Top smells of '22🍰🤠

Scents I love, whether you care or not.

Well, well well—if it isn’t the weekly newsletter I haven’t sent in (way?) over eight weeks. No one’s counting. I got a full-time job (yay) and recently gave up on editing a draft of the novel I wrote this summer (humiliating), instead opting to pay someone to really tear its ass up on my behalf. Maybe I’ll never sell it (books deals net you like three dollars now anyway), but writing something that long at all feels like I’ve exorcised a demon from my body. I can do anything now, I am ascended.

The year-end lists are rolling in as usual and now that I’m paused on my Big Project™️, I thought I’d make a list of my favorite smells from this year/all time. I was once told by a self-described psychic that everyone has some kind of ‘clair’—a strong sixth sense, if you will, like clairvoyancy but add your own suffix—and she identified mine as ‘empathy’, but everyone in the greater Los Angeles area says they’re an empath, so fuck that. I doubt I contain any kind of psychic or intuitive ability, but I am unusually adept when it comes to scent. I can smell the garlic my husband chopped three days ago on his fingers, long after he’s scrubbed them and rinsed them and basically developed a new layer of flesh. When Kim Kardashian said she could always smell when people had cavities, I knew exactly what she meant. When I tell you, “you smell so good,” it is both true and an expression of my relief that I can’t smell the actual scent of your body odor. I’m like Edward in that scene in Twilight, you know the one.

Me when the waiter isn’t wearing deodorant

Without further ado, here are the best things I smelled this year (and maybe ever).

1. Cowboy, Mondo Mondo

Do you like the smell of freshly cut grass? Wet dirt? Gasoline? This scent contains notes of the first two, but the sensation is, to me, like smelling fuel at the gas station: noxious, nostalgic, invigorating. ‘Cowboy’ advertises notes of ‘honeysuckle, grass, earth, tobacco, leather, coffee, Texan cedarwood, cypress’, and I’d describe it as smelling of a very hot, wealthy man who’s been working with soil all day for some reason, and he’s just rolled around in his extensive library of leather-bound books. It’s unbelievably fresh and rich, it gives off just the right amount of scent all day long. I buy it in bulk and remind my husband to put on a little extra every time we go out. I imagine this is what Tim Riggins of Friday Night Lights would smell like if he grew up and got a job. A perfect gift for the cowboy in your life.

2. Dickens, Paddywax

This candle is truly that girl. It’s billed as being Christmas-y, made in Paddywax’s library series as a tribute to the author Charles Dickens. To me, though, it smells like if you curated a fine dining experience around the gingerbread cookie. What sets it apart from your usual, seasonal scents is its zest and spice: its top notes are all tangerine, orange, lemon and cinnamon with a punch of ginger and clove. The core of the scent is fresh fir and invigorating eucalyptus, but that’s all wrapped up in a bundle of warm vanilla and tonka—think sugar-y baked goods prepared in a cabin in the woods. I call this ‘thee candle’ for a reason: it is the perfect winter host gift and, truly, the coziest year-round burn.

3. Macanudo, Maison d’Etto

Does this perfumer’s daughter count as a nepo baby?

It Happened to Me: I was influenced by perfume-tok to buy this brand’s expensive discovery scent so I could smell this one fragrance that actually smelled like old lady. But! That was how I discovered one of my favorite samples of the year, Macanudo: its supposed to be based on the scent of riding a pony in a polo field (LOL), something I have never, and will never, experience. But!!! I’ve never encountered a bergamot-forward scent that so beautifully earns bergamot its title as ‘the prince of citrus’ (also lol!), this one smells luxe. Its heart is tonka, which is the perfect warmth to balance its freshness. It’s how I imagine Rihanna’s house smells. It’s crisp, floral, earthy and fresh: imagine wearing this one to dinner at the hotel from White Lotus—miserable wealth never smelled so sweet.

5. Honey Caffeine, Strangers Perfumerie

This one’s only for my gourmand-heads, those of you truly who want that sweet, that nasty, that gushy stuff. If, at one point in your life, you went for Aquolina pink sugar (famously the scent of my freshman year roommate from Long Island), this one’s for you. Caffeine Honey smells toasted, honey. It’s got the burnt sugar smell of a candy shop and the truly ~roasted~ scent of a coffee shop—and, as an added bonus, there’s a subtle saltiness, like if burnt popcorn got sexy. There’s a smokey, lit-cigar quality to it too, but it’s not as masculine as other tobacco-forward scents. It dries down with a sort of booziness, like the syrupy last sip of an Old Fashioned or the initial sweetness of an Espresso Martini. Wear it if you want to smell addictive or repulsive, depending on who’s getting close to you.

6. The Edition Hotel

Money, money, money. Have you ever been to an Edition hotel? They’re a perfect place to get a lobby bar cocktail, since that’s what most of us can afford there. This scent—which they make in candles, reed diffusers, bath salts, shampoo, et al (thanks to Le Labo, of course)—is like if the Restoration Hardware cloud couch had a signature scent, or if a fat investment account had a scent. It’s simply rich! It’s supposed to smell like ‘Sicilian bergamot, green tea and cedar wood’, which brings us back to our Prince of citrus. It’s like getting into the sauna at an Equinox, and inside that sauna is Oscar Isaac. I believe my king Carey O’Donell said that this Boy Smells candle is a good dupe for it, but I have not verified this on my own.

The end! Please comment with your fav scents that I need to try. And if you enjoyed it, forward this to a friend who appreciates fine (or just okay) fragrances. I wish you all beautiful smells and other riches in the new year. See you then.