To a Wild Rose

Initially sepia, with glimmers of a technicolor dreamscape peaking through, only to shift back to Sepia. Somewhere between a wish and a dream. The plastic flowers feel oddly charming. Why are trees so vicious? What makes poppy fields so soft, sweet, and dreamy? Horses that shift color! A wizard, a witch's broom, and all it takes is a bucket of water? Yet, after it all, I find I crave the bitter thorns. Transportative, but there's no place like home. Bleed me out.

Dim rays of sunlight peak through dense canopy to reveal a forest floor thick with leaves and moss. Deep purple roses barely poke through the undergrowth. Dainty, sugared soap bubbles hover over the scene. Vintage Avon at its best!

Rose is one of the oldest perfume notes, and demonstrates with vast landscape a plethora of sub-characterizations, nuances, and provocations. Shape-shifting odors and infinite combinations with other worldly scents, have captured audiences throughout history, and continue to beguile even the best of perfume lovers. Many of us lucky enough to have a nose built to detect subtle variations, and a compulsion to collect moments of intrigue manifested through emotion, often compile these threads into memory. For us, perfume becomes a powerful story teller, weaving tapestries and landscapes of times long passed, and becoming a very vivid touch point in grounding to the present. To A Rose is not a rose perfume, but rather the perfumer's interpretation of earth's love letter to roses. It is Autumn's carnal moss mourning the last falling petals, while the soft gasps of rose sweeten at the cusp of decay. Green stems linger for a compressed instant, channeling valuable stores of nutrients deep into damp root systems in preparation for winter, finalizing the season of color into the dreariness of cold. In this way, To A Rose exists in contrast. Melancholy chords of youthful beauty lost, sweetened with the wistful wisdom of nature's continuous renewal. A nod to the past, and certainly worth consideration. Embarking as a whole, dressed in traditional chypre fashion, bearing aldehydic attire consistent with the era of its genesis. This haunting scent proudly takes its place amongst the great story-tellers of its time.

My sister tells me this is what my maternal Grandmother wore. She was born in 1912. So I, her Grandson, got a bottle of this and just sprayed it on. Immediately I get vibes of Moss Cologne by Bornikoff. Makes sense given the prominence of the mossy accord. Quite unisex. Its an EDC so its very, very reserved, even more so than the aforementioned Moss Cologne, which drops off a cliff in 30 minutes. I sprayed To a Wild Rose very heavily on skin and clothes. Its a very nice mossy powder in the drydown, slightly sweet. The rose is a dewey green, and very reserved. Rose is not even the second most prominent accord. Powdery should be a listed accord. Again, as masculine as it is feminine appropriate, and maybe more so.

I bought a newer vintage bottle of To A Wild Rose. It's in much better condition that the first one. It is the mossy, floral, softly sweet scent I'd hoped it would be, and I would love to wear it often. It strikes me as an evening scent but it has a balance between the notes that feels appropriate for day, at least in cooler weather. I'll probably look for a modern scent that resembles it to avoid using this up, since it's discontinued.

a vintage rose/oakmoss. it opens with the 'sweet notes' i think, which reads as kind of ambery. the rose is the strongest note for me and is green but also powdery. it's a powdery, musky rose with greenery and oakmoss. very pretty and also nostalgic for me.

In the 1950's I was fascinated by American based perfumes like Elizabeth Arden. Being a Brit, I was always seeking more exotic perfumes. I used to read fashion magazines from the US and would always wonder what American perfumes were like. I took a trip in 1953 and 1955 and then again 1957 to buy American products. I went into the Red Door salon on Fifth Avenue. I came across a lady selling Avon products while I was staying in New York. A woman that sold perfumes door to door was not heard of in the UK. Avon was a line I'd never heard of until about 1955. I ordered various unusual Avon perfumes that were shaped like sea horses, snails, a horse-drawn carriage, and a peacock. To a Wild Rose was shaped like a hand held mirror and indeed it was a mirror. It reminded me of the Magic Mirror in Beauty and the Beast. At the time the only Beauty and the Beast movie was the French live version by Cocteau. I really loved that it looked like a mirror as I'd never seen anything like it. Quite charming! I still have this perfume in my old Avon collection. This perfume smells of pretty red and pink colored roses. They are not roses in a decorative bouquet or even roses in vases inside a home. They are "wild roses" so they smell more natural and outdoorsy like rose bushes in a forest. This smells of beautiful roses and for days. My nose also detects the scent of a light citrus, possibly bergamot orange and an apple. The Fragrantica editors and administrators have the note listed as "Sweet Notes" but they are fruit notes of citrus courtesy of orange and an apple, both fruit flavored fragrances are similar to the smell of roses. Apples are part of the rose family so it's no surprise that this smells of apple. The citrus gives it a sweet and refreshing air. The green notes are greenery typically found in rose bushes and rose leaves. Very green, a garden, or a greenhouse. The green notes and the rose-citrus-apple remind me of Tea Rose by The Perfumers Workshop. However unlike Tea Rose this fragrance had a dry down of puere oak moss. The oak moss was pretty strong at the end and it smelled like burnt moss, warm, resinous, Oriental. I do love oak moss in my perfumes so I enjoyed it immensely. Such a pity this perfume doesn't exist anymore. I wish that everyone could experience some long lost perfumes that should find their way back to us somehow. The closest thing to this is Tea Rose by Perfumers Workship and layered with a heavy oak moss scent. Beautiful. It was my first Avon perfume.

