Sensuous Stars

This is an unusual take on iris. I've had a few irises in my life, such as Hiris, Iris Rebelle, Silver Iris, and even the long time discontinued Iris Ganache. Sensuous Stars is closer to Iris Ganache than the others. It has the typical carroty flavour that iris root can have, but also the sweetness of the flowers. It's creamy and dense, without being heavy. There are plums is here, and they are sweet, ripe and dark purple. So sweet that they actually make this scent smell like candied violets. The scent is almost gourmand. The candied violets remind me of Meteorites, and a little like Lipstick On, but the perfume maintains its individuality. It turns powdery in the dry down. It also brings back memories of doll heads, (when dolls had rubber heads that were slightly scented) and it even smells a little like scented plasticine. I cannot smell any lavender. It is definitely charming and feminine. Despite being reminiscent of many childhood things, like the violets pastilles, this isn't a juvenile scent. To my surprise it lasts quite well, and the silage is not bad either. I find it very beautiful, but I know everyone's tastes differ. The bottle is nice, heavy, the magnetic lid sort of spins in your hand. I don't think it's a safe blind buy, especially because it's pricey, but it's quite a stunner. Now I really want to smell the other from this collection.

As an iris lover, I'm very impressed with this scent. A light, airy take on iris enhanced nicely by the plum and lavender notes in supporting roles, Sensuous Stars is a powdery beauty. It is rare to find iris-dominant scents among modern designer/mass market offerings, but SS features a high-quality iris note. Sweetened nicely by the plum note, and enhanced by aromatic lavender, it is simple yet beautifully composed, like this Estée Lauder luxury line in general. SS is iris-forward at its early stages, with plum emerging after a little while, adding jammy sweetness. I get lavender as it develops, restrained but aromatic. I was very excited about the powdery orris note here - it is pitch-perfect - but unfortunately, the iris note fades after the opening subsides. It becomes slightly lipstick-y as it dries down, fading to an airy, woody-amber skin scent. I get a hint of ambroxan or similar fixative in its later stages. The lavender remains, sweetened by plum. I would have preferred an iris-dominant scent throughout, but overall SS is still really good. Sillage and longevity are moderate. A youthful take on a scent profile that may be traditionally viewed as mature, SS is timeless and ageless. Best worn in spring, but is transeasonal. An effortless but excellent feminine everyday scent. 4/5.

🩰💜 Cue Tchaikovsky's 🎶 Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy 🎶 💜🩰 Oh my stars, Sensuous Stars is lovely, an underrated gem!! Sadly discontinued, but I picked up a bottle on eBay for a song and loved it so much I purchased a backup! This is Chanel's Misia, but with plum instead of violet! While not listed in the notes, I detect aldehydes in the opening, giving Sensuous Stars that bubbly champagne cocktail sparkle that I find so addictive in Misia, Volnay's Perlerette, and Vermeil by Bienaimé. The base of Sensous Stars is very similar in structure to Vermeil with sophisticated grounding via Irisy orris root. But the plum lends a dash of whimsical sweetness. The lavender note is slight, but present, providing added depth and interest in the background. Longevity is excellent, silage is moderate to strong. If you love "lipstick" scents, I suggest getting a bottle while you can! This is an enchanting fragrance befitting the Sugar Plum Fairy, and I will be wearing Sensuous Stars this year to watch The Nutcracker ballet! ✨🩰✨

I like it very much. I can’t smell the lavender but the Orris and Plum are very prominent. Its vibe and olfactory category reminds me a lot of « Yvresse » by YSL (Lately called « Champagne »). It’s a Fruity-Chypre for me. This is very poetic and also « gourmand », but not in the sense of current sugary perfumes, but rather « mouth watering » and « gourmet », I mean, it makes me want to crunch into a fruit! Very sparkly and dusty, like sparkling stardust 🤩. The purple color is a clever choice because this is exactly what I see when I close my eyes smelling this : A purple cloudy sky with bright silver stars (Think satellite pictures of the universe with saturate colors). Sensuous stars is classic and polite but impertinent and playful at the same time. I like the fact it is ageless. I can see a young girl like an old woman wearing this. Other perfumes make me the same effect, for exemple « insolence » from Guerlain (in particular the EDT), who can play very youthful game as well as mature feeling.

