Mon Guerlain Sparkling Bouquet

Very clean, very floral, very fresh and crisp in a somewhat soapy fresh kind of way. I smell like I just hopped out of the most luxurious shower anyone could ever take. Yes it smells like the most beautiful very clean and crisp florally crisp lavender orange pear vanilla. I was afraid of that "powder" everyone says they smell that it'd make me smell more powder like those powdery perfumes from early 90s, late 80s, perfumes that smelled like someone dumped a whole bottle of their child's Johnson and Johnson's baby powder into a tea rose with jasmine, bottled it up and all the ladies went crazy for it. Ladies like my lovely mother. Lol. I understand the Tea Rose craze. It's the most realistic rose smell of all. But I like my roses dark and brooding and with thorns they aren't afraid to use (Atomic Rose, Intense Cafe, etc). I get none of that kind of powder or rose in either of these and def not in this flanker. This flanker I'd say has no smell of powder at all that screams at you it's so well blended so elegantly if it's there at all you can barely tell. These days, most flankers just smell so much like the original they just seem like another money grab. Sparkling Bouquet smells very VERY vaguely like the EDP. It is worth having both if you like both. They ARE different. And I even like it just as much, maybe even more, but it smells very different than the edp. I haven't recieved Intense yet, but I did order it and it should be here the day after tomorrow. Im not a patchouli fan - which Im searching for in the edp which says it has it but it's certainly not the dirty patchouli I'm used to smelling on fake Coco Mademoiselle clones and in Flowerbomb - which shouldve been named Patchoulibomb because that's mostly what I smell there. Nothing wrong with patchouli if that's your gig but it reminds me of smoking a blunt in my bedroom as a kid and then lighting 3 sticks of patchouli incense because it was the only smell stronger and dirtier enough than marijuana to cover up the smell of it so my parents would have an excuse as to why my room smells vaguely of weed. ("You're just smelling the patchouli incense Dad!" "Oh...ok." Lol) In short patchouli dominated scents will always remind me of a headshop. But the patchouli in this edp is so well blended I have to put my nose into the clothing and search for the patchouli note in the edp. I do smell the "licorice" giving the edp some character. I'll come back after I get the Intense which has more patchouli and do a little update with them all side by side and tell you how it compares to your regular patchouli. I DO get the orange and the pear though but they are not sweet, they are sparkling like their lives depend on it like they were picked off the tree before they were ripe. I dont even want to call it "floral/fruity" they are that clean and crisp in SB. More like floral/fresh. On my clothes, this one (SB) lasts longer than the edp inside in the air conditioning. I'm wearing it right now on one sleeve, and can still smell it going strong on my clothes. I sprayed one arm with the edp, and one with SB, and the SB is still Sparkling. The edp checked out for the most part about an hour or 2 ago and its basically a skin scent now 7 hours in, imo. But keep in mind I have huge expectations for performance from my perfumes. I was a child in the 90s when you could drop $17 on Sunflowers by EA at the local outlet fragrance store at the mall and it was so strong and it'd last so long you'd have to spray it in the air in front of you and walk through it and everyone in the house could smell those 2 sprays when the air turned on and circulated it to every single room, whereas now, you better moisturize and spray 5-7 sprays directly on your person and bring the bottle in your purse because ALL of these perfumes (Montale excluded) are going to fade away halfway through your night out. I don't get a lot of a sweet surupy vanilla here on either tho. So if you're looking for that here, you're in the wrong place. This vanilla is different...different from ANY vanilla I've ever smelled. But then, I read Guerlain has been tweaking and perfecting their vanillas down to an art (along with the "Guerlinade") for at least a century, and Juicy Couture's sugary syrupy gourmand vanilla doesnt seem to be the scent they were going for for their vanillas. This is such a clean vanilla. In short, this smells like a luxurious perfume, not baked goods, and I love baked goods perfumes don't get me wrong, and perhaps acquired more than I meant to lol and so to compensate, I invested in a Guerlain, or 3 and threw Guess Seductive Noir in there just for good measure, yes, I got carried away on a cloud of the nicest actual perfume perfumes I've smelled in a long time. I've been drowning in a sea of gourmands and Guerlain just pulled up like a lifeboat that smelled like heaven, like going home back to when perfumes had so many well blended notes they actually smelled like a perfume, and I may have swam to this lifeboat and jumped on it like I'd been stranded on that raft for 10 years in an ocean of mostly linear gourmands. Lol I've been choked in surupy vanilla, milk chocolate, dark chocolate, sweet almonds, milk, praline, honey, caramel etc for so many years now, so when I smelled the Guerlains, the "wifey perfumes" aka perfumes men want to smell whenever they go home from their sidehoe at the local Hotel 6, my nose decided I wanted a polygamous marriage with all 3 of the Mons still available. Sad I missed Bloom of Rose...I like the queen of flowers in all my perfumes. But they have rose in the edp for a mid note and a peony in Sparkling Bouquet for a mid note (and peony in GSN as a mid note) - which my mind always just percieves as a sharper rose which is perfect for a fragrance described as "sparkling". Do either smell like Guess Seductive Noir? Well, GSN smells a bit more mainstream to me. I feel like more ppl would have no problem with that one. Why would they, its lovely, and a little more of the vanilla they are used to. Most perfume brands are all getting their ingredients from the same manufacturer. But Guerlain does their vanillas in-house and they do not share so you will not find it anywhere else. Guess isnt a 150 year old perfume house. But don't get me wrong, GSN smells AMAZING for $20 - best $20 I've ever spent in my entire life of perfume adventures - and yes I've smelled a few hastily thrown together Lattafas and they smell cheap and perform cheaply as well. They are beast mode for about 1 hour then ghost on you sooo fast... everyone always thinks they got a counterfeit bottle of a $25 perfume they disappear so fast and smell so weird. How would you make ANY money on counterfeiting a $25 perfume especially considering it looks like they spent the majority of their $ on presentation?!! The Lattafas all look good on the vanity and the boxes are so luxurious, but that is so deceptive. I think, to trick your brain into not trusting your nose and that it needs to "macerate" - a term I've never heard of in perfumery until Lattafa came along with what I feel is a term hoping to establish a placebo effect. Ive read comments of ppl letting their Lattafa they initially hated "macerate"/mature for 3 days, coming back to it and "its growing on me! Maybe there something to this maceration thing!" Lol as if 3 days was all it needed. I've made my own perfumes. They need to sit for about 3 weeks. Do you really think Lattafa hasn't had these perfumes made for 3 weeks before they shipped it off to you? They were flying off the shelves before they were even done maturing?! That's crazy talk. But if you like smelling like a drunk Santa Claus taking pictures with the kids at the mall - get you some Khamrah! If you want to smell like a drunk Santa Claus on his coffee break get the one with coffee. GSN does NOT smell like it was $20. Id have paid $70 for that one. But does it smell like the 2 Mon Guerlain's I'm comparing right now? They have the same perfume family vibe for sure. Well blended oriental/aromatic/florals. They're in the same family, but the 3 all smell distinct to me. GSN is not a dupe, it's an alternative. And a GREAT alternative at its current price. Lasts about 5-6 hours on clothes, 3 or 4 on skin. But I spray a LOT of it when I wear that one. And it's a 2.5oz so it's coming with me for the day in my purse. These Guerlain Bottles are huge though and made of a lot of glass. I bet they weigh 2 pounds each! TLDR: a sharp fresh floral that is in no way just another copy of the EDP with one note added. It's a whole different Guerlain imo. They should have seperated this one from the Mon Guerlain line. It smells much different than Mon Guerlain. But it still smells like Guerlain that's for sure. I can sooo easily tell the difference between the edp and SB. And the two smell sooo good. Money well spent. I love these. 💖 And SB may be my favorite since it has better performance. I think I'll buy the Mon Guerlain lotion next. I'd wear Sparkling Bouquet day or night in any weather. It's beautifully versatile.

