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vipechka – :
It’s such an odd one for me, this perfume.
I absolutely adore it when wearing it outdoors, it transforms into something that I can only describe as sweet smelling fresh air. If I wear it (outdoors) in the winter, it evokes the strongest sensation of the arrival of springtime. Reminds me of playing outdoors in the summertime as a child.
However, when I wear it and remain indoors, I find the jasmine way too overpowering for me and I just want to wash it off. Very interesting scent.
trueneman – :
Would have never named “aquatic” this oily, greatly aromatic white floral. Not a thin watery one. It has incredible depth and soft-spicy sophistication, notes smell so natural, night-alike, when all flower’s aromas are so intense, it is also somewhat mysterious. Rare luck nowadays to discover such a gem, even more pleasure to receive it as a gift. Thank you, blacktaffeta, it is an amazing one!
hembrowcedqos – :
I like floral aquatics. They just work for me especially in the hot humid summer. This one is nice. I get fresh young jasmine and orange blossom. Not a lot of powder but some and it makes it interesting. Don’t always see powder notes with marine or sea notes. This is a frag I use for daytime.
Vovchik1234 – :
@smellsogood; You have the notes correct.
“L’Eau de Monteil
A beguiling and magical scent of flowers -as- fragrance
from a garden grown in dreams. A retreat for the spirit, a respite for the soul. A time to find that special place where fields of flowers bloom.”
I have a bottle still in the box with the product liner….It then goes on to list the notes(also beautifully described) in 4 languages plus the product line, is listed as well.
serdz5 – :
This is a potent perfume with the unmistakeable aroma of ladies’ public toilets near a beach resort where the cleaning staff make gallant yet impossible attempts to keep the facilities clean.
I’m sorry that I find nothing pleasant about this at all. Luckily, that’s what samples are for.
If anyone needs to buy some, there is a seller on eBay uk who has lots of inexpensive samples of this; £3.25 free p&p for 3 samples. I won’t be taking advantage but if you are struggling to find this, it can be had if you don’t mind samples.
As always, YMMV.
monetca – :
Feminine, ladylike, elegant. Perfect.
On my skin I don’t get the aquatic element, just beautiful white floral and jasmine.
Gutted that I’ve only discovered it now that it has been discontinued.
I’ve no idea why they would discontinue such a perfect perfume.
heksSlestedge – :
Another gorgeous fragrance lost to us in the Graveyard of Glorious Scents. Oh how I regret not buying this when I could, but Acqua di Gio won out against this one and by the time I made up my mind to buy it, L’eau de Monteil was gone 🙁
Lesson learned.
This fragrance was one like no other in a bottle, and this is coming from a person that used to work years in a perfumeria and have been a lover of perfumes since she was 5. Although many refer to the sea with this fragrance, I must respectfully disagree. Maybe it was my body chemistry? I do not know. But, what I do know is that to me, this evoked memories of bathing in gentle streams, but the ones that were deep enough to dive in and that were so clear, you wouldn’t need goggles to view the floor.
Streams which washed away all your stresses, invigorating the mind and soul, and caressed you with endless fragrant waters which seemed to enjoy submerging you in a way only Mother Nature possibly could when she is kind. Yes, a stream…the only known cradle that is cold yet manages to pacify and rejuvenate.
It was like the scent of the earth after the rain, no saltiness detected, just purity but not in a sterile way, it was definitely fertile, full of life and harmonic energy. Ozonic…aquatic…the most delicate of floral notes…and what I can only add as pure magic. The sillage and longevity were perfect. The perfume, undeniably feminine but smelled almost like something not quite mortal but rather, eternal…like the earth.
I leave this review with much bittersweet melancholy. I do not know if I was blessed or cursed to have experienced this masterpiece of a perfume that has now ceased to be. I guess only time will tell.
sterrlockerrs – :
Dear Readers,
This perfume..is divine..mind altering and till this day there hasn’t been no other, let me explain why.
When this perfume came out I was a tender teen insearch of my own fragrance and I found some like Chanel’s Egoist and No5 but I found them way to mature that I could not pull off at that shy age of mine then, but when I came across this fragrance in a magazine having a coppertone model with vivid eyes coming out of the water like a river or lake nymph and the fragrance strip to match , I had to go see how much was it .
Well sadly this fragrance was beyond my little allowance price range and my mother did not buy it for me because it was pricey and all the little and middle bottles were always sold out and left the big bottles of this magnificent perfume and I said to myself I will collect my earnings and get me this perfume someday and sadly this perfume was taken out quick since it wasn’t very popular, so this perfume in my perfume lovers heart is in eternal lament as ” the one who got away” category this perfume for me will remain forever.
This fragrance had a such lush, vivid, crisp, fresh but had depth of mysterious greens, flowers and watery scent that could have been taken from a pool of virgin forest and jungles of paradise where nymphs and gods bathed in that left their divine essence in , this perfume was majestic of earth and water elemental spirits in a bottle.
On me, this scent it made me feel like a sweet water nymph of fables of a lost age where the earth was still young and Gods were among us.
VanBasten – :
Forgot to say: very longlasting on my skin. About 8 hours!!!
sicks – :
A wonderful perfume! One of my favorites. I started with a miniature bottle and felt completely in love with it; it smells so different from the perfumes I knew. Salty, you can realy smell the ocean and you can imagine that the wind blows your hair on a warm sunny summerday…lovely. Okay, so its salty,I can also smell the jasmine ,very strong and loud. Carnation is probably one of the ingredients, like some fragrantics wrote below. It’s a little bit spicy, but nog much. Just enough to make a beautifull composition, like in an painting. Everything is in balance in this superb combination. It’s a masterpiece!!!
denibotna – :
A wonderful auqatic opening !!