this is my favourite of the new EL scent line. I smell plum TEA, not the real fruit, but luckily more of an unsweetened plum tea in a wonderful combination with orris root, (so not the powdery, flowery iris, it's really the slightly herby iris root that was used here). The lavender is hardly detectable and I can only smell traces of it very late, maybe after 2-3 hours of wearing. It remains mainly this lovely plum tea and orris root mixture which immediately gave me the impression of a Japanese teahouse , very soothing, protecting, quiet, almost spa-like. The scent impression remains quite exclusive and expensive to me - especially if you are a general iris-scent fan like me and have tested like hundreds of iris scents and found that many of them resemble each other. This one is really new to my nose, plum tea and iris root, a combination I never smelled before and very well done.

This is the first one that I have tried from EL’s new Luxury Collection. And I have to say it has impressed me. All of the perfumes in this line seem to have only a few notes. This one has plum, lavender and orris. And they play off each other brilliantly. Orris and lavender by themselves are androgynous, leaning a bit to the masculine side. But the sweet plum acts as a very smartly placed counterpoint, which brings the fragrance right back into the target range of unisex. If the plum was left on its own, the fragrance would undoubtedly be cloying, but the lavender and orris temper the plum so well. These three notes offset one another in a way that I have not encountered before, and this is a welcome addition to my collection. I do not have anything like this in my collection yet. Well done Estée Lauder! I look forward to sampling more from this new luxury collection!

This was a blind buy based on one of the reviewers below mentioning a similarity to MM Lipstick On, and it does not disappoint! That orris note is the perfect powdery vintage makeup iris scent that I've been searching for. The plum on the open has a little bit of warm spice in it which is interesting. It doesn't last super long which is fine since I'm here for the orris anyway. I don't particularly smell the lavender note on its own, but it seems more like it serves to soften the transition between jammy spiced plum top & powdery orris base. Really nostalgic too as iris/orris was a popular note in the scents my teachers & mom's friends wore in the early/mid 80s. Dry down turns more woody/earthy but still pleasant. Really lovely & so glad to have it in my collection!

I recently tried this for the first time on vacation and fell in love with it immediately! There was something about it that hooked me right away. For some reason, Estee Lauder is discontinuing these, and I bought it at a fantastic deal. Later, when home from vacation, I checked Fragrantica and see that so many found it smelled like Bibliotheque, one of my top five favorites, so loving this one makes so much sense now. And yes, they are in the same vein. I'm also noting some find it similar to Replica's Lipstick On and Nest's Black Tulip - both fragrances I have and enjoy!. The bottle is also absolutely stunning - luxurious in both looks and feel. Why are they discontinuing this line?

So funny, the review below is almost exactly what I was going to write! This is a magical sugar plum fairy perfume! It definitely reminds me of icy weather, watching The Nutcracker, etc etc. It’s so different than anything I’ve smelled. It’s discontinued and being sold all over the place for so cheap, I also bought a backup bottle that I probably won’t need for a decade. Sparkling, tart plum with grounding orris—fun but also sophisticated in an Estee Lauder kind of way.

I got a mini bottle. It's a beautiful scent and light, gentle and delicate. I'm just a little uncomfortable with something(orris?) for the first few minutes though. I feels like an over-40 woman scent. Classy.... In other words, This is the Estee Lauder... Anyway, Floral Fruity scent for mature women. Not for girls. Yes, I feel "Bibliothèque without leather" slightly. Update: Finally, I got a full bottle. I'm getting in love with this scent :)

I just got this and I think it’s going to be a favorite. Underrated gem in my opinion! It has a sparkly quality but it isn’t juvenile. The plum is strong, but there is a touch of lavender which adds something floral and contributes to its calming qualities. The orris grounds it and adds some depth. The sweetness level is just right. It feels so pretty to me. It makes me think of a purple, shimmery powder in a good way.

