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Zagrebelny – :
aldehydes, tuberose, amber, civet, incense, ylang, benzoin, sandalwood; this is a total floral aldehyde but with this amber/incense/benzoin resinous base that is unlike other frags of the time; lovely, but why isn’t oakmoss listed? It’s in the final drydown, not prominent and bitter like some chypres but still a bit woody and mossy and dry
kalash007 – :
Passionata, you are right, my bad. I wasn t sure it it was also a splash EDT edition – being launched in the end of 80s, it was obviously a splash version existed. So, EDT, EDT splash, Esprit de parfum deluxe edition and small purse parfum (also a purse deluxe spray 7,5 ml) All … spectacular if we talk about vintages.
replicaw94721 – :
Actually EDT comes both in splash and spray. I have both splash and spray versions of EDT in 50 and 100mls but of course there is an esprit version in a splash bottle with a pump. Not all solash bottles are esprit versions 🙂 Just saying
klandervol – :
Carolyn, th splash bottle is the limited deluxe edition of Esprit de Parfum, 100ml (a huge amount for an esprit) and came in a luxury box with bulb atomizor. I have both EDT and Esprit, they are the same as composition but the esprit is, obviously, a very concentratef version of the EDT and -in my nose- a bit more animalic and leathery. But both spectacular!!! These are the old, first edition. There are some reformulated editions available (totaly changed) on some sites (especially in 50 ml amount) but the best are the pre barecode ones, espcially the 1989 one, the 1st.
Gegan – :
Happy Birthday Joan Collins
1989 Spectacular By Joan Collins
“I have a reputation for being unpredictable devious and manipulative. I cherish that reputation because it keeps my enemies off guard!” –
Alexis Morell Colby Carrington Rowan
Scoundrel by Revlon was launched during the first season of Dynasty and Spectacular came at the end of the Dynasty craze. Joan Collins’ Alexis character had become a household name. No one looked more glamorous and behaved more witchy than TV’s most infamous villainess or was she just a powerful woman of the 80’s ? Whatever she was we love her. An I love her perfume. This was Joan’s first formulated fragrance from her own line. The fragrance came in two editions one was a rare splash bottle and the other the Eau de Toilette spray which can be found on Amazon.com and eBay. This is a review for the EDT spray. I wear it and have enjoyed the fragrance ever since it’s release. As the reviews attest this is still a beloved perfume and a 1980’s classic.
Opens with aldehydes and bergamot, green notes and gardenia. The gardenia is quite noticeable and layered with the green leaves and fruity notes of peach and citrus it’s quite summery and even sweet. It speaks of day wear and big hats the kind Alexis wore big white wide-brimmed hats, Kentucky Derby hats. The florals that follow the gardenia are white flowers of jasmine, lily of the valley, tuberose, narcissus and white rose. An ylang is also thrown into the floral mix and a powdery iris. Yes this is a very floral scent. It’s like a subdued floral chypre and quite soapy. It’s fresh and light, not the showy vainglorious and bitchy image we have of Alexis. In fact this is more like Kristel Carrington’s perfume. She is quite demure. Pleasantly floral. I think it’s best worn in the day time – spring and summer. Classy and English, like Joan.
However at the dry down, as the fragrance dries, the Alexis bite comes through. Smells spicy, tangy, smoky and musky. A civet note is in here and reminds me of the civet in the orignal Diva eau de Parfum. There’s patchouli and amber, vetiver and green notes. But again nothing flamboyant or too strong. The fragrance could use better sillage and staying power but I do love it. Mature? Definitely but your grandmother is nothing like this perfume as it represents a very beautiful and confident woman in haute couture. The dry down is a bit unisex because of the musk and the greenness of patchouli. This is a good chypre and I am in awe at how it could have been overlooked for a FIFI award. This is really well-made juice. It’s almost like a Chanel, like a more floral No. 19, or like Givenchy III. This perfume has a fan base. Joan Collins fans and Alexis fans, as well as fans of 80’s vintages. The perfume matches up with suits and high fashion long sleeve blouses and skirts, high heels. Very pretty.
