Evocative sights and smells

Blue Grass perfume by Elizabeth Arden was my first grown up perfume bought for me at Christmas by an aunt when I was 13.

@Rosesarered - you triggered a memory! 1954 - first job, in an advertising agency - a lot of the copy writers were young women - boy did I get used to Coty l'aimant! It seemed to be extremely popular with them - and then my girlfriend took to it as well... It's the only scent I was ever able to identify by name.

Ah me...

Loose tobacco in the shop - was it Finlay's? My old pipe tobaccos, Gold Block or Clan, and at Christmas Balkan Sobranie. We all smoked. Not many of us left now.

My dad always smoked a pipe with St Bruno rough cut tobacco, he also smoked little cigars at Chritmas. We couldn't think of anything else to buy him!

At Christmas my Grandad gave up his pipe [for a short while] to smoke Wills 'whiffs' as they were called, small thin cigars[a bit like Tom Thumb cigars I suppose] they smelled wonderful.

Pinkprincess
Tom Thumb cigars for Christmas,
TomThumb in tins of ten
They're the ten tin tops
They're in all good shops,
Tom Thumb cigars for men.

A merry little TV jingle. I remember it well.
Men everywhere who didn't usually smoke would be puffing away on Tom Thumb cigars!

L'aimant brings back happy memories of my youth as well. As well as ''Ma Griffe''by Carven.I bought a bottle of this in 1969 and the next day I found out I was expecting my first child.
Cigar smoke takes me back to happy childhood Christmas days, when my grandfather would smoke cigars all day. Cigars were one of his luxuries and he would always get given a box at Christmas.

One of our rites of passage was to be taken to a saddler's shop for a new satchel. When I started secondary school I was given a leather briefcase which was carried in my bike basket. I love the smell of new leather.

glad it's not just me!

A set of Coty L'aimant was the first present my DH ever gave me [1969].
I recently bought the body spray in the supermarket, just to remind myself, it's ok but maybe a young sort of perfume.
mrsmopp I know what you mean about the leather satchel!Any whiff of leather brings that memory back of setting off for grammar school aged 11 feeling small but important at the same time.

Coty's l'Aimant was available as a cream perfume as was their Muguet. Loved both of them.

The Perfume Shop has it. Amazon has it.
I was amazed when I checked as I thought it was long gone! Off to perfume shop tomorrow just for a whiff of it!

mrsmopp I haven't smelt Coty L'Aimant for years, I don't know if it is still around but it would also take me back to my teens and early twenties. Was it ever available as a cream perfume with a plastic "feather" applicator or was that something else?

School dinners always smelled of mince and cabbage regardless of what was on the menu!
I say menu, but we didn't have a choice in those days. Take it or leave it!

The smell of new leather vividly reminds me of my new satchel when I went to grammar school. Ferreting around in it, looking for books, pens, etc. it had a strong smell for ages.
Who can forget the smell of wet gaberdine macs hanging in the school cloakroom on a wet day?
And one whiff of Johnsons baby powder and I'm a new mum again.!
I think smells are tremendously evocative. Perfumes such as Coty L'Aimant take me back to going to dances wearing a pretty dress...

Harrigran that memory brought a tear to my eye. The Sunday lunch was always followed by home made rice pud. Dad and I took it on turns to have the 'skin' off the top.

The smell of my school blazer in summertime
The smell of may trees as I walked home from school.
Newly mown grass as my Dad pushed the lawnmower on a summer evening when I was in bed
Lavender furniture polish
Horses - dust and leather
Boarding school - fishy smell on Fridays and steamed chocolate pudding on Wednesdays
Tar & coal
Mac the milkman with Blackie his horse clunking down the road

I could go on.............

Oh and St Bruno tobacco. If I smell that, I can virtually see my father sitting on my sofa with his pipe, a book and one of my cats.

My sister and I were talking about evocative smells and both agreed on the aroma of a box hedge which takes us straight back to our granny's garden in Fife where the whole large garden was edged with these little hedges.

* The smell of the almond paste that I used to use in my scrap books.
* Johnsons baby powder and Farleys' rusks.
* The general smell of overbooked cabbage as I walked back from Sunday school.

Honeysuckle. I used to wear Avon Honeysuckle perfume. Now I have honeysuckle in the garden and when I smell it on summer evenings I'm transported back to the seventies.

The scent of a new-born baby's skin.

School dinners sometimes -spam fritters followed by gypsy tart (whatever
was in it we never knew, but it was great!) and now and then,thick, sweet semolina.

The smell of sunlight on old creosoted fences. The voice of Frank Philips (wartime and later BBC newsreader). The smell of the warm air issuing from the tunnel on the Northern Line - it smelled different from the other lines somehow! The tune In Party Mood (Jack Strachey) that introduced Housewives' Choice...

The songs 'Two Little Boys' Rolf Harris and Elvis's 'Suspicious Minds' still make me feel nauseous as they were very popular just as I was suffering terrible morning sickness in my first pregnancy.
I can be chatting away not aware that either of them are being played on the radio then become aware of a nauseous feeling and there on the radio is one of those tunes. I would not have liked them even if they didn't make me sick