Ex'cla-ma'tion

I bought this at a Walgreens store. They keep the perfumes and colognes behind glass that can only be opened by a key from one of the staff and you have to push a button and a voice will be heard over the loudspeaker "assistance needed in fragrance'. I love my Walgreens! I love the white bottle with the black top in the shape of an exclamation point. This retro 1988 perfume I had always heard about but never got around to trying it. It was a blind buy but very good blind buy. Opens with what smells like a very feminine 'beauty salon' scent. It is charmingly retro. Smells like the kind of hair salon I used to go to in my little 'ghetto' hometown community. There is an instant sweet smell that says girly-girl but also woman in her twenties; doing her hair, nails, applying make up. It is not exactly a make up scent. It has more of that kind of absolutely beautiful hair spray kind of scent. Totally hair spray but of high quality. The peach and apricot are immediately identifiable. The peach is sweet but subtle, not too syrupy. The rich head filling sweetness seems to come from the moment the peach merges with the floral notes. The floral note that most pops out is heliotrope. There is a small white flower trace of possibly lily of the valley and a little jasmine. But it is mostly heliotrope and also unlisted geranium and very soft Bulgarian rose. Spicy but not too spicy notes of cinnamon emerge as the dry down begins. By the time it is very dry the musk is obvious and it is a clean musk. The musk is the only base note I am picking up on. The whole thing is soft, and not in your face explosive. There is a similarity to Lagerfeld Sun Moon Stars and of course as so many have pointed out to Lancome Tresor. But to me this perfume goes off on it's own path. It has the fruity floral musk airs of both scents, and closer to Tresor but it has a grown up vibe; not very mature, but a woman who is getting herself made up and pretty for a special date, or just enjoying her femininity and spraying herself with this to go with her make up and pretty dress as she goes out with her girlfriends for lunch, or to any event. It is a multi purpose perfume. Dates, dinner, girlfriend time, school (and a lot of girls according to the reviewers on here did used to wear this to school) so it comes off as casual and any season any place anywhere kind of perfume. I peg it as being a spring and summer scent. This smells so good, so delicious. It is not a complex or statement making artsy fragrance. It is just a way to enhance your beauty besides clothes and make up. It is a fragrance accessory. Seems to be best on teen girls and women in their 20s but would appeal to anyone who likes Sophia Grojsman vintage perfumes (and this one totally has her signature on it as a nose). It has no age no gender just wear it if you like fruity floral musks and want to appear more attractive through your scent. I am so glad I finally got a hold of it.

Back in 1988, myself and my three bffs used to hang out with a group of punks. One of my friends was dating one of them and we all just kind of started hanging out. It was a carefree time of my life, too young to work, too old for toys. My parents gifted me a bottle of this for my birthday and, as was our tradition at the time, when one of us got a perfume we all wore that perfume so I shared it with my friends. We all wore Exclamation throughout this 1988 pre-grunge summer of punk and it was such a fun time. I remember sitting on the pavement one evening beside one of the lads who was pushing six inch nails through the eyelets of his Doc Marten boots. When I asked ‘why are you doing that?’ Because I was wondering how on Earth he was going to walk (!) he simply replied ‘For decoration’. He tragically died soon afterwards at the tender age of 17 from inhaling an aerosol and we all kind of stopped hanging out after that. Exclamation will always remind me of those wild and carefree nights with a group of guys who looked rough but couldn’t have been more decent. There was no pressure to be anything other than yourself and that’s how I still feel when I wear this perfume. The modern formulation is not the powerhouse it once was, so I’m glad I still have a 90s bottle. A beautiful peachy creation from Sophia Grojsman. It’s a shame younger noses don’t have the patience or the inclination to love and understand it. Does the world need more punks? I think so!

"THISSSSS!!! This... I bought a bottle of this for my mom (Christmas 2024), as this was one of her absolute favorite scents during my childhood, and both of us remember and love it fondly. I remember going into her room and stealing sprays of it, until she eventually bought me a body spray version for myself. It was my first "real" fragrance. Upon giving it to her, she said it didn't smell the same, and I agreed. I work in the fragrance world, and I told her it could very well have been reformulated since the '90s because a lot of fragrances with Lily of the Valley have undergone reformulations because of new regulations etc... She ended up giving it back to me a few months later as a re-gift situation. I'm a fragrance collector of sorts, so this wasn't out of the ordinary. Long story short... Lately, I've been going through my collection, wearing long-lost loves, and things I haven't touched for a while. Coming back to this gem nearly 2 years later — as it's had time to macerate and truly settle into itself — was something I wasn't fully prepared for. It had become what I remembered it to be. I feel such comfort in this scent. I can't wait to wear this (most likely dose myself in it, so there's no way she won't notice) next time I see my mom.

this was a blind buy with no prior knowledge about it from me. a stranger asked me one day if i was wearing it (i was wearing the og viva la juicy + a fruity body wash and lotion) so of course i had to look into it and bought it as soon as i saw the price. i'm truthfully not at all a big fan of peach or powdery scents, but somehow this is done perfectly and i adore it. i recognized it as soon as i sprayed it despite never knowing the bottle or name. when i was little, this was one of the perfumes i'd occasionally smell on young women and i always thought it was so pretty and grown up, i wanted to be just like them. funnily enough when i wear it, it reminds me a lot of my childhood, the sweet, fluffy innocence of girlhood, playing until the streetlights came on, the haze of midsummer's dusk, wading through tall grass in the flower fields where crickets chirp loudly, and the soft cocoon of being freshly bathed and wearing clean clothes while playing outside. it's one of the first fragrances to evoke such a visceral image for me. i love it. i feel so comfortable, happy, and cozy wearing it. it's a warm, summery, peachy, baby powder scent essentially. girlhood in a bottle. <3

I'm casually living my life, thinking I know a thing or two about perfumes. Then bam! Exclamation! Excuse me, what now? This little bottle is a time-traveling vanilla-powdered cloud of retro fabulousness. And somehow, I never knew it existed. Released in 1988, Exclamation! quietly entered the scene with a whisper of grace, not a shout. It predates Trésor by two years, and surprise, surprise - both are the brainchildren of Sophia Grojsman; Exclamation! walked so Trésor could sashay as you can definitely sense a shared DNA, but Coty’s take is a little sweeter, a little fluffier, like Trésor’s introverted, dreamy sister who spends her evenings reading poetry by candlelight. The first spritz is a gentle kiss of peach and apricot, like soft sunlight through sheer curtains. Then come the florals - rose, jasmine, lily-of-the-valley - lush but never loud. It’s feminine in a timeless way, not performative, not cloying. And then the drydown: A powdery, warm vanilla-musk cloud. It’s soft, it’s romantic, and it wears close - like a secret. It doesn’t scream for attention; it rewards those who lean in. Phew! Better late than never, and definitely worth the wait. ❤️