, then adds rose, jasmine, Peru balsam and roasted tonka. It’s built exactly on the benzaldehyde idea: the almond isn’t a side note, it’s half the cherry. The balsam and tonka make the base warm and slightly boozy, so it reads as cherry liqueur in a dark bar more than fruit in a bowl. This is not a quiet perfume.
One wearer loves the boozy opening turning into sweet-and-sour cherry, then a cookie-like almond. The All Over Body Spray is a separate, lighter format.
Tom Ford Cherry Smoke
Cherry Smoke puts a dark-cherry accord with saffron over smoked woods, olibanum, Peru balsam, osmanthus and cypriol. Osmanthus is a Chinese flower that smells of apricot and suede, and it bridges the fruit and the smoke. Where Lost Cherry is a cocktail, this is the cigar that comes after it. If marzipan puts you off Lost Cherry, try this one.
Tom Ford Electric Cherry
Electric Cherry is the fresh one. Retailers list morello cherry and ginger over jasmine sambac, with ambrettolide, musk and pink pepper in the base. The morello is a ScentTrek note, rebuilt from Givaudan’s headspace analysis of the real fruit, so it’s tarter and juicier than the liqueur cherries. Ginger keeps it bright and the musk keeps it clean. It’s the cherry for daytime.
Kayali Lovefest Burning Cherry 48
Kayali puts cherry and raspberry with praline, rose, jasmine and heliotrope, over palo santo, guaiac wood, patchouli, Peru balsam and vetiver. Praline and heliotrope push it toward a cherry dessert, and palo santo, a smoky, slightly minty South American wood, gives it a campfire edge. It’s sweeter than the Tom Fords and a fraction of the price of Lost Cherry.
One wearer gets more artificial almond than cherry, which is benzaldehyde doing its job a little too well. Buy the EDP; the body spray is a different format.
Kilian Black Phantom
Kilian lists rum, coffee and “cyanide”, with sugar cane and sandalwood at the base. There’s no cherry in the notes. The cyanide is a joke about bitter almond, the smell of benzaldehyde, which is why so many people describe Black Phantom as dark cherry. It’s the pick for someone who wants the almond-and-rum side of Lost Cherry without the fruit.
Escada Cherry in Japan
Escada’s Cherry in Japan is cherry blossom over jasmine and tonka. Blossom is a different smell from the fruit: soft, powdery and slightly almondy, with none of the liqueur. This is the gentlest cherry here, and the easiest to wear every day.
Bath & Body Works Black Cherry Merlot
Bath & Body Works describes it as dark cherry, black raspberry and merlot. It’s a body-care scent, simple, sweet and lighter than a perfume. That makes it a cheap way to find out whether you like smelling of cherry at all before spending Tom Ford money.
Which Cherry Should You Pick?
- The reference: Lost Cherry.
- Smoky: Cherry Smoke.
- Fresh and juicy: Electric Cherry.
- Dessert: Lovefest Burning Cherry 48.
- Almond and rum, no fruit: Black Phantom.
- Blossom, for every day: Cherry in Japan.
- Testing the idea: Black Cherry Merlot.
If the almond is what you like, our coffee perfumes include Black Phantom’s rum-and-coffee side. If the dessert side appeals, try marshmallow perfumes, and for greener fruit, fig perfumes.
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