A beautiful fragrance from a beautiful woman.
Here’s to you Alexis darling!
Bateectiopatt – :
This is a true gem.
Unfortunatly the shape of the bottle, the fuxia of the box, the name of the actress, drives you into kitsch/cheap/bully-bossy territory. But this scent is not overbearing, it is superb refined and classy. This could be a Caron, or a Givenchy fragrance (by the time reminds me Givenchy III).
It is pure natural oakmoss moisturized and lit by white flowers aldehids and touches of delicious well balanced essences.
Very nice. Chic Chic Chic.
aidar92 – :
@Lucia – what a spectacular review! Amazing. I m just warning you, don t let you tricked by the (let s say) new formulation (still available on fragranceX and most of ebay sellers (in 50 ml amount 99% of available items) it is different, weaker and not something to represent the spirit of this astonishing fragrance. Sure, mostly because of the chemical ingredients and IFRA killers. Try to find the original, pre – bar code editions, before 1995 (the best are 1989-1992, no matter the Esprit or EDT, both high quality). There you can find the magic.
evgen7-7 – :
EIGHTIES SPECTACULAR
I remember when this fragrance was first released in the UK back in 1989. Joan Collins name was attached to it but it came as no surprise as she had already launched her own line of lingerie. I was too old to wear the lingerie which would have suited me in my 20’s or 30’s but I am never too old for any perfume!
Joan Collins was marketing this fragrance to her American audience, but it was not lost on her British fans. Spectacular is an early celebrity fragrance. The 2 other major names in the celebrity world to launch their own perfume included Elizabeth Taylor (Passion 1987) and singer Cher (Uninhibited 1987). Joan Collins was as big a name as either of them. She received a lot of publicity and media coverage for it. She seemed to be honest about her intentions: to make money! Greed was good in the 80’s but this didn’t boil down to greed. She stated quite clearly in interviews that she knew that she couldn’t be an actress forever so she needed to transition into a new venue. Fragrance was one way for her to make money to pay her bills. Why not? Nothing illegal about it! And when a fragrance is this good we wished she had continued to make more of them which Elizabeth Taylor did with one hit after another – White Diamonds, Diamonds & Rubies, Black Pearls, Violet Eyes etc. Joan made only a few fragrances. I believe after this one she only released I AM Woman which I also wear and will review another time.
Spectacular opens with good old fashioned fresh and soapy aldehydes. For me the opening is very nice, despite that chemical or rather aroma chemical blast. It’s a classic, a Chanel No 5 style opening. Later on it develops into something like Paco Rabanne La Nuit only sweeter and more floral, and less musky. Citrus swims in these aldehydes and a sweet peach so that the opening is indeed fruity though still more aldehydic than anything else. There’s so much going on in this fragrance after the opening that I don’t know where to start. After the aldehydes settle down, the florals open their blossoms and the perfume really kicks in. It’s an 80’s power perfume with lady like feminine sweet flowers for mature audiences only.
The rose reaches my nose, so does the white florals of jasmine and lilies, narcissus, ylang ylang, and gardenia. For many this is a gardenia scent and it is, absolutely, but I feel that on me the gardenia is harmonizing with all the other flowers, which is rare for showy gardenias. This is a green floral gardenia that allows space for the other flowers to do their thing. I smell creamy almost fruity banana ylang ylang (similar to the ylang in Diva by Ungaro) and creamy tuberoses. This is quite a mature floral fragrance so if you are experienced with aldehyde florals this is definitely for you. It’s classified as a chypre but it’s truly just a floral.
The dry stage of this perfume is a hodgepodge of more Oriental notes like sandalwood, light woodsy notes, light musk, green patchouli, warm benzoin, incense, some powder and iris root, and amber. It’s warm and spicy, unisex (at least the dry down is unisex) and quite beautiful. It’s well formulated. I don’t know who Joan’s nose was but whoever it was did a fantastic job. The dry own is not as animalic as I was expecting with a civet or civetone chemical note in it. You mostly smell the sandalwood and the powder. Womanly, stylish, elegant, sophisticated, glamorous.
