Bird of Paradise

Another of my favorite Avon classics This was a beautiful adornment of a fragrance. I had the mirror shaped To A Wild Rose perfume along with this one. Bird of Paradise came in the bottle as pictured in this page. It was a decorative large glass sculptured bird with a lot of room for the fragrance and it lasted for years. In fact I still have mine. The scent can be described as both a chypre and an Oriental. It's an evening musk. The animalic notes are prominent and that would make sense. She's a bird. There's a bit of leather and musk, incense and smoky notes which give it a deep rich smoky sultry air. This smelled so marvelous. When applied with a light touch it was powdery. When sprayed liberally it became a real incense. The notes of white flowers namely a jasmine and gardenia were in there as well. Not very flowery but a kind of slightly soapy white floral scent. The jasmine was gorgeous. It gave the fragrance a Shalimar style. The jasmine was fragrant for a while before it turned green with what they call green notes but they were distinct galbanum, oak moss and patchouli. These herbal green notes are common in Orientals and chypres. This is a green oak moss scent that smells like burnt grass in a good way. Lots of moss and woodsy notes of which a sandalwood and dark cedar is detectable. Woodsy dry down. In today's perfume industry, this is terribly old fashioned and old lady ish. But why would eBay sell some of the vintage bottles then? It has a demographic and people do want to bring this into their home. They are vintage collectibles and they smell great. I love how this smells on me. I wear this to Synagogue. I also wear this to candlelit dinners. A classy mature sophisticated and absolutely gorgeous Oriental woody musk. If you can get your hands on it especially the bird bottle go for it. You will love it. So much to love from the opening top notes of white floral jasmine, to the progressive middle notes of galbanum patchouli oak moss and dry down base notes of incense and musk. Glorious!! An Avon masterpiece.

Purchased Vintage 197? Blue Victorian Woman Bottle From Ebay... This fragrance is an absolute marvel for the senses. It opens with a captivating blend of sweet yet sharp jungle green floral chypre, layered with hints of smoky incense and tobacco. The presence of sandalwood imparts a nutty/smokey sweetness to the base notes, and while there's a subtle trace of vanilla, the dominant green and sharp florals create a unique sweet, powdery smokiness. The high-quality jasmine oil used in this fragrance adds to its allure, subtly contributing to its green, oriental, and boozy character. One can also discern a faint, somewhat sweet undertone of urine in the middle opening, Castoreum? which adds another intriguing dimension to the scent profile. The bird of paradise flower introduces a distinctive green note, while the violet gracefully transforms into a blend of sweet tobacco, vanilla, and green powder. The opening leans unisex, but as it evolves, it takes on a slightly more masculine/androgynous character. For a creative twist, I layered this fragrance with Dakar from Al Rehab, resulting in a fantastic dark green, boozy chypre. The initial stages and transitions I experience with 'Birds of Paradise' remind me of the scent of Amaretto, the Italian liqueur, with an almost boozy almond note emerging within the smoky jungles of this mysterious green floriental chypre. A true masterpiece of yester-year.

Notes: TOP: "Bird of Paradise" Flower, Tobacco MID: Jasmine, Iris BASE: Incense, Vetiver, Sandalwood ( Source: Avon press release circa 1969 ) It's the incense and tobacco notes that stand out most in this especially on first application.. Even so, I don't get Emeraude ( or even, by extension, Shalimar ). Maybe closer to vintage of both due to the smokiness but absolutely no vanilla or citrus notes, so it's never going to be that close. I get some green notes but as it dries down, mainly florals with the tobacco; : jasmine, iris, a hint of violet or what I assume is the brightly coloured beauty that is Bird the Paradise flower ? Which I've seen but can't recall smelling. This too is a beauty from the days when Avon could compete with any of the top French houses. Yes, really !

