20 000 Flowers Under the Sea (No. 31)

Edit: okay, what happened here? After smelling this a few more times, I’m finally getting the marine notes, and now I’m obsessed and have gotten this perfume back into my collection. A strange one for sure. If you don’t feel like it’s for you at first, keep it for a while and come back to it periodically. It’ll grow on you. An unsuccessful blind buy. This is beautiful, but not for me. Unfortunately, I don't smell any of the marine or salty notes listed. All I get is ylang ylang and lily, which are totally gorgeous smells, but I was hoping to get more of the salt and coral so that the fragrance would be more "20,000 Flowers Under the Sea" rather than just "20,000 Flowers." Reading everyone else's reviews here tells me that my nose is what's off, though. It seems like others are picking up on the coral, salt, etc. so this is a me problem, not an issue with the perfume itself. All that being said, I gifted this to my mother today and she absolutely adores it. I think she'll get a lot of use out of it in the spring and summer months, which makes me super happy because like I said, it is a beautiful smell, and it deserves to be enjoyed!

20,000 Flowers Under the Sea is, I believe, the only aquatic perfume in my collection. Aquatics aren’t my jam, but I have a (perhaps unreasonable) love for this fragrance. The opening definitely conjures a fantasy oceanic setting with an invigorating, salty, white lily and ylang-ylang breeze grounded with a subtle, coarse coral accord. The balance of salt water and florals is perfect for me and the dry down is airy and uplifting. TokyoMilk in general makes fun, relatively inexpensive fragrances that I often find enjoyable. I’m impressed that they made an aquatic scent that didn’t get a “meh” reaction from me. Indeed, Margot Elena, its creator, developed a distinctly aquatic scent that I actually really like. To be honest, I don’t know if this scent hits my nose just right, or if it is objectively an excellent scent in this category. Like many other aquatics, the longevity and projection are on the low side of moderate. Super cute bottle and a good value, though.

I love easy to wear, refreshing fragrances like this. It's simple and wholesomely intimate. Very marine floral and somewhat beachy without being too salty. I like the coral note, though I'd prefer if salt and coral traded places in terms of strength so the coral could overpower the salt, sea salt fragrances don't compliment my chemistry too well. It's very inoffensive, delicate, and ideal considering I'm in regular contact with someone who seems to be allergic to a lot of perfumes, tends to get watery eyes and cranky. This one does not cause issues for him. The bottle is pretty, as are all of the TokyoMilk perfumes from this collection.

I purchased an already maturated bottle, so my review may be different. The ylang-ylang in here is so sunny, bright, fizzy, banana-esq, and honeyed. The lily in here is beautiful and was dunked into clean ocean water. The salt here is clean and mineralic, but still very wearable. There is a note in here I can’t describe, but I assume is the coral accord. Really beachy, clean, and girly. I can’t wait to pull this out during my vacations, as I imagine this would smell great after a dip in the ocean.

So floral. I am sad that it has been discontinued.