Babycat

A pragmatic review of YSL Babycat / Rifaaqat from an unrefined nose Testing Methodology: Two sprays on a paper test strip. For the skin test, two sprays were applied to the forearm, followed by a gym session and a normal shower to simulate a full day's wear. Note on the Clone: My nose perceives Rifaaqat as functionally identical to YSL Babycat; any minor performance difference could be attributed to the sprayer. This review applies to both. -------------------- Opening: This gave me pause. It is a strange vanilla, blended with an incense that is not the familiar Asian temple type, but a very specific Western Catholic Church variety. The result is a single, unified, challenging, and intoxicating accord of "dark slutty vanilla." Performance: Performance is excellent. The scent is very compatible with my nose, as I perceive it strongly and distinctly. It is completely linear on both skin and paper, making it a reliable performer. After showering, a faint, sweet vanilla skin scent remains. -------------------- Overall Impression & Use Case: This is a masterful fragrance and a reliable projector of its unique "dark slutty vanilla" effect. It is not gourmand. I would not eat that vanilla bean, but I would flick it. The core concept is clearly "gender-fluid sex in a bottle." The scent leans feminine due to the "slutty vanilla," but it is not strategically equivalent to a tuberose-heavy stripper fragrance. The image it creates is of a high-class escort or a business leader with a specific, edgy aesthetic. Think a boardroom by day, anal by night—either giving, receiving, or both, I don't judge. In my mind's eye, I see very specific attire options: a dark business suit, a chic leather jacket, priestly garb, or a chic goth with a studded choker. Specifically, all wearing fishnet tights, especially the men. This is not a man's-man fragrance. So, who is this for? Its most straightforward use is as a daily driver for someone promiscuous with a Goth or alternative aesthetic. For anyone else, the use case is highly situational and almost exclusively at night. Babycat is a contradiction: upscale, mature, possessing a sex-worker edge. The best image I have for it is an upscale swingers party; I would not expect this at a college party. There is one exception for daytime wear: you could, funny enough, wear this to church. The liturgical incense note would blend into the environment, and people would just think you were wearing a vanilla perfume, which is probably normal behavior. I love the scent but I fail to articulate a strategic use case for most people.

Some of you have spent so long creaming yourselves to mafia boss fanfiction, or imagining yourselves as the mafia boss in question, that you now seem incapable of smelling perfume without attaching a lurid little novella to it. Sweaty skin? Sex? Burning petrol station? Marshmallows? I don’t know where your noses have been buried, but whatever happened there has left you with the olfactory judgment of a concussed teenager. At heart, Babycat is a remarkably simple but effective composition, which is precisely why I suspect some of you feel compelled to hyperbolize it. The vanilla is resinous, the suede gives it shape, the incense lends a faint smokiness, and together they produce something elegant, warm, and slightly dark. That is why normal people consistently describe it as vanilla with something smoky, rather than whatever depraved fantasy some of you have imposed on it. I also do not understand the hysterics around the opening. There is a peppery edge, yes, but not to the deranged extent some of you insist on. I truly cannot emphasize enough how embarrassingly overnarrated many of these reviews are. I understand the desire to elevate one’s opinions, but at this point the overinterpretation is just grating. Please practice some basic restraint. It might allow enough oxygen to reach the brain for a genuinely interesting observation about this wonderful, but ultimately quite tame, fragrance.

Seriously, how can anyone like this? I was so excited to try this because I love vanilla, but to me it smells REVOLTING. It smells dirty - like a mix between vanilla and the dirt you’d find under a car (rubber / carborundum) 🤮🤮🤮. That just about seals it for me - I REALLY DON’T LIKE YSL perfumes. **EDIT#1** This bastard is actually growing on me. It still smells like carborundum, but the vanilla is strong and I love the bottle. I'm giving it another go - just ordered a 10ml decant. We will see - I'll keep you posted. **EDIT#2** OMG, I have actually grown to LOVE this scent, to the extent of buying a whole bottle!!!! 😲😲😲. The rubber / carborundum smell I perceived when I first sniffed this has altered into the most delicious frankincense / resin / incense scent, which I LOVE! I actually own Comme Des Garçons - Avignon, which I also love but never wear because I need a little more - and vanilla is always the key. The vanilla in Babycat is thick, heavy and long lasting, perfect for winter. The bottle is gorgeous and it really is a classy scent, well executed with finesse and mastery. Fragrantica, I apologise for my ignorance and I hope you can forgive me. Grow to love is the BEST kind of love. 😍😍😍

Imagine a sexy hot mature lady + cigarettes + drink in hand clink clink clink but in a Restoration Hardware. --- Truly dont get how it's so polarizing. You'd think those of you whose chemistry lacks the fortitude to handle pepper heavy scents would learn real quick but no you have to blame the fragrance.... This is delightfulllll for those of us who can carry it. Bourbon vanilla has always been my favorite vanilla - and the rest of the notes in this work in such harmony imo. Like in my description above this is a unisex scent - but I imagine a sexy women of a certain maturity and she might be the sales lady in the LEATHER STORE! Which in my mind perfect for this would be the restoration hardware in the mall.....but in a fab way. Now somehow take the smell of that Restoration Hardware, and then somehow also transport that to a ski chalet with a fire, and now miss girl from the store has the drink in hand and also has some furs on like in that sexy iconic picture of Rihanna with nothing but furs and wine glass in hand.. but there's cigarettes and weed being smoked indoors too because ... we bad...xoxo y'all wouldn't get it.......

I bought a sample years ago at the beginning of my fragrance journey and my holy grail starting point was ✨Vanilla✨. Babycat was one of the first vanillas that somehow made it into my sample cart & one the first to have me consider giving up on my search for a new perfume - it was everything I did not want. Well I kept searching, tripped & tumbled down a gourmand rabbit hole for years because it was easy and safe & I've finally popped out the other side. Sweet, fluffy vanilla had a chokehold on me & now my nose craves more complex, non-cloying, mature, story-telling dusty, spicy woody leather-bound-book vanillas. First 'Le Labo Vanille 44' changed my brain chemistry & now my revisit to 'Babycat' has me honestly wondering how I got here from there. Better late than never I guess. I feel like I've graduated somehow. Or I'm aging. Either way I'm on my way up somewhere and I'm not sure of anything anymore but Babycat is beautiful. It was the hot sister I wanted all along. You may not like it today but there's a chance you'll be back later & I hope you get to appreciate it then.