Cornelia Blimber: Speaking of the Dom and 4711: I have a round bottle with the Kölner Dom on a metal plate.

Speaking of noticeable, it's very unlikely anyone will smell this on you. It's much more of a thing you'd use to make yourself feel fresh and clean for a little bit without trying to grab attention. On the other side : ”Johann Maria Farina gegenüber dem Neumarkt” and two little angels carrying a picture of the shop. In my family it was just as much a disinfectant as it was a fragrance. A mosquito bite or a paper cut? Nothing burns so deliciously as a dab of 4711. Oh, all those memories. I had a small box set with 6 miniature bottles that I guarded as my most valuable possession. I remember that sense of panic when the first bottle was empty and only 5 remained. The original Eau de Cologne is a spirit-citrus perfume launched in Cologne in 1709 by Giovanni Maria Farina (1685–1766), an Italian perfume maker from Santa Maria Maggiore, Valle Vigezzo. In 1708, Farina wrote to his brother Jean Baptiste: "I have found a fragrance that reminds me of an Italian spring morning, of mountain daffodils and orange blossoms after the rain". [3] He named his fragrance Eau de Cologne, in honour of his new hometown. [4] That’s interesting. Did they put it on your forehead? (Hola Pirita, eso es interesante. ¿Te lo pusieron en la frente?)

Original Eau de Cologne, launched in 1792, is apparently the cologne of all colognes - it's the one that started it all.

Created in 1792 by Wilhelm Muelhens, 4711 was a blend of citrus oils and herbs, not very different in style from other 18th century citrus mixtures. One of the first successfully marketed was Gian Paolo Feminis’s Eau de Cologne. Feminis moved from Italy to Cologne, Germany, and his Eau de Cologne, born in 1709, gave rise to a new scent family and put Germany on the fragrance map. Feminis’s Eau de Cologne is now sold as Jean Marie Farina Cologne by Roger & Gallet, but I prefer 4711 by a small margin. Wilhelm, Jürgen, ed. (2005). Das große Köln-Lexikon (in German). Cologne: Greven Verlag. ISBN 3-7743-0355-X. opens up very citrusy,lemony,bright and refreshing !! As it dries down the neroli comes in making this less citrusy but more green and soapy. In the drydown it retains some of the lemon surprisingly and the neroli is still there but it does get more powdery making this more well balanced. The drydown is by far my favorite part.|Simple. Lemon with a touch of lavender and piney rosemary. Not a perfume to wear if you want a big trail. Not a perfume that will make you ponder the mysteries of life. Just a good, no-nonsense cologne that smells bracing and sharp and makes you feel clean and energized. And the name is straightforward too, just four numbers. 4711. In the novella Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote, the famed lead character Holly Golightly uses 4711. [14] [15]

Uniqueness- It is a modern classic till now, copied to death but none comes close to the awakening this gives you. A citrus perfume. I can feel a noticeable bitterness which reminds me of juniper, even though it actually comes from petitgrain with other spices but it surprised me because I love juniper ;)Victoria: I was laughing over your comment earlier and then later in the day came across some old press release also claiming to recreate “Napoleon’s cologne” formula. re: your comment above and with your knowledge and experience, you should do a list of “instead of X, do Y”— e.g. Instead of TF Neroli Portofino, do Fleurs d’Oranger. What do you think?! MPFlorian: I smelled 4711 a few weeks ago in a perfume discount store. I really liked it, and I’m interested to try some of its flankers. I can easily agree that the sillage and longevity are nothing to write home about, but it's hard to complain about either when my 90ml bottle was about 13CAD on sale. I find it's a nice little burst of freshness with a pleasant citrus smell... and that does make sense, when basically every layer of it has some kind of orange or orange oil. While the lavender and rosemary aren't very pronounced, I suspect they take a bit of the edge of. I could easily imagine myself carrying around a little bottle in my bag to freshen up during a hot day in the city or the next conference I attend, especially since it's so inoffensive to spray, even around my slightly fragrance sensitive partner. I've seen a lot of people compare this to Neroli Portofino by Tom Ford but to me, they are perfumes from completely different calipers. neroli Portofino is sexy and very well blended. a summer perfume I would wear any day on a hot sunny morning/afternoon but the 4711 is blended in a very linear way to my nose. It's not a sexy perfume but still putting some on after a shower would feel very nice and refreshing.

Annette Reynolds: Victoria, thank you for this terrific piece on 4711. I’ve been using it for several years (yet still always searching for the “perfect” eau de cologne that I found, then lost by Berdoues, and before that by Maja) and really do love it. Sabetay, Sébastien (1960). Les Eaux de Cologne Parfumée. Sta. Maria Maggiore Symposium (in French).Perfectly unisex (the masculine notes of lavender and herbs are balanced perfectly by the more feminine neroli note), 4711 is a classic with mass appeal. It is simple, smells great, and serves its purpose - to refresh, rather than act as a fragrance. I never believed in paying big money for citrus colognes, and 4711 proves that point - it smells effortlessly classy and high-quality. No-fuss excellence, this is German efficiency and engineering at its best. I must buy the soap version next. 4/5. My immediate reaction when I first put my nose on it was that it smelled strangely familiar. It smells either like alcohol or like those refreshing tissues passengers get on commercial airliners.