My expensive hobby smells better than your expensive hobby

When it comes to some of TikTok’s most successful fragrance influencers, their joie de vivre and willingness to let their freak flags fly set them apart from the rest of the beauty community. German social-media star Jeremy Fragrance’s ecstatic scent reviews, rambunctious personality, and proclivity for shirtlessness have helped him gain upwards of 9 million followers. There’s @thatfragrancekid, an Arizona teen with a style that resembles a young Uncle Fester, ravenously inhales department-store colognes as if his life depends on it. Cherubic suburban teenager Jatin Arora, aka @thecologneboy, posts videos of himself unboxing packages filled with $800 worth of cologne in front of a wall stacked with countless fragrance bottles. 

I used to watch their TikTok videos feeling a mix of pure delight and mild horror at their enormous collections. Who needed that much perfume? It was only when I began storing my heavier winter perfumes in the refrigerator — they should be kept from sunlight and humidity, so I’m simply taking it to the next level — to make room for my lighter summer scents did I realize I was a pot calling the fragrance bottle black. My own inventory check forced me to admit I’ve spent too much money on perfume. 

So what’s going on with me? Why can’t I stop buying perfume? Thankfully, I stand by every purchase. I own seven full bottles, close to 30 travel-size perfumes, and a dozen samples of fragrances sans their atomizers. I’ve been barred from wearing Italian perfumer and “queen of gourmand” Hilde Soliani’s Buonissimo because my boyfriend thinks it too accurately captures the smell of a fresh-out-of-the-oven buttery croissant and a cappuccino, a grave concern when there’s no croissant or cappuccino in sight. 

A single bottle of perfume or cologne averages $200 for 50 milliliters, with each bottle expected to last about a year. For me, that’s over $2,000 spent on fragrances. But I don’t care! Each scent expands my knowledge of the fragrance world and has revolutionized the way I think about wearing perfume. I have designated scents for various ventures — attending a pilates class, flirting at a party, flying on a plane, even sleeping. There can be a special scent for every occasion if you’re crazed enough.

There’s Una Tira L'Altra, a boozy and flirtatious cherry fragrance from Soliani, which feels like a seductive summer night in a bottle. Swedish perfumer Stora Skuggan’s smoky and wet Mistpouffer is as eerie as the unexplained natural phenomenon “skyquake'' that inspired it. I adore Profumum Roma’s Acqua di Sale, a salty marine scent that transports me to an empty beach. Another favorite is Tar by Comme des Garçons, a peculiar fragrance that smells exactly like the inside of an AutoZone on its initial spray — think hot asphalt, scorched tires, and, my standout note, gasoline — and quickly dries down to a surprisingly wearable combination of leather, vetiver, and bergamot. 

I wasn’t always this obsessed with fragrances. I got into perfumes in what I consider a very normal way: as a tween stealing spritzes of my mom’s tried-and-true Chanel Coco Mademoiselle for special occasions. When it came time to select my first signature scent, I chose Vera Wang’s Princess almost purely for the bottle. The fruity, powdery scent — which includes notes of apricot, dark chocolate, and vanilla — was encased in a purple heart-shaped vessel crafted to make teenage girls who lived and died by their monthly Teen Vogue subscription lose their minds. It even had a bronze tiara sitting atop the atomizer, which made me extra susceptible to purchasing. I eventually ditched the scent for Marc Jacobs’ Daisy, a citrusy white floral for the die-hard Sofia Coppola fan. Finally, I found sophistication in Escentric Molecules’ crowd-pleasing skin scent Molecule 01. I’ve received compliments on it from both refined women at my Manhattan dermatologist and loiterers on the Lower East Side. 

This signature-scent-only state of mind shifted when I noticed a curious X trend circulating screenshots from Fragrantica, a fragrance database that categorizes perfume and cologne notes. It was a world beyond seasonal scents too. A new generation of fragrance lovers had eschewed the concept of a signature scent altogether to continuously try new perfumes and colognes, from niche perfumers to longtime staples of department stores and Sephoras.