I bought the Estee Lauder Small Wonders discovery set, and Sensuous Stars is the sweetest one in the collection. This is the fragrance I would buy a full bottle. It smells like a candied plum with a sweet powdery dry down. Think pastel purple cloud. The lavender smells more like violet to me. Very feminine and light without suffocating you with too much sweetness.

I purchased this the same week that I received Tutu by Gritti. It’s a honestly a brighter and more delicate version of Gritti Tutu. Layers really well together. This is a category of perfume I didn’t know that I would love but I keep going back to it. I have gotten quite a few compliments while wearing this!

I side very much with @Ina.rem review. This is very pretty. I found a 100ml bottle on eBay for $60 and I am exceedingly pleased. I find it seasonally versatile; it’s light and soft enough to not be cloying in summer and I would find it cozy enough to wear in winter. She’s a true delight!

Sweet iris and plum. Beautiful, very elegant! Similar to Iris Goddess by Floral Street but sweeter. Very tender. Be aware, this is one of those scents that smells super different on paper vs on skin!!! I love it!

If Tchaikovsky's Sugar Plum Fairy had a scent, here she is. This treasure instantly transports you to the Land of Sweets. How could bottled ethereal joy be so underrated, and discontinued?? I'm beside myself.

They discontinued this? What a shame. It’s criminally underrated in my opinion! It reminds me of a sparkly sugar-plum fairy, but also a little sophisticated! I’m enjoying my bottle.

Gourgegous fragrance and people who come close will compliment.

okay so usually if I was describing a raspberry leather perfume you'd not be a fool for instantly jumping to the conclusion that Sensuous stars is just some pale Tuscan leather rip off, by Estee Lauder but actually like many in this line it keeps to the traditions on EL and actually does something creative and classy with it. So to me this perfume is about a soft, supple radiant, iris/orris based leather accord, with masses of fruity raspberry on the top. Yes I know it says plum here and actually sniffing a card i sprayed it on a few days ago I can see somewhat more of that, however when first sprayed and applied to skin I get that very tart and characteristic raspberry thing. Now orris and raspberry have a strange affinity because some orris materials and molecules which can be used to recreate orris ( can't think of the specific one off the top of my head) have this raspberry juice effect to them. So perhaps it's that which is conjuring it for me? I dunno. So despite this perfume not really being for me, the orris is very soft leather and cosmetic (not that I'm apposed to that I wear Lipstick rose quite happily) something about this with the raspberry is just a little too light and playfully femme for my tastes, well it's not even about taste as such, it's more... do I want to add it to my wardrobe? and I'd say....no. However, I think it's a fine perfume, This theme may exist in this format elsewhere but I'm not really aware of it and I was quite taken with just how lovely it is.

A creamy, powdery, overripe, sweet plum is what I would call Sensuous Stars in a few words! A truly delightful scent IMO. Nothing ethereal or celestial about it from what I can tell, but very fruity, slightly sweet and gourmand in my experience. I like it a lot, because it has a pronounced plum note which I always love in perfumes, even though I am not huge fan of iris, but not enough to pay full price for a bottle. The opposition between lavender and plums is amazing, it makes Sensuous Stars feel unique. Without being a challenging scent, it’s on the unique side. A delectable, very wearable, fruity, irisy, purple floral, potentially unisex fragrance. Actually, might be more feminine because of the strong fruity aspect and the subtle sweetness. Don’t think lots of men would like to smell that fruity and sweet in the same time... Very underrated and quite different from what I have currently in my collection. Goes on my to buy list, but I will purchase it only if I can get it on a decent sale! This Luxury Collection has nicely done scents, very mass appealing but on the lighter side which for me doesn’t justify paying FRP!!!