Then there are quite a lot of sweetness and that original and very nice note of wisteria.
This is a lovely aquatick floral that is just so beautifuly made.
Most be the best aquatic out there !
It is going up om my 25 best list !!
Please Fragantica correct the notes – there are no spices in it – and this is surely not a hint of powder – just the opposite clear aquatic.
angels – :
This was a beauty, I was devastated when it was d/c’d.
Light, airy,aquatic, floral slightly salty.Just perfection.
Such a dreamy fragrance in a beautiful pale aqua floral glass bottle.I would love to see it come back.
Meilp660bedyWelty – :
Sand, beach, wind, marine, sea, air, fresh and floral….i am traveling light and i love it!
jefojewn – :
il mio preferito da sempre!!!!
dendic – :
My all-time favorite fragrance. Why was it discontinued?
gbplfv – :
I’m really happy with this fragrance-got a brand new bottle for a great price on Ebay and was really pleasantly surprised with it. The best way I can descibe this is an oily floral,and on me it is very intense. It smells like waxy white flowers and ambre solaire and evokes memories of hot & sunny days at the beach in the 70’s. The orange blossom,jasmine and sea notes are predominant with the spice and powder being incredibly subtle. I would wear this on warm spring or summer evenings,as I think it may be a little heavy for daytime use.
ksevna83 – :
This a really pretty beachy type of scent to me..It’s not too heavy or too light.If your having trouble finding this scent,you could try Mary-Kate and Ashley coast to coast L.A, not listed here…But this smells so similar,It’s the sister scent of this fragrance.
dbrf251 – :
It smells oldfashioned, too choking for a young girl. I suspected something fresh and airy so I’m dissapointed.
ewgenchik – :
I have wanted to try this for sometime. I finally found a mini on ebay. This is the scent of summer! The ocean in a bottle! On my skin I got all the marine notes and thankfully, none of the floral notes. So sad that this has been discontinued. It would be the perfect summer scent, or great when the tempurature drops and there’s snow on the ground and you want a little instant beach vacation!
bizon_tver – :
not just any boring old aquatic fragrance, this takes you from the deepest depths of the see, up to the plush greens the woods.. the flowered skies… gets your mind a drift.. until you’re so far gone,, you dont know where it began
a++++ vintage and rare… a keeper!
Bottle is amazing, romantic, and lasts a very long time.. great value
08051979loi – :
This is a very nicely done early women’s aquatic. Instead of relying on a heavy use of Calones, the “sea spray” effect is achieved primarily through a use of green notes, delicate aldehydes & orange blossom. L’eau de Monteil does not smell like the sea; rather it evokes it. This is creatively much more difficult to do.
I have to agree with Serafina that the spice seems to be from carnation. Here it is held in an aqueous substrate, from which the spice diffuses enveloped in a moist cloud. The light powdered drydown remains aqueous, and is very comforting and soft. Interesting, yet still sophisticated and modern.
I am surprised that cyclamen is not in the notes, I will research to find more detailed ingredients.
The strength and longevity even in the EDT is excellent.
jbc574Bessinepome – :
Very curios scent. I feel lily when smelling from bottle, but when sprayed, I feel salty and sour honey near the skin and beautiful flowers around me.
denmoreman – :
This scent evokes memories of a very humid, very wet (but at the same time cool) tropical garden. The first time I encountered a similar scent was in a garden park in Florida as a child. I probably equate the scent of L’Eau De Monteil with the fragrance of that garden because of the obvious jasmine and water elements they have in common. There is also a undertone of overblown blooms, earth and tropical forest floor. I tried wearing this fragrance in the heat of summer to recapture the cool water element but it didn’t work for me. I find that L’Eau DE Monteil is best used in Spring and Fall. I have enjoyed this scent since the mid 90’s and have given it as a gift to my daughter, who likes it as much as I do.
officesecurity – :
This beautiful fresh fragrance lends a lightness to the floral notes that waft, tempered by the so-called sea notes that I find most intriguing about this scent. It is a pleasurable ocean breeze in a garden along the chalky white cliffs, and reminds me of Debussy’s La mer, Sibleius’ Oceanides, and Germaine Monteil’s 1940 South Seas sheath gown (if anyone’s seen the famous photo of the model spreading the elegant dress out on the beach sand). I love it in the morning, but also at night before dreaming sleep; the orange blossom always creates a feeling of happiness and wellbeing.
ataniyaas – :
Oh…!!
I was just searching this site and found this one listed…! It has been available for such a short time here in the Netherlands! How I miss this one! It was such a beautyful scent!
It smelled like holydays, beaches surrounded with beautyful flowers. It had a bit of Rem by Reminiscense in it, but was even more interesting!
I really don’t understand why this has been discontinued!!!
Everyone asked me what I was wearing when I still had it….
No link to a website of Germaine Monteil, otherwise I would have been able to find out what happened to this beauty…
Too bad!!
acevovods – :
I got this in miniature as a gift – the bottle is cute and the watery blue-green color is just my thing.
The scent is floral, I smelled carnation and jasmine, with many interesting undertones – greenish, woody, earthy, spicy, powdery. Imagine the blue and green color with sunny white, streaks of dusty grey and earthy brown. Imagine nature in spring, giving birth to flowers, burbling clear brooks, cool stones, wet marshes and powdery fogs.
No fruit and almost nothing sweet, maybe a drop of tame vanilla in the drydown.