Waterlily Tea Dress

Waterlilly Tea Dress is an herbaceous experience, a stand alone in Zara catalog. It is a simple scent yet completely unique (like Jo Malone can be!). It's also dewy, musky and lightly spicy. Mint is the diva of the composition, and it is not the mentholed gum, peppermint oil or cheap kind. Its smell is true to the little leaves of the plant, earthy and natural. It is intense green in color and photorealistic. This is the kind of mint I like! Some other herb it's likely in it aswell, fresh herbs still with dew and morning brew on them! I don't think it's particulary citrusy, but fresh. Clean musk gives bone and background; it's not the velvety or fluffy white kind though, it's more sterile and cold, still enveloping nontheless. I don't pick up the powdery aspect this is said to have, it's more vibrant and musky to my nose. I understand that some wood would have made this more complete but I respect it just as it is. A floral presence is suggested, but I am not sure. If some flowery touches are in here then they are delicately white, acquatic and a little spicy (is it lilly of the vally or an acquatic/lake flower??). It is a straight forward, linear fragrance, unisex, that last well for being a freshy (surely more then usual Zara). I still tend to overspray for better performance. The name is a program, as we say in Italy! Very true to the imaginary that you picture while smelling it. A summery afternoon picnic (or tea time) in a field near the lake, dressed in linen! Somehow, I even see this on an unruly summer bride. As with all the perfume in Zara's Emotions line, you would buy this if you want to be distinct yet approachable. If it is glam you want then Zara has better offers, this is a different category. Waterlilly Tea Dress and Ebony Woods (from the same line) are precious layering materials. Ebony Wood lends body, warmth and spiciness to other fragrances, Waterlilly Tea Dress the herbaceous dimension. Lately I am sporting Waterlilly in combo with Zara new Chapter 6 line, specifically with Majestic Lilas and Noble Wisteria, the result is an herbaceous summery overload! A cocktail of herbs, fresh spices and ethereal lilac flowers. Many perfumes lines arose on the market with just the layering claim, Zara is giving them to us (9 of them!) at an exeptional price and with persistent stock availability (also on sale every summer). You can even buy the disvovery set. I am enamored with all the Zara x Jo Malone CBS Emotions line (actually all her works with Zara). They have her minimalistic yet impactfull style. I agree with Luca Turin opinon about them, that they are scents you could find in a essential oils sustainable shop (that offers quality products I may add). They are photorealistic renditions, you could easily find them in an apothecary expensive shop, sold for at least 60,00 € for an 80 ml bottle. The best thing about them is that the materials used are of decent honest quality; they are well blended and exceptional for layering (wich is how I use them most of the time, pairing them between themself or with other lines). In true Jo Malone style, they used to come with the same fragranced body lotion, shampoo/showering gel, candels and hand gels. I have the body lotion and hand gel of Waterlilly...wish they made them still. The body lotion helps with longevity.

Reviewing the Elixir version, which has yet to be listed on this website. It's basically the same as the original, but much longer-lasting and with better sillage. I blind bought this version as a summer fragrance because I tried the original in the shop and, while I liked it, I couldn't smell it after half an hour. The perfume opens with a very green, slightly bergamot scent, that reminds me of cut flower stems. It eventually dies down into something a little warmer and softer, like the scent of freshly cut grass on a hot day, before settling into a delicately floral, humid scent, like heavy damp lilies in a hothouse. The name fits perfectly. On the box, it says that there are notes of peppermint, musk, wild rose, ginger lily and bergamot, but the website says orange blossom and ginger lily. Honestly, I don't smell much of this combo in the fragrance. To me, it smells like bergamot with a little bit of musk in the early notes, then lily and maybe a tiny bit of rose (rose petals after summer rain) in the later stages. The Elixir version lasts much better than the original, although it is a much smaller bottle than the original's 100ml (60ml) for the same price (£29.99). I'd definitely say it is worth it, though, to buy the more concentrated version, as to my nose it smells so much stronger and I don't have to spray nearly as much. Next to Ebony Wood, this is probably my favourite fragrance in the Zara collection, as it is original and beautiful, leaning feminine but with a nice balance to it that makes it almost unisex. The bottle is very pretty too, particularly the textured fancy paper sticker. The box also came in a drawstring bag, unlike the perfumes I have bought directly from the store and not online. Highly recommend! I feel like an art nouveau painting or a Monet when I wear this.

I finally bought a bottle of this after waiting for it to come back in stock, then balking (both online and in-store), and I'm glad I did! First of all, what impressive projection and longevity for a Zara fragrance! Seriously, this thing has the power of a Chanel in this regard. And minimal spraying is needed; I'm talking like two spritzes and it's there forever, and I'm someone whose skin seems to eat fragrances to nothing. As for the fragrance itself, I wasn't 100% sold on first sniff. But I'm glad I thought, "Well, compared to what I spend on other fragrances, this is worth it!", because the dry-down is beautiful. Like, so beautiful. I think I hesitated on the opening because it wasn't what I was expecting; more specifically, it's not as minty as I expected. Green, for sure, but not really minty, and not really citrusy in the way I thought it would be, at least to my nose. It's really nicely blended; no one note stands out to me. The musk comes out in the dry down; it's a clean and deep musk rather than a sharp, super animalic one. And it was the dry-down that sealed my love of this fragrance. For the opening, if you know ELd'O You Or Someone Like You, imagine that fragrance, but like it hit a ceiling before its brighter citrus and floral notes could emerge. That sounds like a negative, but it isn't--they're really different fragrances, especially in the dry-down. tl;dr: Excellent value. Beast-mode projection and longevity, unexpected opening, beautiful sillage and dry-down!

Okay, I am lowkey obsessed with this. I picked up a travel rollerball on a whim with an order from the Olfactive line, and this actually ended up being the winner of the bunch. Opens with a realistic cut grass smell, quickly joined by lily of the valley and a little sweetness. Then the mint comes through. The fragrance is remarkably balanced and well blended on my skin: it smells clean, green and fresh, and reminds me of laundry drying in a sun-basked spring garden. I don't get any rotten stem/flower smell. Just pure lightness and joy. I'm really impressed - I own several of the Jo Malone x Zara collab fragrances, and this is hands down one of my favourites. I'll try to keep some restraint and finish my rollerball before buying a larger bottle, but I kind of can't wait to douse myself in this properly with a spritzer! It is very reminiscent of ELDO You or Someone like You, as it shares that green cut-grass scent, although it is not an exact dupe - YSLY has a more "mint chewing gum" quality on me, while this is a little more on the clean/floral/soapy side (in a good way). WTD is also more feminine than YSLY. I actually prefer this over the ELDO offering.

Absolutely love this! I'm happy to see Zara creating original scents, rather than doing dupes of the hyped perfumes. Overall, it smells exactly like its name -- imagine walking in Monet's water lily garden on a hot summer day. The opening is fresh and citrusy, and there's an underlying water note (like from watermelon) throughout. The watermelon note balances very well with the greenness, which I can hardly tell it's mint. I didn't like the mint in Florabotanica, but here, it's completely different. The mint is light and gentle, very Jo Malone style. There's also some fruity facets to it which are not listed in the notes. Something reminds me of an unripen sugar apple 釋迦 that I used to have in Taiwan. If you like Dom Rosa from Les Liquides Imaginaires, you will like this. They're not the same but shares some similarities. I'd say that one reminds me of guava, and this one reminds me of sugar apple. The only thing I have to complain though... it's the performance. I can't smell it after less than an hour even if I over spray it.