I got a sample of this recently and after about a week I bought a small 30 ml. I couldn't get that beautiful opening out of my mind! The opening is bright, citrusy, fruity and just plain joyful to my nose. Pear notes are often cloying for me, but in this one, the citrus- pear combination is fresh and delicious, not cloying, high pitched or shampoo like at all. It does change and dry down quite differently IMO, becoming a sweet, fragrant, calming and cosy almost skin scent. It is wonderfully comforting, almost maternal in a lovely way, which must be the lavender. It never ventures into herbal or medicinal territory though. This may be what I want my daughter to remember me smelling like! 💕 It's been years since I've smelled the original MG EDP or EDT, so I can't compare this one to those, but at the time they weren't to my tastes. Someone mentioned if you like the original MG you probably wouldn't like this and vice versa ... very possible, but I now like this vanilla lavender combo here so much I may have to go back and retest the original ... Overall, the whole fresh, slightly warm, elegant combination is just so lovely to me. Low sillage with moderate longevity ... maybe 4-5 hrs. I wish the opening citrus fruity burst stuck around longer, but I don't mind reapplying. Incidentally, this has one of the most satisfying sprayers I've ever come across :) EDIT: I’ve made a serious dent in my little 30ml bottle. Wish I had bought a bigger size and will repurchase when done. I think it does better in moderate heat and cooler temps where you can smell the top fruit notes and then soft lavender vanilla. It went above 30 today and it pulled really floral and a bit high pitched. I also blind bought MG Floral thinking I’d love it as much, but I don’t, 2nd edit - it has become one of my top 5! I bought another bottle and also the EDP which is also lovely but sweeter vanilla from the get go. More of a fall/winter scent for me. I love them both.

