Spray on sexiness (Chanel: No 5, Eau de Toilette)

Member Name: Plushroom

Product:	Chanel: No 5, Eau de Toilette
Date:	09/11/09 (74 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Classic scent that doesn't date, even the bottle exudes class and sophistication

Disadvantages: The price (Thus only 4 star rating I'm afraid)

It's one of the best known perfumes around the world, magazines advocate this perfume as the ideal gift every year and Marilyn Monroe reportedly wore nothing to bed but a spritz of this. Ladies and gentlemen, I am of course talking about Chanel No5.

Of course, as we all well know, Chanel No5 comes at a price. A rather high one for that matter. But what exactly is it that you are getting for your money?

Firstly of course it's the name, Chanel is a high class brand that's name exudes luxury and good quality. There isn't a woman alive that doesn't know this, so men take note, if you are trying to impress a lovely lady in you life, you won't go too wrong with anything that has the name Chanel on it! In the case of this iconic perfume it isn't just the name that is important of course, but also the bottle and the scent itself.

The bottle is a classic piece of design that looks great on any dressing table (though if you want to really look after your pricey scent you should keep it somewhere cool and dry out of the reach of direct sunlight). It is a simple square design with the plain yet pretty white and black label on the front of the bottle. It's funny how a bottle so simple can be so iconic, but the fact is that it is, who in the future (or even now for that matter) can recognise the popular Diamonds perfume by another luxury brand? Honestly in the future no-one is going to remember the multi-faceted golf-ball like design of that bottle, but chances are people will still remember this one.

Now when you are spending a small fortune on perfume as much as the look of the bottle is important it is the scent itself that is paramount. Chanel No5 is a floral scent with notes of jasmine, ylang ylang and vanilla among other notes (such as Vetiver, may rose, and neroli). It's a classic scent that doesn't go in and out of fashion like many others, and unlike newer scents that are made it isn't too overpowering, or overly sweet so can be worn by most people with ease. Now for the sciencey bit - Chanel No5 has the classification of being a floral-aldehye - not too complicated as the perfume is made up of florals and synthetic long chain aldehydes. Doesn't sound very pretty when you put it like that does it? Well there's more, lab tests concluded that the perfume contained secretions from the glands of civet cats (Do I hear a urgh yuk from everyone?). Civet was used as a fixative in the perfume, making the scent last longer on the skin. But not to worry if that disgusted you, after campaigns by animal rights groups who said that the secretions were collected in a way that was cruel to the Civet cat, in 1998 natural Civet was replaced with a synthetic substitute. So now you can wear your perfume safe in the knowledge that you haven't hurt any civet cats for your luxury smell.

This perfume comes in three different strengths (which of course differing price tags) - Pure Perfume, Eau de Toilette and the newer Eau de Parfum (which replaced the now discontinued Eau de Cologne). There are also other products in the range which can be bought such as body lotions and a hair scent. I've found myself buying the hair scent and using that as a perfume as it is lower priced than the perfumes more often than not and because of the oils in the liquid designed to go onto the hair without damaging it, that it lasts all day and night on my skin this way.

Now if you've gotten this far in the review and thought you may buy this I have a couple of pieces of advice - firstly try the tester first: though this is a very wearable fragrance it may not suit you personality-wise - lets face it if you love partying and doing crazy stuff you may not want something as simple and subdued as this, it's not a fragrance that you'd describe as fun. Secondly make sure that you buy the original Chanel No5, Chanel have since relaunched with a lighter more modern version called Eau Premiere and having tried it I can say you'll probably like one or the other but not both - I couldn't stand the modern take on Chanel No5 even though it was probably aimed at us twenty-something's to get us into their perfume range. All I can say to that is no thank you, the original is the best. After all what more encouragement do you need than uber-sexy Marilyn Monroe's claim that she wore nothing but this to bed?

So to sum up, what is Chanel No5? Chanel No5 is an expensive perfume that is well worth its money. The bottle and label design are effortlessly classic and instantly recognizable. The scent has stood the test of time and is still popular today, showing that the amount of work that went into creating it was immense. It is a classic scent that is classy, elegance and very sexy and will make any wearer feel like a pin up. Think of this as beautiful lingerie in a scent, it may cost a bit of money but when you put it on you instantly feel good.

Summary: The one and only classic.