The more I sniff, the more I like this. Like others, bought the enormous bird decanter for my vintage vanity (I also collect vintage Avon frags. But not usually the novelty shapes.) I have this in a .5 oz "fragrant gems" cologne as well. At first Ticonderoga pencils 😊-- then, it smells much like Coty's Emeraude, but starts developing into something more unique. Incense before being burned. Resinous green floral, galbanum perhaps. Cool, soft spice like cardamom. Creamy sandalwood. Almost creates a vanilla impression, but not a true vanilla fragrance. This is fantastic juice, brings a smile to my face. Mitsouko is an appropriate comparison, but to me, Mitsouko is spicier. Vintage smelling, yes! And I love it.

Bird of Paradise is another Avon cologne I'm sure I smelled on adults when I was a child. It strikes me as richly floral with a lot going on behind it. To me it's first floral and green, then equal parts powdery and smoky. I don't get much wood from the scent. I'd say it's a fairly fresh scent, though softly so due to the smoky note, which on me seems to convert to powderiness in the dry-down. I liked it out of the bottle and like the traces that remain after hours. Best of all, I found it in another lovely, kitchy vintage Avon bottle. I can't be the only person who wishes they still made those!

i have a vintage roll-on of this. i get mostly smoky and floral notes. not a lot of green here, but maybe top notes have died off. i get a kind of root beer/cola scent here after a couple minutes. overall it's a smoky floral incense on me, it's pretty gorgeous and not what i was expecting. i find it to be romantic and kind of mysterious. interesting how the reviews seem to be all over the place. i recently got a lot of mini perfumes with a bunch of avons and this is one of my favorites so far.

Bought a partially full peacock bottle because I finally realized this was my grandmother's signature scent. I've been hunting for years, but the only bottle I could remember was Chanel no 5, and these avon bottles. She had collected many bottles in different shapes of this perfume, a peacock, a dolphin, a seahorse. For me, this scent smells like home and brings me so much comfort. A touch sharp at first but It is soft, warm, smokey, and a touch powdery in the dry down.

I have one ounce of the little swan shaped cologne bottle, I also have multiple mini concentrated oils shaped like watering cans that I poured in a 2 ounce glass sprayer, they were under the name "dream garden" I would honestly go with the concentrated oil version, it is so potent. It lasts for hours on my wrists in cold weather.

I would have to say this is one of my all time favorites. Yes, very churchy, inscense, smokey, deep, mystic, warm. Love it

To me, Bird of Paradise has some fruity notes, in addition to the notes mentioned in the description. I get a very nice, slightly sweet, fresh tropical fruit, possibly mango or pineapple (it is light so I am not 100% sure of which fruit). The floral notes are also of the "tropical" variety,combined with a "leaves after a rainstorm" accord, a slight hint of smoke, and a powdery sandalwood. I own a "French Telephone" Avon bottle, with Bird of Paradise EDP in the clear phone handset and bath oil in the bottom part of the phone, and a red glass cardinal bottle with Bird of Paradise cologne splash. The longevity is pretty good (especially with the EDP), while sillage is more of a "skin scent". The cologne splash would make a pleasant aftershave for men. This is a lovely summer perfume!

This is for the 15ml CPO formula. A very sweet oriental... veering gourmand with overdosed vanilla, but kept in check with the dryness of benzoin and myrrh modulating the labdanum, as well as a layer of woods, and the signature Avon blend of sweet musks (there is only the barest whisper of patchouli, so I don't agree with comparisons to Youth Dew in the least). Over this is a nectar-rich blend of sweet floral (mimosa, osmanthus, honeysuckle, orange blossom) and delicate, indiscernible fruit notes, a speck of green aldehydes. Resinous, balsamic, sweet. Not as "tropical" as one would expect from the name, rather, it reminds me of freshly-opened Indian floral incense.

My ex-husband loved this fragrance. He always asked me to wear it. I wasn't a huge fan of it myself, but of all the Avon fragrances at that time (80's), it was the best imo. It is similar to cinnabar as someone else mentioned. Not fruity or too flowery. I haven't thought about it in 30+ years! Might have to check it out again. 9/1/2016 UPDATE: I snagged a vintage bottle w/box really cheap on ebay today. Happy to add it to my ever growing collection.