I find the negative reactions to this perfume to be very perplexing. On my skin it's absolutely beautiful that I enjoy smelling throughout the day or night. And (no exaggeration) I've rarely ever worn it out in public without someone telling me that I smell amazing. I live in a warm climate where this one comes on delightfully light and bright in the beginning, and then settles down to a beautiful, comforting, and decidedly feminine scent after the first hour. I love that it's sweet without being too sweet as modern perfumes often are. And it's not just the that I'm tolerant of lavendar, since I mostly dislike the Libre line, and have only found one flanker that I like. Sparkling Bouquet projects to just about an arm's length for the first four hours on my skin, and then becomes a skin scent that I can smell for a good 10 hours. It stays even longer on clothing or in my hair. And my nose picks up the pear, and also the peony mixed with that beautiful and familiar Mon Guerlain DNA. For me, this one is a definite love. I adore the entire Mon Guerlain line, and have and enjoy all of the flankers, but this is my most worn go-to Mon Guerlain for the spring and most of the summer. I have a large collection of my own, and have easily sampled three times as many fragrances as I own, and this one still stands strong for me. I know that perfume is 100% subjective, and tastes often vary, but I don't get how there are those who dislike this fragrance. They sure aren't picking up what my nose does.

The two beautifully written Fragrantica articles by Elena Prokofeva & Alex Osipov prompted me to make yet another Mon Guerlain flanker purchase. They both captured the magic of Sparkling Bouquet so well, that I will leave you to read their reviews and just give you my opinion. I LOVE this fragrance. To quote Elena Prokofeva, ....”it can easily be called intoxicating, giddy, joyful, festive, and very very springlike”. If MG Intense is the winter version of MG; this is the true summer version of the original. Although the opening has the immediate DNA, it is without the heavy lavender/vanilla of the original and quickly does an immediate turn to venture on it’s own very unique path. It does feel sparkling, bubbly and champagne-esque. It brings me joy and makes me want to laugh - like a good champagne would. It’s fun and beautiful at the same time, while keeping the nuance and magic of Guerlain’s ability to seamlessly float from one note to the next. First citrus, then pear and all of a sudden the peony note seems to stand alone. It remains on me a good 4 hours, but wears on my clothes longer. People around me commented on the lovely fragrance, so I’d say the silage is fair. I no longer suggest safe blind buys and was able to find a sample to test off eBay before purchasing. It was love at first sniff.

For a long time, I've been meaning to get my hands on a full-size original Mon Guerlain bottle, but before I got the chance to make my purchase, Guerlain released Sparkling bouquet and after looking at the notes I decided to buy it instead. I was so eager to know what it smelt like, it became routine to check the votes on this page to see what people thought. The votes so far in comparison to the original were quite low, which made me worried. After just a week of nervously waiting, it arrived this afternoon. I was pleasantly surprised! It's definitely a fragrance for the spring and the summer, it's cleaner, a bit soapy, greener and fresher, reminiscent of the original, the vanilla and lavender come through beautifully. For those obsessed with the original, Sparkling bouquet would smell lovely during the day and into a summer evening layered with the original Mon Guerlain. I think it is a safe blind buy if you're looking for a signature this summer. I'm very happy with my purchase. *Still testing the longevity, will update with a verdict* Update: moderate lasting power about 4/5 hours wear on the skin, it still smells great on my clothes, I could imagine it being on there for a few more hours if not more. 9/10. I have no idea why more people aren't talking about this!