Chance Eau Tendre

This fragrance reminds me of my childhood memories when my mom was doing a quince drink for winter, and we call it ‘compot’ in the country I was born in. So, basically you boil cleaned in advance quinces in water with sugar until the fruit itself is smooth and all the good stuff are released in that water. Then you hermetically lock the jar and leave it for wintertime. This fragrance smells like that drink, a sweet childhood memory. But the way I found out about this fragrance around 6 years ago is that there was a good friend of mine who worked together with me in a company and this fragrance was her signature fragrance and still is. She is so in love with it. When I first smelled it on her I was so impressed that I needed to buy it for myself too as it is my type of fragrance. It is literally a ripe freshly cut quince on the table in front of me with some caramelized sugar on top of it that’s what I get from this fantastic scent. In the top we have quince and grapefruit and yes, yes, yes, the quince is so prominent and obvious, and it literally gives a vibe of a quince jam or a drink made of quince. The grapefruit is a bit present there too but only the bitterness of the skin not the edible part. It is not zesty or sparkling at all, nor juicy, it has only the skin bitterness that enhances the quince scent in a way. That’s all I get from the top notes, nothing more. In the middle, there are 2 flowers hyacinth and jasmine, and it slightly gives some vibes of jasmine more than hyacinth but still I can feel that slight caramelized sugar mixed with the quince from the top. I wouldn’t say that it gives me a floral vibe in the middle as the flowers are very versatile and ephemeral. And slowly we get to the base notes and in the base, we have musk, iris, virginia cedar and amber. There is a bit of amber here that gives a bit of a powdery vibe in the dry down but it such a small amount of it that it makes this fragrance be even more beautiful (and as you probably know already, I do not like very powdery fragrance at all), my favourite base note musk, I can feel it, and I absolutely love it. As always, it makes the base feel smoother and gives a slight sweetness to the base. Not that much cedar nor iris. At least I do not detect them clearly here. So, overall, the base is very smooth and only enhances the top notes and make this fragrance last longer, but also makes it feel a bit more mature. In conclusion I can say that to me it smells of a very realistic quince coated with caramelized sugar a bit of sugar, not overly sweet. A fruity, but not juicy, nor sparkling or juicy, not too floral almost very realistic quince scent to me that I absolutely love. If you are going to purchase this fragrance the EDP version, I would highly recommend you keeping it for a few months to macerate well before you start using it. You’ll get the best out of this fragrance for sure. PERFORMNACE: Speaking about the performance it stays quite a long time on my skin and hair for about 8 hours which I consider a good performance for a fruity fragrance, and I only use 3-5 sprays max. The sillage and projections are also very good in my opinion as I feel this fragrance miles away on my friend. If I’d be asked if I want to buy another bottle my answer will be YES and now, I am planning on buying the 150 ml bottle as my 50 ml is almost gone, so I really need this fragrance back in my collection.

I will preface this by confessing that I have not worn a fragrance since the 80's. I am now in my 50's, happy and content except for the extra pounds I've gained this year. I am working on taking off those pounds, but in the meantime, I felt like I needed a bit of a psychological lift. Over the past few weeks I have made it my mission to find a fragrance that would do that for me. After a lot of sampling, and not finding any fragrance my husband and I BOTH liked, I was almost convinced I would have to abandon my search. But I am stubborn, and after finally seeking guidance from a knowledgeable SA, I took home four samples, one of which was Chance Eau Tendre. I tried it and really liked it, and much to my surprise, my husband said he liked it too and would actually be able to enjoy this one! (There were others he said he could tolerate, but that wasn't enough for me.) So, I immediately ran right out and bought the 100ml size and I am so happy I did. I love the subtlety of the fruit and floral notes in Eau Tendre. I did not want a fragrance that would surround me like a cloud, nor did I want to smell like overripe fruit, heady flowers, or candy. Eau Tendre is light and feminine--just what I was looking for. I also like that it stays pretty much the same, at least on me, and doesn't morph into something odd or funky after a few hours. I am comfortable wearing this with jeans or wearing it out to dinner. I didn't think I'd care about the bottle, but this one is gorgeous. It's classic and elegant, and with its pale pink liquid, it looks beautiful sitting on my white vanity--a lovely bonus. For those who say that it doesn't last, I find that my nose definitely gets used to it after a few hours, but even when I can no longer detect it, my husband says he still can. He has told me several times how good I smell! Those who are devoted to Chanel will still have their classics. But they were always too strong/heavy/powerful for me, which is why I initially bypassed the Chanel counter. I am delighted that Chanel created this one for those of us who prefer something a little softer and lighter. I definitely don't see it as just another copy of all the other fruity-florals out there, most of which are way too obvious and sweet for me. (I tried a lot of them over the past few weeks.) I know others disagree with me, and that's okay. Fragrance preferences are highly subjective, and it would be a boring world if we all liked the same things. But I know what I like and what my husband likes, and this is it! Yay!