First of all, let me clarify something - I'm an amateur grower of heirloom and heritage roses, and I vouch for the fact that there are MANY different rose scents. There's the Damask, which I love, despite (or maybe because) it reminds me of the candy lipstick that we girls bought when I was a kid. Then there's the Tea Rose scent, which many folks (including me) are anosmic to - I can only pick it up when it's REALLY strong. And tThe rugosa rose scent, which is like the Damask but spicier. A newer addition to the bouquet of rose fragrances is the myrrh scent, which doesn't smell like the resin myrrh that we perfumaniacs are familiar with - it's more of an anise or licorice note that some people can't stand (but I love). There are the fruity scents of may more modern roses - apple, berries, pineapples, you name it. And lastly, many wild (or species) roses have a peppery note to them. So when people refer to a "rosy" scent, one has to remember that there are many rosy scents. That said, I can't remember what "To a Wild Rose" actually smelled like, although I remember liking it when I was a child. My Mom bought the bubble bath (tall white bottle with a pink ball for a top) and bathed me and my two sister in it at the same time, so I may be confusing the scent with the detergent/soapy aroma of the bath oil. Lastly, my father was a guitarist, vocalist, and Classical music fan, and it's because of him that I always relate Avon's To a Wild Rose with the musical piece of the same name by composer Edward MacDowell. Look it up on YouTube; it's really beautiful in the romantic but naturalistic fin-de-siècle style - like Debussy's Clair de Lune, or even Vaughan Williams' The Lark Ascending. I realize that I haven't really reviewed or descried the fragrance of "To a Wild Rose" here, but part of the joy of fragrance is the way that they evoke memories. I think I'll need to find a vintage sample of this scent now.

To a Wild Rose by Avon is so strange. The rose in this is not literal -- for a straightforward rose you would need to purchase Roses, Roses by Avon from 1972, which was an exquisite and natural solilore, a real florist shop rose, very similar to 'Tea Rose' by Perfumer's Workshop but a bit more spicy. To a Wild Rose, however, is not a florist's or straightforward rose by any stretch of the imagination. It does not seem to possess any identifiable rose or even geranium to speak of. It's more of an oblique take on rose: a brambly wild rose growing amid the tangles of forest understory amid moss, greenery, and sweet grasses. The 1960s Avon description card describes it as: "Roses/background of moss and forest greenery." The emphasis is on the foresty qualities. It's fairly unique and natural smelling, and it smells sweeter and sweeter as time passes. It would make a good masculine fragrance.

My aunt sold Avon when I was a little girl and then some as junior hi started. My mother and I loved this one. Rose was her name and we are Irish on my maternal side. Grandfather's people came from Dublin.-it smelled wonderful and was appropriate for any age: young girl or older ladies of any age. I wish Avon would bring back some its classics. They are sorely missed. Perhaps it was similar to Tea Rose but somehow it was better. Light and ethereal. Come back to me and do not let linear time stop you.

Another vintage Avon baby, that stands out proudly among so many roses. Rose, surrounded by real, pure oak moss,(oh, bliss!) wild rose indeed, from a bewitched forest, dangerous, animalic and smouldering. It intrigues me, how sweet and lipsticky-inoffensive this rose seems to smell from the bottle, yet those transformations on the skin is something completely different. Wild rose with a secret, a daring one.

Found some. Its on the way from the good ole USA. Birthplace of Avon. Theres a cologne mist, splash and 3 rollerballs. ebay delivers again!! Can't wait. Our late beloved Mum used to do Avon and all I recall is the name of this fragrance. The real earthy ingredients are the prize and added bonus all laid in oakmoss oh my!! Will update later....