Spectacular does indeed smell like something Joan Collins would wear herself. This was made at a time when celebrities did wear their own perfumes because they had so much invested into it that they were behind the selection of notes and worked as a team with the noses behind the scent. The result here is very elegant and no nonsense, like a modern updated fruity floral with spices and wood, a combo of No. 5 and La Nuit, very 80’s, very elaborate with Joan Collins’ grand dame signature on it. I wore it to big operatic events when I was teaching students who were on their way to being in the limelight in the opera world. Joan was and still is a beautiful woman. This perfume captures her spirit in every way.
Posh!
rizvan-95 – :
Spectacular is, well, spectacular!
At such an unbeatable affordable price, you get a very beautiful, elegant, luxurious fragrance of pure enchantment. This perfume blew me away. I’d never cared for DYNASTY or Joan Collins mud wrestling with Linda Evans in front of a large estate. This perfume is meant to smell like a dresser table frag in the boudoir of Alexis Carrington. She spritzes it on twice on her neck and is good to go. It’s a light weight perfume despite the number of notes. It’s a simple elegant scent that wears like a suit Alexis wears as CEO of a big company.
The aldehydes are self-evident at the first spritz. They’re brightly lit, like light bulbs that frame Ms. Collins’ vanity mirror in her dressing room. The aldehyde is refreshing and comes with a fruity peach scent. It has a delicious and sweet opening, not harsh at all, and pleasant. The floral notes don’t take too long to develop. Like I said, this fragrance can be quite simple, though this doesn’t mean that it has weak sillage or longevity. It’s still a rich and very stylish, well-formulated fragrance.
The first floral note to reach my nose was a white gardenia and tuberose. The white florals are quite creamy and full-bodied. I detected ylang ylang, rose, lily of the valley and narcissus. There’s also iris in the form of orris root. So yes it’s floral with a capital F but it doesn’t feel heavy or hardcore floral either. They are sweet, creamy little flowers.
The dry down slides into darker unisex territory.
All of a sudden the sweet fruity-floral vibe is gone and a spicier, more Oriental style fragrance develops. There’s patchouli leaves, quite herbal and green, a musk, civet, leather animalic accord, styrax and mossy oak, amber. These are distinctive Oriental notes.
The musk in the form of leather and civet are noticeable. To me this is not a big civet when compared to Elizabeth Taylor’s Passion, which dries down to pure musk. This is dance of ambers and oak moss. It smells more like a chypre toward the end. It has a natural base, all these ingredients do not reek of aroma chemicals. They are quite true to the scent of actual oak moss.
I lived for 6 years in Savannah Georgia where the Spanish oak moss trees adorn so many of the streets. I became familiar with that scent of moss. This is in here. It’s green, dark, nocturnal, spicy, and fiery. There should be a note of fire but I’m guessing it’s the incense note. This smokiness gives this scent a sexiness. It’s meant to be taken seriously and to be worn in glamorous gowns and outfits like Alexis would have worn in Dynasty. There are times when the white florals into amber and incense progression reminds me of Fire & Ice by Revlon. Others have noted the similarity to Chanel No. 5 and Paco Rabanne La Nuit.
A classy, very womanly fragrance that exudes confidence, assertion, femininity and old money and power. This is a perfume that will grab anyone’s attention. It is not a shrinking violet. She is a show off gardenia. I wear this to dinners and black tie events. It has a formal aura and it’s very glamorous. I always have to dress up in this perfume.
The fragrance is long lasting and it’s a ravishment of aromas and scents that go well together: florals, peach, amber, incense, oak moss. I can’t get enough of this perfume and have been wearing it for 2 days. I wore it to dinner last night and a lady said I love your perfume though she didn’t go beyond that statement. My hubby Scott loves this fragrance on me. More importantly I love it on me.
This is a very good fragrance.