A simple plum and iris fragrance. The lavender in this is very subtle. You can smell its clean and herbal touch if you know it's supposed to be there, but this is not a lavender-dominant fragrance and I'm not sure if I would have noticed it if I didn't read the notes beforehand. The iris/orris is much easier to pick up. It's powdery as usual and has a bit of a lipstick vibe, no earthy roots here. The plum is very nicely done, it smells warm, ripe and juicy with a slightly musky undertone. Am I the only one who sometimes gets a musky note from plums in perfume? Anyways, the blend of powdery iris and plum also smells a bit like fuzzy white peaches, with a nice 90s throwback vibe. The scent is rather sweet and doesn't change much over the time of wearing. I like it, but I'd like it more if it had a little complexity. Performance-wise I'd say it's moderately good, perfect for daytime wear. For anyone wondering, this has nothing in common with the old Sensuous fragrances by Estée Lauder, they only reused the name.

Sensuous Stars is a fruit bathed in dusk. Plum opens the fragrance, lightly laced with pale lavender at first then growing deep and syrupy, swollen with ripeness but never overripe. Its skin is very much warmed and taut, catching the last streaks of a golden yet cool light. Its sweetness is rich, not loud, cushioned in hazy clouds remiscent of soft coconut-y sandalwood and gauzy, seductive musk. There’s something so round about it, plush and enveloping, yet not quite heavy. I get this little bit of osmanthus on my skin peeking through, deep leathery, apricot-drenched, yet with that pretty floral echo, nectar diffused into the air rather than dripping off the petals. A trace of velvety orris hums in the background, suede-like and just a little smoky, lending depth without being thick. Sensual in the way of bare skin amongst draping curtains, a naked game of hide-and-seek with your lover.

A classic plum-lipstick-powder scent. I always love this scent profile and have yet to find one that I dislike. I don't get the lavender here personally; just the plum and the iris. I just bought 1889/Moulin Rouge from Histoires de Parfums, but this is very very similar to my nose. I don't need two of the same scent, but this one is pretty good. Scent: I'm a sucker for fruity lipstick scents - 9/10 Longevity: Average Projection: Average Polarity: Feminine If you're like me and LOVE this very specific type of fruity lipsticks, give the following a shot as well: Lipstick Rose (Frederic Malle), Misia (Chanel Les Exclusifs), 1889/Moulin Rouge (Histoires de Parfums).

I'm on the hunt for my perfect plum perfume. This isn't it. However the projection is much more powerful that I expected which is a plus for me. It's definitely Feminine too. Unfortunately my nose is picking up on something green almost menthol leaning underneath the plum. She just arrived today so I need more time but I feel I'll probably layer this with something ultra sweet & enjoy it more that way. You definitely do get a lovely plum note with a soft powder edge to it, my nose just doesn't know what to do with this green thing hiding like a caterpillar underneath the plum.

I’m usually not a big fan of iris in perfumes, as it often feels too powdery or heavy for me, but Sensuous Stars surprised me in the best way. Here the iris is soft, sweet, and very mild and never sharp or overwhelming. The overall impression is clean, smooth, and pleasantly comforting. It feels effortless and very wearable, the kind of scent you can reach for every day without getting tired of it. For me, it’s a gentle, clean perfume that works beautifully as a daily signature.

Revisiting sample. Perhaps it's matured, but I'm getting a much better impression than the first time round. Fruity opening of the plum variety followed by a rather beautiful dry down that I would describe as clean/elegant. What I find positive is that the fruit note sticks around, but it's not harsh or screechy. That in itself sets it apart from a lot of fruity perfumes I've sampled over the years. If they fix performance issues this could be a good proposition.

Took a while before I really understood this fragrance. Found it rather odd at first, but after a few wears, have come to love it. Fruity, powdery iris notes - don't really get much of the lavender from it, though the slightly medicinal note is probably just that. Very calming, relaxing, elegant type of fragrance.

So far I'm enjoying this. As a man who loves Iris, I think this leans feminine but still unisex. A little similar to Chopard's Imperiale Iris Malika. Bottle is nice with a magnetic cap. Edit: More time with this fragrance and side by side its not very similar to Chopard's Imperiale Iris Malika

I tried this in Macy’s, it’s nice! I mostly get super juicy sweet plums, with a touch of juicy fruit gum or nerds candy? it’s not my taste, but if I smelled it on someone else I would think they smelled yummy

Powdery, wintery, sugar plum fairy. The orris keeps it grounded enough to remain sophisticated imo. Think of a ballerina wrapped in soft, plush furs surrounded by pristine powder snow.

