Top 10 Chamomile Perfumes
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This 2007 release by perfumer Pierre Negrin evades classification. Certainly, there are gourmand elements, spice fig and plum with herbal notes. There is the power accord of rum, leather, and tobacco (not listed). The amber/vanilla sensual base with intrigue from the patchouli. Chamomile plays a top note here as one of the only floral notes in the composition other than the violet. This is not a single note treatment of chamomile in a fine perfume. This is a formal gourmand perfume that uses the best of chamomile to build a restrained floral, fruit note that ushers one into the deeper fig and plum heart. It balances the sweetness of basil in the opening with a dryer hay note. Chamomile’s sweet, dry herbal aspect helps support a tobacco note with saffron and a dustiness that plays well with the incense in the base.
Top Notes: Basil, Coriander, Chamomile, Cardamom, Cinnamon bark, Lemon, Cistus
Heart Notes: Black plum, Parma violet, Cedarwood, Sandalwood, Saffron, Thyme, Brogiotto black fig
Base Notes: Rum, Haitian Vetyver, Caramel, Vanilla, Black truffle, Fir balsam, Leather accord, Amber, Patchouli vieux, Shoyeido incense
Released in 1971 only three years after the Clinique brand launched, Aromatics Elixir was a generation-defining, accessible scent for women moving away from the heavy, spiced perfumes of the 1960’s. This was a sharp, medicinally bitter green powder that came out the same year as Chanel No. 19’s galbanum driven green monster. Chamomile shines by blending well with the green notes, but softly bringing in the fruitiness of rose before ending with a well-blended white floral and inoffensive amber musk finish. The chamomile keeps the floral and the white musk soapiness from becoming cloying.
Top Notes: Bergamot, Galbanum, Rose, Chamomile, Coriander, Rosewood
Heart Notes: Jasmine, Lily of the valley, Ylang ylang, Carnation, Tuberose, Orris
Base Notes: Patchouli, Musk, Amber, Sandalwood, Vetiver, Civet, Oakmoss, Cistus
3) Perfumer’s Workshop Tea Rose
This one has the lovely story of a wife and husband team starting a bespoke perfume business in New York meant to be affordable to everyday people. They initially carried Tea Rose at their store as a premixed EDT made from their bespoke materials. When the bespoke interested faded, they continued producing this success, still at very affordable prices despite the attention it had received. They were spot on with the trend of green florals made famous by Chanel and Clinique just a year before. The chamomile here creates a more complex opening, supports the fruity entrance of rose, and enables a longer, softer drydown than the cedar would afford. This scent remains incredibly popular 50 years later for a reason.
Top Notes: Peony, Chamomile
Heart Notes: Tea rose, Damask rose, Bulgarian rose
Base notes: Geranium leaf, Violet leaf, Cedarwood
The name is certainly anachronistic in 2020, but this 2003 release by perfumer Christopher Sheldrake achieves a balanced intensity that requires attention. Imagine designing the notes of your ideal tobacco scent. Of course, there is tobacco. Vanilla is a given. The tonka gives you sweet and the needed coumarin. Patchouli is nice, but not a surprise along with the suede and styrax. The currant all by itself in the listed notes is interesting. Currant is fruity, herbal, spicy, incensey. Rose is a class tobacco heart note. Finally, the chamomile. It is the oddball that blends well with the current, the rose, and the tonka. The medicinal, herbal, fruity, hay scent, sweet enough for the honey, but dry enough for the smoke. One could say that chamomile is the perfect foil to tobacco.
Top Notes: Red currant
Heart Notes: Honey, Juniper berries, Tonka bean, Chamomile, Turkish rose,
Base Notes: Tobacco, Styrax, Suede, Patchouli, Vanilla
5) Comme des Garçons Avignon
This scent generates a lot of discussion. Most reviews are positive based on the linear incense, church vibe. Most negative reviews are based on the linear incense, church vibe. The chamomile is actually a core part of this scent, softening with a floral, fruity note that does not diminish the brightness of frankincense. There is also a dustiness, a hay/tea note, to the chamomile that conveys a sense of burnt incense that has settled into the environment and is then disturbed by your presence. The medicinal aspects of chamomile blend well with the frankincense and aspects of the patchouli. Don’t get this just for the chamomile, but if you are looking for chamomile and incense, this is a young classic.
Top Notes: Rosewood, Elemi
Heart Notes: Frankincense, Roman Chamomile
Base Notes: Patchouli, Vanilla, Cistus Oil
Spring in a bottle. The opening is soapy floral, continuing to powdery floral, and ending in a synthetic sandalwood and white musk. The chamomile heart note stands out for its fruity, grassy, herbaceousness, blending well with the fruitiness of the geranium note, against the narcotic white flowers of the jasmine and orange blossom. This all works because Cerruti 1881 avoids cloying sweetness and doesn’t overdo the white musk into headache inducing territory. This smells like laundry detergent as your fresh sheets cool down out of the dryer.
Top Notes: Bergamot, Freesia, Mimosa, Violet, Blond Woods
Heart Notes: Rosewood, Chamomile, Coriander, Jasmine, Geranium, Orange Flower
Base Notes: Sandalwood, Ambrette, Musk
There is something grounding about chamomile that calls for using its product much closer to the raw than what most perfume houses are providing with note listing. Ojai Wild is a small fragrance company maintaining a focus on a deep sense of place. With Chamomile Flowers, the supporting essential oils are blended with a chamomile extract. Most chamomile flower blends have rose or a stronger white floral. The combination of neroli and sage here combined with the green of linden goes in a much more ethereal direction.
Notes: Grapefruit, Chamomile, Linden, Champaca, Tonka bean, Neroli, Sage, Australian Sandalwood
This 2020 release from perfume house Zoologist and perfumer Prin Lomros is intended to evoke the rainforest habitat of the Sloth. This is a fougere for the 21st century, with the top note of Chamomile dropping nicely through a spicy, sweet floral heart to a grassy/hay, moss base. The idea is that you don’t smell like a sloth, but smell your environment as a sloth would smell theirs. The resinous/cepes/moss base captures the dank nature of the rainforest well.
Top Notes: Chamomile, Açaí berry, Lavender, Violet leaf
Heart Notes: Marigold, Beeswax, Anise, Jatamansi, Jasmine, Cumin
Base Notes: Hay, Frankincense, Myrrh, Mushroom, Oakmoss, Vanilla, Tonka
As with the Serge Lutens Fumerie Turque, this scent adds complexity and dryness to a sweet tobacco scent. In skipping the rose note, the chamomile in the opening here supports the top fruit notes and builds the medicinal side of cardamom and coriander, but does not extend the fruit note into a floral in the heart. Reviewers find this scent incredibly sexy, which may be marketing or a broader association of the gourmand with sex appeal. If you find the Fumerie Turque to be to harshly tobacco, this may be a sweet, sexy alternative with a bit of intrigue from chamomile and friends at the top.
Top Notes: Bergamot, Cardamom, Coriander seed, Raspberry, Blue chamomile
Heart Notes: Honey, Olibanum, Atlas cedarwood, Vetiver, Patchouli, Moss
Base notes: Tobacco, Amber, Cistus labdanum, Almond, Vanilla
Not a fan favorite, but could be useful for laying with other scents.
