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Jagerbomb, Glamourdale, Tiffanys Diamond, Sir Caramello Old… If you’ve spent the summer collecting names of Olympic dressage horses and sharing them Snoop Dogg in jodhpurs memesHow about a perfume to match? A new generation of fragrances is winning over the equestrian, variously recalling the smell of sweaty saddles or the curious aroma of straw and excrement that the humblest groom will be familiar with. Let’s call it “horsewoman energy” in a bottle.
The first one to leave is Hermeswhose Oud Alezan joined the Hermessence high-end perfume group earlier this year. Developed by Swiss perfumer Christine Nagel In an attempt to overcome his own fear of horses (something of an elephant in the room in a luxury house with saddle-making roots), the new fragrance is inspired by Nagel’s contact with a chestnut horse named Sherazade. The smell of sweat and sawdust stuck in Nagel’s memory; it resurfaced seven years later, when he smelled an oud grown in Bangladesh. By blending oud with soft rose water and a deeper rose oxide, the result is a deeply sensual perfume without the cloying heaviness of traditional ouds.
Hermes Oud Alezan, £283 for 100ml
Perfumer H Saddle, £130 for 50ml
Lyn Harris, the British perfumer and founder of Perfumer H, experienced an equine epiphany in 2023 when his friend Cameron Smith, co-owner of Los Angeles antiques showroom Galerie HalfShe sent him a package containing soap and brushes for her horse-loving husband’s saddle. “The funny thing is, I’m not a horse lover,” Harris laughs. “But I am obsessed with the smells and sweat of animals. I came up with the idea of soap on the beautiful, warm saddle and just put it on paper.”
Though originally intended as a candle and room scent exclusive to Galerie Half, Harris couldn’t resist creating a complementary eau de parfum, Saddle, which launches Sept. 5. “The fragrance emulates the shape of the body in the saddle—it’s about the sculptural element of how the fragrance wraps around you when you wear it,” she explains. With a pure musk base, “there are interesting dirty amber notes, but with very clean aldehydic notes and a hint of orange blossom.” Still, you won’t see Harris saddling up anytime soon. “I love the different smells in the stable. But I’m not tempted to ride horses.”
It is not so with Etto’s Housea New York-based fragrance brand founded in 2017 by horse-crazy competitive dressage rider and luxury brand executive Brianna Lipovsky. Each of Maison d’Etto’s six fragrances is named after Lipovsky’s interactions with a particular horse, though she is quick to emphasize, “It’s not necessarily that [the perfumes] “They smell like horses, but horses are my muses.” (They are also his market research panel: Lipovsky took samples of what would become The best-selling scent in the line. (to her equine namesake, Durban Jane, for her yay or neigh.)
Today, Lipovsky presents her seventh fragrance, Verdades, created by French perfumer Julien Rasquinet and named after the “spirited” Olympic dressage horse. The tango-colored perfume, “inverted orange blossom,” was inspired by Lipovsky’s memories of her competitions in Wellington, Florida.
Then there is Cowgirl in the grassBrooklyn’s latest fragrance DS and DurgaIt’s a more feminine take on “rustic and dirty” Cowboy Grass, the sagebrush- and ambergris-tinged scent that put DS & Durga on the map when it debuted in 2008 (a time when “in Brooklyn,” cofounder David Seth Moltz recalls, “we were all pretending to live in 1808.”) Cowgirl Grass is a “simple, modern” pink floral “for the modern cowgirl, the Texas lady who wears a diamond belt and Lucchese boots,” Moltz says. In other words, it’s a bit dressier than its sister scent. “Cowboy Grass” [is] to sleep on the trail,” Moltz says. “Cowgirl Grass [is] for staying at the nice hotel overlooking the trail.”
Perfumes for women that are dedicated to horses won’t have everyone galloping. But those that fall, fall hard. Mackenzie Reilly, the young American perfumer who formulated Maison d’Etto’s vetiver-based Macanudo, was so taken by the equestrian energy that she has since taken up riding. For everyone else, there’s a spritz and a rousing rendition of “Texas Hold ‘Em.” Up!