I tried it today and I must say it smells like 90s Lipsticks....it took me back when I was little and I smelled my mom's makeup

Sweet carrot juice and vegan muffins, made me think of Poets of Berlin. A hypster one in this collection of granny novels

I tried the entire Small Wonders line from Estee Lauder and Sensuous Stars had one of my favorite openings. The plum and lavender blended together to make blueberries. Yum. Blueberries and Iris. However, after the opening settled for a few minutes, the blueberry note started to fade and a sour plum took it's place. The lavender was thankfully never prominent, but in general, I found the development of the scent disappointing. It just lost the initial magic and fell flat on skin and clothes. I feel like most of the Small Wonders line progresses in a similar manner when worn--the fragrances are top loaded and optimized for paper, not for wearing. Most of the fragrances in the line needed more support in the base, which is something that I'd expect from an inexpensive designer fragrance, but not a luxury line like this one. This line will not stick around for years to come and most of the scents will be quite forgettable--another jaded money grab from Estee Lauder. Edit: I tried this again 10 months later and the unbalanced sourness seems to have calmed down. Maybe the juice needed time to mellow out, but I'm finding it very pleasant and a little bit whimsical. This could be a replacement for Replica Lipstick On, which was discontinued a few years ago. I'm not always into lipstick-style fragrances, but this plum note is really nice and smooth, balancing the serious iris with a playful gourmand touch. In addition, now that we can find discounted and partial bottles, the Small Wonders line is pretty good value for money--I take back what I said last year.

A sample of this perfume was gifted to me by a fellow perfume enthusiast. It's completely not my cup of tea and I want to emphasize it, but I appreciated the possibility to test something different than the scent profile I'm usually looking for. Greenglama mentioned carrot juice in their review and I generally agree here, maybe for me it's not a juice per se, but a freshly sliced carrot instead. No plums detected in my case. Carrots linger for a while and then the relatively pleasant iris phase begins. As the perfume dries down, the powdery notes emerge. I would rather compare it to compact powder than to lipstick, but it smells like the contents of a cosmetic bag in general if you put your nose somewhere near. It's not an unpleasant smell, but at some point I also got a hint of staleness exactly like tanaC which clearly impacted my rating.

Sensuous Stars Estée Lauder (Store test, ELCA sale) Sensuous Stars is fruity-iris scent. This is wired to me a bit because this is no violet involve. I means, normally when it comes to this classic framework, it should be contain violet. It is cake-like iris, dense and vanilaly with a nuance of fruity-floral support. This is not the plum that I don't like, and mild tint of floral freshness is kind of there. It light fruity, I am not mind, it is beautiful to wear and the compose well enough. I perceive some musty note in far dry down. It quite a miss for me. Opening 7/10 Closing 6.6/10

This is a sugar plum fairy nibbling on baby carrots in the top notes. I don’t smell the lavender but I feel it grounds the perfume from becoming too sweet. The dry down is a powdery makeup with a hint of violet. I get a well behaved Chloe Nomade of plum. And delicate Floral Street Orris Goddess vibe. Medium projection and silage. I don’t mind it, it’s a pretty scent. Different to what I remember from a few years ago as having a more violet and Iris makeup component. However it is more plum which gives it a bit of a sweet and sourness feel mixed with powder. Leans more feminine

I blind bought this last summer and I still don't know what I think about it. First sniff I perceived something slightly woody (in a good way) which turned out to be the interplay of the plum and orris. After additional wearings, I started picking up more of the individual notes, but I'm not sure that I liked how they interacted in the composition. Now that I'm writing this I'm thinking I should get it out and test it in the cooler weather and see if my impression has changed. However, as of right now I'm a solid "OK" leaning towards "like".

