If you’re looking for an affordable cruelty free fragrance, I have some good ones to try! It can be so hard to purchase cruelty free perfumes online (since you can’t sniff ’em), but it helps when they are reasonably priced. Keep in mind that Amazon won’t let you return most fragrances due to flammability concerns.
It seems like everyone I know is sick this month, and I don’t want to catch anything. So, I haven’t been venturing out to Sephora, Ulta, or the mall much lately. I took a chance on some fragrances on Amazon, and I hope my reviews will help you decide what to try or what to avoid!
If you like the scent of Bum Bum Cream, you’ll probably love the Sol de Janeiro Brazilian Crush Cheirosa Hair and Body Mists. I like gourmand scents but if they are too sweet or if there’s a vanilla scent that isn’t balanced with something darker, I usually don’t like it. I wasn’t a fan of Sol de Janeiro’s original Bum Bum body cream’s scent – it smelled wonderful in the jar, but weird when it mixed with my skin. I took a chance on the Black Amber Plum and Vanilla Woods 40 hair and body mist, and I’m glad I did. To me, it’s still on the girly, sweet, fruity side, but it has the amber to keep it from being a teenybopper fragrance. It’s still pretty youthful, and I tend to like more mature scents, so it’s not an everyday thing for me. But if you’re younger, or you just prefer girly scents, you’ll love this one.
R+Co Serious Gaze Fragrance Spray is a more mature fragrance spray, and definitely more in line with my darker tastes. It’s an Oriental Chypre scent with juniper berries, blood orange, and rhubarb, that are deepened with violet, dark woods, and a synthetic leather accord. It’s quite bold and long-lasting for a hair and body mist. If you read the reviews on Amazon, you’ll see a lot of people interpret the leather accord as cigarettes, smoke, or gasoline (and as the top notes die down, you definitely get more of that vibe)! I like weird, unconventional scents (including tobacco), but if that turns you off, I’d recommend trying this out in person first.
I had to try the Ariana Grande Sweet Like Candy perfume, even though I had a feeling it would be too sweet for my tastes. It’s described this way, “Luscious burst of sugar-frosted Blackberry and juicy Italian Bergamot sparkle with delicious addiction, while velvety layers of Crème de Cassis, fluffy Marshmallow and sexy Vanilla blend.” It’s definitely girly (what else would you expect from Ariana Grande?) but the bergamot, jasmine, and cashmere woods give it a classier vibe. Overall, I am really impressed with the way they blended all the scents together. Yes, it’s sweet and girly, but it doesn’t smell cheap or overpowering. My husband loves this one!
Le Monde Gourmand 002 Macaron Rose perfume looks beautiful, and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it on the beautiful shelves of places like Anthropologie and Urban Outfitters. Unfortunately, for me, the scent was too strong, and not complicated enough for my liking. I really love the rose scent, but it has a synthetic feel that I couldn’t get past. I SO wanted to love this and I thought it would be my favorite of the bunch but I really can’t get into it.
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