In the 90s, my mom had a roller ball version of this fragrance. When I started getting into fragrances as an adult I knew I had to pick this one up. It’s this lovely mixture of florals and smoke, which is one of my favorite combinations. I think this scent would layer really well with sweet floral fragrances. It’s beautiful on its own and I think it could elevate other fragrances when paired together.

To my nose, this is a dupe for Cinnabar by Estee Lauder. And I love Cinnabar!

Not a huge fan but it is strangely comforting. It reminds me of a grandparent's musty basement carpet in their wood cabin. Something your grandfather would wear. To me it feels very much more woody than green, I do get some florals but they are very light. The bottles are so cool for these perfumes, I have a vintage pear-shaped bottle but I have seen many different decanters that I would totally get if I loved the scent. So far it is a 6/10, I wouldn't wear it out but I think I would wear it in if I wanted something cozy, woody and not sweet.

Over the years I've found full bottles of this perfume inside second hand shops and antique stores. There's a reason Grandma bought it and never used it. Every time I dab some on, it smells like bar soap. It has some citrus in the top, detergent-tier floral notes, it's vaguely green, I get touches of the smoky notes and sandalwood in the base... but it overwhelmingly smells like fatty, thick aldehydes. I find Avon to be all over the place. Some of their perfumes smell great (Timeless, Moonwind) and some smell crummy (Imari, this one). I think the majority of women bought this perfume for its impressive bottle. The massive bird has ornate detailing, I think that's where most of the budget went. The comparisons section and the comments leave me scratching my head. Are you guys serious? I must be missing something. I'll have to test it again.

I own the cologne in the urny-looking bottle, the cologne decanter (the bird bottle) and the perfume concentre. I went to town with this perfume because it has all the notes that I love, and because the reviews were (mostly) so positive. It as an opportunity to experiment with different concentrations, and to try to finally get past my snobby bias that perfumes are longer-lasting, more potent, and therefore, better (more desirable) than colognes. I should know better, given the fact that I grew up in the sixties and seventies, and came of age in the 80's when shoulder pads were big, hair was bigger, and colognes were...COLOGNES. On me, Bird of Paradise is a green oriental. I enjoy the perfume concentre the most because the smokey note is more apparent, although not by any means overwhelming. I do not get incense, but I do get spice - cinnamon and pepper, and sandalwood. I also get a beautiful powdery note - iris?? - that balances out the green crispness. BofP is a linear scent and while it seems like a contradiction, it is fairly light. Neither sweet nor syrupy, it sits close to my skin and last about 6 hours. I wish I could help more with identifying the notes. Overall, this is a very pretty light oriental.

My chemistry matches the opening notes exactly of Bird of Paradise on my left wrist with (vintage) Estee Lauder Youth Dew on my right wrist, just as an Avon customer, a retired Air Force nurse, told me in the earliest 70's. I agreed then and I still agree with her pronouncement forty eight years later. I smell incense and some spices. One hour later, the Bird of Paradise scent is beginning to fade and a grassy green note is emerging, while the Youth Dew will remain on my wrist another three to four hours. My small bottle of BoP rollon "perfume" is over 30 years old and as true to scent as I remember.

A Schiff base of methyl anthranilate and aldehyde upon which a relatively opulent drugstore oriental structure is built. A keen smattering of fruity esters, mainly some citrus and pineapple, followed by honey and a few florals and greens on a synthetic (but rich) sandalwood and incense base. Some very high quality sandalwood molecule was used here, and given that Avon in the 1960s and '70s used twice the average budget of designer brands for their formulas, this isn't surprising. If you can get a full peacock-shaped bottle of the cologne, you've hit the jackpot.

Found this in a thrift/antique shop and I brought it mainly because of the cool bottle design. It does have that old fashioned incense feel to it....The sent is beautiful along the oriental lines of Cinnabar, Tabu, Youth Dew, Obsession, etc. which I have to reaaaaally be in the nostalgic mood to wear (and usually during winter because I live in humid, hot, South Texas 'tis "why".)