Bottom line if you like florals, moss, incense, and Oriental perfumes, Spectacular by Joan Collins is for you. Someone used to wearing the masterpieces of the 80’s like La Nuit, Passion and Coco Eau de Parfum as well as the No. 5 sold in the 80’s in the black rectangle bottle (the EDT) can also easily adapt to this fragrance. So beautiful and sophisticated. I wager that Joan Collins herself wore this perfume.
Jacky313 – :
Fragrant, bright, floral, fresh, summery, elegant, classy, wearable, feminine. All apt descriptions of this lovely scent. It has plenty going on, and is in no way girly, but it never feels like it’s too much. It’s not a heady scent, although it has richness, that feel of a good quality perfume. It feels very well balanced to me, with a certain restraint about it. And it’s never too sweet. The peach note is there (and I normally hate peach) but it just keeps it from becoming too dense, I think. That and the bergamot and green notes. There’s also a hint of musk and smoke and leather as well, giving it some body but in no way making it feel heavy. It’s true the longer you wear it the more it evolves. Not less floral exactly, it seems to become a slightly deeper, richer scent. I wouldn’t say this is something relegated to evening wear or formal wear. It’s Spring here and I’m wearing it to work and finding it absolutely lovely. This was a blind buy, based as usual on the reviews of my fragrantican peers. No regrets. I would say this is a much lighter fragrance than the likes of First, Arpege and the Chanels, but certainly in the same class. It’s just a really beautiful wearable fragrance.
Voffkua – :
Powerful and bold, this luxurious Chanelesque fragrance really does match up with the character of Alexis from the hit 1980’s TV drama Dynasty. Strong white florals: fragrant diva flowers. Gardenia, tuberose, rose and narcissus. The base they rest on are also aromatic and strong on their own: styrax, patchouli, leather and musk. This is a mature fragrance for women who know what they want, and go after it, and get it. Seductive, sexy, empowering, spicy, but at the same time it has a femininity. It has a side to it that really does feel soft: peach and rose. The aldehydes too are brilliant and feminine very much in the style of the Chanel aldehydes (Chanel No. 5, No. 22). This fragrance is very different from all others but I would say that it has some things in common with fragrances like First by Van Cleef and Arpels, Lady Stetson, Chanel No. 22, Arpege, Wind Song, and White Shoulders. It has a vintage aldehydic floral feel to it but it’s also very musky and leathery. She means business. A great evening perfume to wear with your most glamorous evening gowns. I wore this last night during a lounge act performing in Savannah Georgia. I received compliments on it. This fragrance smells much more luxurious and much more expensive than it’s affordable price.
dima 2 – :
Extreme high quality. Animalic, bold, brave like a declaration of real love. Civet is strong but surprisingly not pungent at all, gives a glmourous vibe to everyone who wears it. Tuberose is to die for here. Forget about white florals from nowadays…here you can find NATURAL white florals, nothing chemical, nothing unusual, just like a huge garden. I also feel a peach vibe and and patchouli, among the incense on the base, civet , amber, rose and a high quality leather. Definitely a niche recipe and the ingredients smells so natural, nothing chemical in it. The esprit de parfum is a really sillage and projection monster. The longevity is until the next day. Stunning!
9.5 out of 10
–KoT– – :
When asked what sets this fragrance apart from others, Joan Collins Alexis herself replied “It has a very elegant smell, it has a simplicity and a touch of spice”. This is Alexis in all her bitch beauty and I’m using bitch in an empowering, beautiful, positive context. This is a woman who knows what she wants and usually gets it. This fragrance appears to have been competing with Elizabeth Taylor’s Passion, which also contains notes of sandalwood, incense, leather, patchouli, and white floral scents of gardenia and jasmine. I think this fragrance is more fresh and not as dark as Passion. The bergamot and peach fruit notes at the top are keeping this thing light and summery. It’s got more flowers than Liz Taylor’s Passion and I can smell the roses, jasmines, narcissus, tuberose and ylang-ylang The floral heart is heady and sweet. The dry down is the best part. It turns more masculine, more fragrant even than when you first spritz it on. It has a lot of leather and vetiver. Smells classy and like something you’d put on with a Chanel suit. A little more wood notes and it would probably resemble Bandit. This is a beautiful spicy floral fragrance that perfectly embodies Joan Collins herself. A cheap price but not a cheap fragrance.
jourioush – :
One of the best and beautiful combination of civet, musk, incense (in the dry down) and natural florals. Nothing synthetic, nothing chemical in it, lots of oils in a genius blend.Not dated at all…just special and divine. The sillage and longevity are one of the most impressive I have ever met in a perfume (I have a 7,5 ml purse spray of parfum esprit). NICHE quality discontinued masterpice!