To me this is a very subtle scent that warms up on the skin and releases a bit of magic. It's extremely subtle to the point of being unnoticeable until about 10-20 minutes later you start getting wafts of it as you move. The scent is barely there and has an earthy, orris feel with a hint of plum. The plum comes through in the dry down. I think people who enjoy those skin scents like 'not a perfume' or 'escentric molecules' would like this. Eminently wearable in an office setting. To me it's a perfect perfume to wear to bed in winter.

I absolutely adore this perfume, but I do love powdery feminine perfumes with 90's twist in general. It has a gorgeous fruity and pulp-inspired opening, that is very juicy and sweet, and wears off into a powdery iris, lipstick-like smell. I do not find its lip-gloss-like scent repulsive or bad, I fine it very feminine and 90's inspired. I agree with others that it is subtle, and not offensive at all. However, it's also not extremely unique or original.

Well executed. My third favorite in the line, following, Dream Dusk and Tender Light. It’s aloof elegant, classy. Good sillage and great longevity. Update: 5/16/2023. I tried again, and I get this lipsticks but sour plum more than before. Not sure I like as much anymore.

Trying it in the store I *loved* it because it was powdery but still a clean floral... Now I cant stand it and am trying to burn through it bc it's very old lady and u sophisticated to me. Does not have the luxurious feel of the other scents in this line.

Sweet powdery... not my cup of tea. It's nice but not as nice as the price asked. I think it can get sickly sweet fast if oversprayed. Give it a try if you like sweet plums.

I think this is the most lipsticky fragrance I have ever smelled

Wow, so much plum! As soon as I sprayed it on the tester strip, I got a sharp blast of plum, a boozy plum that reminded me of the time I got horribly sick at a fortified-wine-tasting party. The iris/orris comes through a bit, but it really can't compete with the sharp plum-wine accord. The lavender doesn't come through at all for me, except perhaps as a medicinal-herbal note on top of the plum. It's not listed, but I'm also getting a weird patchouli-like woody-green aromatic note that almost nauseates me in this context. I'm glad I'm just smelling this from the Mini Wonders discovery set because I would have been really disappointed if I had blind-bought this on the basis of the notes, which appeal to me (aside from the plum, which I didn't expect to be so boozy). Not a fan, although maybe this will be better on skin. I'll probably test it on my wrist before curling up my nose and banishing it forever. Maybe I'll change my mind, but something tells me that if I want a woody fruity floral, I'd be better off wearing Lalique Amethyst, which has much better and more realistic (as in "berry on the bush, not turned into a syrupy liqueur") fruit notes. Or even Midnight Fantasy, frankly.

Sooo... I like plum but really can't get into any iris/orris notes. When first sprayed, this is fairly off putting to me. As it dries down, the notes morph, but they remain a super strange combo, in my opinion. After a while, all the plum is gone and it is straight orris. Therefore, this one's not for me. I would caution anyone thinking of picking this up to not expect much else other than orris - if you are looking for strong, juicy plum, you may be disappointed.

This to my nose smells like some sort of laffy taffy. Very disappointed in this one. The marketing and the perfume just don't meet up. Edit: Later in the day on 12/12/21 this has a very plastic smell that I just do not like. Laffy taffy and plastic. Very fake. This and Infinite Sky were total losers for me. The winners for me in this line were Radiant Mirage, Tender Light, Desert Eden, Dream Dusk and Blushing Sands. Paradise Moon is just ok.

I just tried this on at the only place it’s physically for sale in my country. Smells exactly like walking past a Lush shop. That smell gives me a headache so I’m not a fan.

Strange perfume. On me - no lavander and no plum. Try before purchase. Very strange.

Mystery fluid mixed with grape soda. Gak.

I had high hopes for this, as I love all of the notes and someone below compared it to Bibliothèque, my all-time favourite. However, my skin chemistry is bringing out a pissy smell, which is definitely not what I was hoping for. It settles down to a wonderful powdery iris...but still with pee. I hope others have a better time with this, because I know it would just be stunning without the urine note that I bring out in it!