It’s important to understand that spending a few grand on perfume should be viewed less as an example of rabid consumerism and more as any collection hobby. It’s not unlike collecting PSA-graded Pokémon or sports trading cards. And my hobby smells better! A well-displayed perfume collection also doubles as art. I love to see the demure black-swan topper of Gumamina’s Odile — a seductive, rageful scent with notes of dark chocolate, blood orange, and a hint of rubber — coyly watching over the rest of my perfumes while the mysterious, asymmetrical onyx slabs that store Andrea Maack’s fragrances feel worthy of scents like Coven and Lightsource.

My love of perfumes goes beyond the material realm. There’s a genuine social component to the fragrance world often lost to those who cling to the ways of the signature scent. Enjoying perfume has become a social lubricant, much like gabbing about the latest draft, trade, or score update from your favorite team or Bravo-verse gossip. I give recommendations to people, and they share their new favorites with me. A dear friend and fellow “frag-head” and I started a tradition we fondly refer to as “huffing Tuesdays” in which we meet up with new samples for the other to sniff and geek out over. When I invite people to my home, they beeline to my collection to inspect what I’ve laid out, maybe finding a future favorite scent.

In many ways, I feel like a learned, more whimsical, and, most important, less annoying version of a sommelier. My perfume knowledge is now part of my conversational wheelhouse. I can talk about my most (or least) preferred notes with confidence. I’m also learning something I can actually use in the world. What’s that smell? I can probably help you identify it. It’s fun, and well rounded! Plus, I never have to swirl wine in a glass to make its legs appear — a major win in my book. 

Testing fragrances is a matter of personal choice, but mostly it comes down to how much money you’re willing to burn. You can opt for a blind buy of Rihanna’s secret scent — the warm, sugary Love Don’t Be Shy by Kilian — at $295 for 50 milliliters, regardless of whether you end up liking it as much as she does. (A blind buy is exactly what it sounds like: blindly buying a fragrance online based on “vibes.”) Another, more economical option is to choose a mini size at 7 milliliters for $50. The most affordable option? Checking massive fragrance retailers like Scent Split or Luckyscent for a 1-milliliter sample vial for a few dollars. There won’t be an atomizer, but you’ll be able to test out the perfume for at least a few days to get a better grasp of its longevity and sillage (aka its “wake” or scent trail).  

My process goes a little something like this: I hear about a perfume through word of mouth, dive into Fragrantica reviews to see what other obsessives have to say, and then immediately open a new tab to purchase a sample from Luckyscent. With niche but beloved perfumers like Marissa Zappas or Universal Flowering, I’ll skip the sample step and go straight for the travel size — I know that whatever they put out will be interesting. Zappas’ Pink Bedroom Oil commemorates artist ​​Portia Munson’s exhibition “The Pink Bedroom” with an intoxicating mix of makeup powder, strawberry, musk, and the pièce de résistance: notes evoking plastic doll heads. As for Universal Flowering, the refreshing mix of yuzu, rhubarb, apple, and musk feels as breezy as wearing a crisp linen shirt on the most humid day of the year. 

Sometimes a fragrance house will opt to create scents in a more conceptual fashion. This doubles as catnip to influencers. Etat Libre d'Orange may have totally wearable, fresh options like You or Someone Like You​​, but nothing generates attention faster than Secretions Magnifiques, a primal scent reminiscent of the more base pleasures in life: post-coital semen, sweat, and spit. Romanian perfumer Toskovat’s reputation for note combinations like bubblegum and metal or latex and smoke have made it a hot commodity as well as meme fodder. While partaking in this unsavory side of the fragrance spectrum could cost you invites out, at least the monetary pricing ranges only between $100 and $330.

Maybe one day I’ll pare back and minimize my collection to three or four main fragrances I’ll rotate for years at a time. For now, I’m enjoying the rush of sensuality and whimsy that comes with pairing a fragrance with a mood, occasion, or moment. And if you see me IRL at Scent Bar inhaling perfume, no, you didn’t.

Layla Halabian is a writer in New York.