9.5/10
Арчи – :
Its been a long time since I had this, it stunk to high heaven, so I threw it down the rubbish chute…the bottle had broken on the way down, still reeked weeks later when you opened the chute!
keykeeper – :
I may well have to buy a back-up bottle soon! Love it. This is the kind of scent I hope to find when searching Fragrantica. Whether or not there is any comparison, I feel like this keeps me as happy as Chanel no. 5 EDT would, at a fraction of the cost. I gender bend and have tried Chanel no. 5 more than once b/c I work at Macy’s. I already realized that so long as I love Elizabeth Taylor’s White Diamonds and can get that from an online discounter, even 20% off at Macy’s isn’t going to get me to buy the Legendary Chanel no. 5 any time soon. Now I also have Spectacular to add to this. (I’d already seen Brilliant White Diamonds as another alternative.) Sure. They are different, all of them. However, there is a similarity in how they make me feel. Elated. Bubbly. Shimmering. And I love that contrast on a dumb boy like me.That said, there Is also a great many shared notes, just compare them ..
Besides, how many people are wearing Chanel no. 5 anyway? Spectacular has become almost niche to me in a way because who is really thinking of this now? Score!
Kvark – :
I selected musk as very intensive but I presume there is a mistake it is moss oakmoss not musk.
Tuberose and gardenia are very high but well balanced cold gardenia temperate the hot tuberose and believe me this fragrance is not so glamour as expected considered the actress.
Who says this is a “watch me” fragrance probably accuse the fascination of Joan Collins sign on the bottle. So not so spectacular but intimate the fragrance is a real chypre mitsouko style plus mentioned flowers soft creamy fruity apricot and natural oakmoss and vetiver.
very feminine at first but almost with a masculine side in the dry down when vetiver and moss take place.
very complex and more aristocratic and chic than sexy. an excentric work for a Celebrity Fragrance… well in 1989 she was one of the first.
And Passionata please. she was in the Dynasty cast, not in Dallas.
castellano – :
I purchased a 5ml parfum sample from a legitimate seller on ebay. I say legitimate, because trust me it took me quite a while to srub this potion off me… I wish I was not adverse to white florals when done in excess, but tuberose (and Jasmine for that matter) in high extremes sends me queasy. I am looking at you Boudoir and Jardins Baglitelle. This was also the case with this number. However, this potion is spectactular in it’s own right as it stands out, just as Joan Collins would. Like a typical 80’s scent, it is designed to stand out from a crowd and plough down the foes, friends and allies. I detect a bit of coconut in this(?), which I find lovely. It is a competitive, dramatic scent in it’s own right. It takes centre stage, and takes you along with it for the ride.
sashasincov – :
This is classified as as chypre floral here. I don’t think its very chypre, but it is very floral. The gardenia is most prevalent, and there is the sweetness of peach that is almost as strong. I find this to be a very sweet, creamy floral overall. I could not detect any civet till drydown, but if you wait for it, its there. This fragrance is about Joan Collins the actress, not Alexis Carrington the character. I find it to be rather elegant and classy, feminine, and wearable. This is reminiscent of a past era, the 80’s, where florals were sweet and loud, but this is more classic to me, and doesn’t smell dated, especially at the beginning. The longer you wear this, the more civetty it becomes. At the base, there is a quite a discernable animalic note. Most of today’s fragrances avoid this type of note altogether, unless they are reformulations of an older scent, so I guess this aspect would place this perfume neatly in the past. Still, worth a try, but civet haters, beware – the opening and middle phase will fool you.