This is a pretty and feminine, fresh fragrance. I very much enjoy the sweet grapefruit. The best way I can describe this is imagine marrying Marc Jacob Daisy and Cartier Baiser Vole, they have a lively and sweet tempered pink daughter who is neither screechy/synthetic like Daisy nor as intense/green-spicy as Baiser, but she does resemble her parents like a watercolor impression of both. She also has a cousin in Clinique Happy and a cousin in Gap's So Pink - which is why we all swear we've met Chance Eau Tendre before. I pick up the citrusy grapefruit, apple-like quince and a green, subtly spicy hyacinth all set on a slightly powdery musk. It's clean like the sweetness of shampoo and thankfully not soapy (I detest soap/detergent notes, so happy I can't find any here.) The coolness of iris becomes most apparent in the drydown. Chance Eau Tendre is pleasant and if there's one thing I love, it's to smell pretty and pleasant; it lifts my mood and that is one of the criteria that makes a great fragrance for me: does it give me joy when I wear it? This does, I have to admit, partly because she is familiar and reminds me of perfumes I used to wear in my 20s - this fragrance was first launched in 2010 and yes, I was in my 20s, so aesthetically this fits right into that style that was popular then. I'm somewhat tempted to layer my Baiser Vole with any of my shampoo like fragrances and see if I manage an approximate Chance eau Tendre. As other reviews have stated, if Chance Eau Tendre suffers from one thing, it's the projection. Don't know about longevity yet. However, I prefer well blended and pleasant to synthetic headache beast mode, so I'm okay with it.

I fell in love with this when it was first released, and for years it was the only fragrance I wore. I wore both the EdT and later the EdP from 2010 until 2020. I tried other perfumes now and then — it felt almost unreasonable to own just one — but nothing ever felt more right on my skin than this. It wasn’t just harmonious; it had depth. It was elegant, feminine and unmistakably classic without ever feeling old-fashioned. It smelled composed. Complete. There was something about the balance — warm yet fresh, luminous yet grounded. It worked in every setting and every season. From the height of summer to the coldest winter days, it never felt out of place. Over time, it became more than a perfume. It felt like a quiet extension of who I was — steady, refined and effortlessly present. This was a perfume that lived throughout the day, and every now and then I would catch a soft trace of it on myself — subtle, intimate, unmistakable. Never overwhelming. Just a gentle presence that felt completely my own. In 2019, the fragrance was reformulated and relaunched. The new version is noticeably different, and while many people seem to enjoy it, I can no longer wear it. To me, the new Eau Tendre feels like a diminished version of what this once was — the seamless softness and depth I loved are simply not there anymore. It also appears that many of the more recent reviews here are describing the new version rather than the original 2010 formulation. To this day, I have yet to find anything as perfect as this was 🩷

🌸🫧🚿This is like a romanticized version of what a shampoo in a fairytale reality would smell like. I remember this was the first perfume I smelled as a kid and realized maybe there is a perfume out there for me because they can be fun and not all of them smell like grandma or intense! The opening smells exactly how I remember – it smells like shampoo that's fruity and floral-y, but not the cheap and literal fruity smells like garnier, something maybe like your classic herbal essence rose or what they would use at a nice salon. Everytime I catch a whiff – I feel like I'm being lathered with feminine bouquet of bubbles. (⁎⁍̴̛ᴗ⁍̴̛⁎). ̊○ • ° The sillage is super weak, but it does last a little longer than I thought for a EDT. This would be my signature if the performance was stronger than only being visible to me and my partner (and whoever I hug!) It has all the traits I love – fresh/feminine classic shampoo smell, with enough fruity to be playful. It dries down to be smoother and a little creamy imo. And although she's shampoo-y, she's not soap-y. Rather than a bubble bath or a dove bar soap–the vibe's more like when the smell you catch in your shower while you're lathering shampoo or you catch a whiff of your friends' freshly shampooed hair who brave enough to go outside right after a shower without drying their hair. °‧🫧⋆.ೃ࿔*:・