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8 Perfumes That Smell Like Vanilla
Vanilla is the note almost everyone likes, which is why the interesting question is what’s next to it. These eight run from plain and sugary to smoky and dark. Start with Kayali Vanilla 28 for vanilla on its own, Guerlain Shalimar for the classic, and Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille if you want it heavy.
Why Does Vanilla Smell Like Vanilla?
Mostly because of one molecule, vanillin. Vanilla pods come from an orchid, Vanilla planifolia, and they smell of very little when they’re picked. Curing (weeks of sweating and drying) breaks down the compounds in the pod and releases vanillin, along with hundreds of minor ones that give real vanilla its dark, boozy, slightly smoky depth.
The orchid is also why vanilla was once rare. Outside Mexico it had no natural pollinator, and it only became a plantation crop after 1841, when Edmond Albius, a 12-year-old enslaved boy on Réunion, worked out how to pollinate the flowers by hand. That’s still how it’s done.
Perfumers rarely rely on the pods alone. German chemists Ferdinand Tiemann and Wilhelm Haarmann made vanillin synthetically in 1874, and its stronger cousin ethyl vanillin followed. Synthetic vanillin is the clean, sweet, cake-batter part. Vanilla absolute adds the darkness. Most of the perfumes below use both, and the notes around them decide whether the result smells like dessert, a cosy room or an old library.
| Perfume | The vanilla | What’s with it |
|---|---|---|
| Kayali Vanilla 28 | Sugary and plain | Brown sugar, tonka |
| Lavanila Pure Vanilla | Soft and powdery | Tonka, heliotrope |
| Guerlain Shalimar | Smoky and resinous | Bergamot, iris, benzoin, leather |
| YSL Black Opium | With coffee | Coffee, white flowers |
| Diptyque Eau Duelle EDT | Dry and peppery | Pink pepper, cypriol, calamus |
| Maison Margiela By the Fireplace | Smoky | Chestnut, clove, guaiac wood |
| Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille | Dark and boozy | Tobacco, cocoa, dried fruit |
| Bath & Body Works Warm Vanilla Sugar | Light and sweet | White orchid, sugar |
8 Vanilla Perfumes
Kayali Vanilla 28
Mona Kattan’s Vanilla 28 is vanilla with almost nothing in its way: Kayali describes “rich vanillas”, brown sugar and tonka. Brown sugar has a caramel, slightly molasses edge, and tonka adds a hay-like almond warmth, so this smells more like a baking tray than a vanilla flower. Kayali designed it to layer under other perfumes, and that’s a good use for it. If you want to know whether you like vanilla perfume at all, this is the clearest test.
Lavanila Pure Vanilla
Lavanila’s Pure Vanilla blends Madagascar vanilla with tonka and heliotrope. Heliotrope is the note to notice: it’s a powdery flower that smells of almond and play-dough, and it pulls this toward cosmetics and away from the kitchen. One wearer finds it powdery and floral with less vanilla than the name suggests, which is the heliotrope speaking. If you like baby-powder scents, that’s a point in its favour.
Lavanila uses the same name for a deodorant and a body mist; this is the eau de parfum.
Guerlain Shalimar
Jacques Guerlain’s Shalimar (1925) is the vanilla perfume every later one answers to, and Guerlain and LVMH call it the first amber perfume. Bright bergamot and lemon sit on top of a base of vanilla, benzoin, Peru balsam and leather, with iris and jasmine between. The citrus against that smoky, resinous vanilla is the whole trick, and it’s why Shalimar smells grand where the vanillas above smell sweet. The story that Guerlain made it by tipping vanillin into a bottle of Jicky is a good anecdote with no documentation behind it.
YSL Black Opium
Black Opium (2014) is vanilla with coffee and white flowers. Coffee is bitter and roasted, and against the vanilla it makes the sweetness taste darker, like a café rather than a bakery. It’s the vanilla people mean when they ask for something for a night out. This is not a quiet scent. Our coffee list has more in the same direction.
Diptyque Eau Duelle EDT
Diptyque lists vanilla, pink pepper, cypriol and calamus for Eau Duelle. Calamus is a bitter, green, slightly spicy root, and cypriol is smoky and earthy. With pink pepper on top, the vanilla ends up dry and almost savoury. It’s the vanilla here for people who find sweet perfumes boring, and the easiest to wear to an office. The EDP is a different composition.
Maison Margiela Replica By the Fireplace
By the Fireplace is a scene: clove and pink pepper, roasted chestnut, then guaiac wood and cade oil for the smoke, over vanilla, cashmeran and Peru balsam (Margiela’s notes). Cade is tar from juniper wood, and it’s what makes this smell of a real fire. The vanilla sits behind the smoke like marshmallows held over it. One wearer wonders whether it’s more of a winter room scent than something to wear, and that’s the honest question: do you want to smell of the fire, or just be near one?
Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille
Tobacco Vanille (2007) lists tobacco leaf, ginger and spice, tonka, vanilla, cocoa, dried fruit and sweet wood sap. Tobacco leaf smells of hay and honey, not cigarettes, and the dried fruit and cocoa make the whole thing taste like a fruitcake soaked in something strong. It’s the densest perfume on this list, best kept for cold weather. The tobacco list has lighter takes on the same pairing.
Bath & Body Works Warm Vanilla Sugar
Bath & Body Works describes Warm Vanilla Sugar as vanilla, white orchid and sparkling sugar. It’s the simplest and sweetest vanilla here, and for a lot of people it’s the smell of a teenage bedroom in the 2000s. It’s a body mist, so it’s lighter than everything else on this list, which is exactly why it’s easy to reapply and easy to layer under a richer vanilla.
More Vanilla
For vanilla with leather, amber and tobacco in men’s colognes, see our vanilla cologne list. Tonka smells a lot like vanilla with an almond edge, and our tonka list covers it. For the powdery side Lavanila hints at, try the baby powder perfumes.
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