Queewlymymn – :
In looking for a new signature fragrance, I’m trying to keep an open mind and follow leads that people have recommended based on some of the other fragrances that have been my favorites over the years.
Knowing by Estee Lauder is one of my very favorite fragrances and I would like to find another signature scent that is in this same fragrance family – and would have the endurance that Knowing has.
A fragrance friend recommended that I try La Nuit Perfume by Paco Rabanne and that is a very difficult fragrance to find, so I noticed that this was often compared to Spectacular… so I’m trying this now.
(According to a couple of reviews – Spectacular supposedly smells like La Nuit Perfume by Paco Rabanne, but not so animalistic).
I’m running a side by side test of Spectacular, Timeless by Avon, and First – to see how this compares.
So far, Spectacular starts off much lighter without the heaviness that I pick up from the first blast of First and Timeless. I like the scent of Spectacular, it is a solid type perfume but is registering very “classic” and elegant. There are no screeching high notes or anything that would be offensive. The first blast of Spectacular seems to be coming in as a good business fragrance. Something that has presence but is not taking on a life of its own- and competing with the person who would wear it.
As far as this being a Joan Collins’ fragrance, I think that the image of Alexis Carrington was totally personified in the role that Joan Collins played. She really did a fabulous job in that role and very few other actresses could have pulled that role off as effectively as Joan did. I have a lot of admiration for her, for that. She is a really good actress and played the role so realistically that she literally BECAME Alexis Carrington.
Now… do I want to smell like Alexis Carrington? Probably NOT! But I’m not really “getting” that vibe from this fragrance. If this perfume were in a random line up with a number of other fragrances, I would not immediately associate this smell with Joan Collins – or her role as Alexis Carrington… I would just see that this fragrance was classically elegant.
———–
This fragrance is in the same family and chord range as other floral bouquet fragrances that are my top picks for a “signature fragrance”. This kind of reminds me of the chord within Beautiful, my very favorite Estee Lauder fragrance, that has been a complete staple in my fragrance wardrobe for over 20 years. It is also striking a similar chord to Beauty by Calvin Klein– and other fragrances that hit that medium alto range floral bouquet chord.
Spectacular is a bit more spicy than Beautiful or Beauty… but may fill a gap in someone’s wardrobe where they are wanting to experiment with “spicy” – rather than totally emerging themselves in a heavy splash of spice. This is much softer and more floral than Chanel’s original Coco… and if this were on a fragrance continuum, would be between Beautiful and Coco – about 1/2 way.
ya.linage – :
04. november 2012
Many thanks for finally adding this one to the database!
I have this one both in pure parfum and EDT version and i have managed to wear parfum only by far.
Oh my! I had a feeling it sould be good, however i had my doubts, but i didn´t expect it to be THAT good. I don´t know which concentration the previous user reviewed BUT this is massive white floral with huge tuberose and gardenia, but it also has an amazing dry leathery undertone. All that is bathing in a sea of civet in the drydown.
Magnificent! I think this is very Joan Collins as you would expect it to be based on her most memorable character Alexis from Dynasty! This perfume makes a statement and is bold. Let me say, that though it reminds me a lot of Poison original, but it is not quite the same, it is less heavier but true to 80´s spirit. And it lasts for almost 20hrs one drop of perfume. The drydown is all about leather and civet, simply spectacular! Somehow the drydown reminds me of “La nuit” by Paco Rabanne, however again softer, not that überstrong animalistic note. Those of you, who like bold fragrances will like this one as well. I have enjoyed every minute while wearing this fragrance, it will not give you nausea, but it will surely make you very noticable from the rest of the crowd.
A big love from me!
Highly recommended.
wasqsq – :
Well, that perfume was not so Joan Collins as you could expect: no Boucheron, no Giorgio Beverly Hills, no Poison. It was a nostalgic white florals, white woods, santal, a lot of moss, with reminescences of the original formula of Soir de Paris. Unusual, smart elegant, considering the ’89. Considering Alexis.