Scents of Summer: Hot fragrances to make you sizzle in 2022

Is it possible to smell like summer? There’s no doubt that different scents invoke in us different emotions, different moods, memories of different times and places. On a subconscious level, certain fragrances just ‘feel’ right in different situations. And that includes different times of year. So what are the best fragrances to get you in the mood for summer? Here’s a selection of this year’s best sellers.

Tom Ford Eau de Soleil Blanc

What better place to start than with a fragrance named ‘white sun’? Big on citrus notes with bitter orange, bergamot and citron to the fore, Eau de Soleil Blanc smells like the zesty energy you feel under a bright, warm sun. Florals including neroli, orange blossom, ylang-ylang and jasmine provide a breath of the great outdoors, while the coconut base adds a flavour of the exotic. A unisex fragrance to transport you to a tropical beach with tangy cocktail in your hand.

Creed Silver Mountain Water

Another unisex fragrance that goes big on the citrus notes, with bergamot and mandarin providing that zesty air that just seems to scream ‘summer’ to our senses. But in this instance, those citrus aromas are blended with lots of lush green scents – green tea, petitgrain, galbanum – evoking the riot of plantlife that fills the air all summer long (grass cuttings, anyone?). Concocted to recreate the experience of a mountain spring in high summer, Silver Mountain Water also includes musk and sandalwood for a spicy woodland undertone, softened with the fruity notes of blackcurrant. A fragrance to celebrate the pleasures of the great outdoors in summer.

Jo Malone Lime Basil and Mandarin

It’s always nice when you can tell exactly what you are getting from a fragrance from the name on the label. The Jo Malone range likes to be helpful and upfront like that. And you can probably tell for yourself that this is a fragrance that has summer written all over it. Again, citrus notes are to the fore, a heady mix of tropical lime and oriental mandarin orange, as well as bergamot. These scents are cut through with aromatic, moderately spicy aromas of basil, thyme and patchouli, with a touch of iris and lilac to provide a light, flowery undertone. Bright and herby, like a kitchen garden in full bloom.

Hermes Un Jardin Sur Le Nil

What could be more evocative of exotic summer sun than a fragrance called ‘a garden on the Nile’? If Jo Malone’s Lime Basil and Mandarin captures something of a Mediterranean kitchen garden with an added exotic twist, this is a fragrance that goes all out to transport you to a fertile plantation bursting with life under glorious skies. Let’s not be surprised any more that citrus freshness (grapefruit, orange) is a major component of this fragrance. But after that, it’s a study in using scents to help your mind recreate a place in time – green mango, lotus, bulrush, incense, cinnamon. It’s aromatic, it’s delicately spicy, it’s floral, it’s fruity, it’s green. It is, to quote the perfume house, “an impressionistic stroll through the island-gardens on the Nile at Aswan”.

Byredo Palermo

Sicily’s capital Palermo is a city as steeped in history as it is soaked in sunshine. On the northern coast of the Mediterranean island, Palermo basks in long, hot summers when the glorious beaches stretching out along the coast become filled with people and the cooler mountains surrounding the city are filled to bursting with oranges and lemons. Byredo’s Palermo fragrance quite simply tries to capture the scent of those citrus groves – bergamot and a blend of citrus fruits to the fore, underpinned by earthy, spicy musk and delicate floral rose. It’s one of those fragrances that has the scents of a heaving, sweltering, teeming city and the escape to blissfully breezy, lemon-scented hillsides, all rolled into one.

If you can’t decide which of these fragrances sounds like your smell of summer, then why choose at all? Buy low cost fragrance samples of them all at Fragrance Samples UK. And while you’re there, have a sniff about to see what else you can find.