To my admittedly eccentric nose, some of the big name scents on the high street smell of a peculiar combination of chemicals and cats. Perhaps it's because I'm slightly asthmatic, but when a woman walks past me wearing some of the big name fragrances, it's more likely to make me sneeze than swoon.

I love scents that smell of real flowers and the outdoors. The problem is that up until now this has tended to put me in a fragrance bracket with women aged upwards of 80, who like purple packaging and lily of the valley. Finding scents that are youthful, modern and trendy, yet fresh - and have bottles that I wouldn't be embarrassed to put on my dresser - has been somewhat difficult.

Hence my delight at the advent of the Paul Smith Rose perfume. This is a scent that actually smells of roses- a kind of mixture of clean, crisp tea roses and the simpler but headier old-fashioned blooms. It's quintessentially feminine, but not in a modern Katie-Price-festooned-with-a-pink-boa way: it manages to be simultaneously sophisticated yet fresh, girly yet grown-up.

The packaging, too, is lovely, as you'd expect from any Paul Smith product - a simple, minimalist bottle with a practical heavy base contains a very delicately pink liqueur. It will look good on any dresser, and is likely to appeal strongly to professional women in their late 20s-40s. It comes in a cream cardboard box with a picture of a rose, making this an ideal romantic gift for a classy birthday, Christmas, or even Valentine's. The only downside is that at around £25 for a 50ml eau de toilette, you can't bathe in it.