Nollie

I grew up in a small coastal town in south Florida, where my daily girlhood ritual consisted of sunflower seeds and a slushee from Wawa, slathering myself in Maui Babe tanning lotion and attempting the perfect seashell shaped tan-ttoo, and finally putzing around the mall with some sticky-fingered friends until my mother called me home to supper. It was the sort of idyllic cool-girl vibe that was made possible only by the fact that amidst the Presbyterian churches and cow pastures, my town had a Pacsun storefront situated in what was widely considered the beach babe corridor of our derelict shopping plaza (a 2000s Florida teenager’s holy trinity: Hollister, Pacsun, RonJon’s). And within Pacsun was a highly coveted little jewel of an elixir; packaged in an unbearably cute and holdable bottle, with an unassuming and decidedly cool lower-case label and the perfect splash of lime-green rubber grip. St. Augustine’s fountain of youth had absolutely nothing on the classic Nollie. The snowbirds had their designer scents from the Sephora inside JC Penny’s— Carolina Herrera Good Girl abounds!— but to me, Nollie is the smell of Childish Gambino’s Because the Internet album on CD in my beater with no AC, the smell of skipping Sunday service to practice french kissing with my best friends in the girl’s bathroom, the smell of pretending that you like coconut water (it’s pretty gross, babe, but it’s super good for you). It’s awesome. Don’t get me wrong— you pilfer your mom’s Juicy Couture Viva La Juicy or D&G Light Blue on special occasions, but Nollie is your ride or die. You tan easy, and you never really use sunscreen, like, ever. And you wouldn’t be caught dead without your watermelon Bubblicious. Now I’m in my late twenties and I’m ruminating. I have an office job in the Midwest and the winters keep me sickly pale. I meal prep and network and I generally don’t smell like sour green apple and DIY lemon juice highlights. I go for “skin scents,” because they’re office appropriate/respectable and if I’m being totally honest they’re pretty delightful. Basically, I grew up. L on my forehead. I suppose overall Nollie is a metaphor for the ephemerality of my sunkissed teenaged years— juicy, summery, and begging for an extra spritz. It sticks around in places you wouldn’t expect, but for me, becomes undetectable too soon. This perfume smells like a citric acid head rush tempered by light, bright, addictive tropical fruits. And maybe I’m biased, but I actually don’t think Nollie reads as immature or sickly sweet. True to form, this is the smell of your best friend’s intimidatingly cool older sister. You wear it because you wanna be her, or be her boyfriend (?), or maybe you wanna be the perfume bottle on her dresser (??), like you really wanna be the cute round glass that she holds carelessly in her fingertips and then tosses onto the bed while she’s getting ready (????), you want to be the little nozzle that she suspends teasingly just above her pulse in a casual, nonchalant way (????????), and then ten years down the line you’re in a Pacsun in a strip mall somewhere and the smell of this perfume makes you realize that your lesbian tendencies were never quite latent. You might be thinking, ‘Girl, calm down, it’s cheap, it’s childish, it’s obnoxious, blah blah blah.’ Well, now I know you’re probably a snowbird because spraying then overspraying Nollie for the first time is a spiritual rite of passage rivaled only by, like, successfully orchestrating a game of spin the bottle. And you probably reapplied sunscreen, like a noob! To the real Nollie girls out there: where are we getting our Botox done. The years of competitive tanning have caught up with me. And to my childhood best friend’s older sister: thanks for the weirdly sexually confused relationship I now have with fruity gourmands.

This is a nostalgic scent for me. I wore it all through high school religiously, and although it definitely is fruity, it has a light and fresh quality to it that is very summery and wears well in hot climates, at least it does on me. The bottle has been updated, but the scent remains the same as it was in 2009 when I fell in love with it. It is rather uncomplicated, but it wears well with my body chemistry and fades beautifully into a clean hint of rosewater and sweet melon. It is not long lasting, but it's so inexpensive and accessible that I just fill a travel sprayer with it and refresh after 4 hours or so. It is not soapy at all, which I appreciate since a lot of these more adolescent-targeted scents can end up leaning that way. At 31 years old I do not find this to be overly juvenile, and I still enjoy it very much after all these years. There's something really nice about a simple scent like this, and I get plenty of compliments on it even though it's quite possibly the most affordable and simplistic fragrance I own.

Awh this smells so cute, fresh green apples cut up next to a spring time bouquet dusted with sugar, or a sugar and citric acid mixture like what’s on sour candy. It smells delightfully sour but not sharp or pungent. I got a compliment wearing this from my boyfriend’s sister she said it smelled really good and lingered in the hallway I walked though. The sillage and longevity is really good, it lasts over 24 hours on clothes, it’s a really strong perfume especially for a fruity floral, two sprays is enough for the whole day. It’s a little shampooey with fruity sweetness. I really really like this one a lot, I’m glad I revisited it. It also stands out from other fruity florals I have for lasting so long and having a really fresh green apple note. Also I asked my boyfriend what he thought of it and he said “nummies” I was like wtf do you mean and he didn’t have any other way to describe it, so I guess guys really like this one lol.

I bought this perfume for myself for Christmas in middle or high school: wore it every day until the bottle was gone. It was the og round one with the silicone cover. I guess I moved on to other perfumes that year and completely forgot this existed. Until now, 15 years later I buy a hair detangler. Spray it on my daughters hair and feel transported in time and immediately see this bottle and remembered how it felt holding that petite green bottle ❤️ Oh my god it was good. I was excited to see it still exists, but looks like it’s been changed, and that round silicone bottle was everything... (the hair detangler that triggered the memory was John Frieda 3-in-1 Vibrant shine spray) Edit: yesterday I discovered that Opus Kore by Vilhelm smells super similar to this also. I don’t have Nollie anymore to compare. But if you’re into fancy crystal bottles and perfume collecting, check out Vilhelm.

I was in high-school from 05 to 09 and I got this as a gift twice bc I was obsessed with it when I smelled it at the mall and if I had a bf this is what I would ask for as a gift lol, and bought it when I could afford it myself. It's great for lovers of "Lucky You", DKNY be delicious, Versace bright Crystal, and bombshell by VS. One day I would like to buy this again for nostalgia bc it was a signature scent for me in HS. I remember when I first got it, I would wear it with a country apple body cream from BBW and I felt like that girl, it always got me attention. It smells like early mornings getting ready, hoop earrings, a ponytail w baby hair, and the south pole puffer jacket with fur trim on the hood bc I couldn't afford the baby phat one at the time, and my DC pink and black sneakers. And can't forget the shimmery 99 cent lipgloss. Yesssss.