I'll be the first to admit that I don't know a thing about 90% of the stuff used to describe certain scents. If it's not something obvious like "lime" or "vanilla" I usually have to look it up on-line... But, I do read here and remember hearing about Patchouli. Think Rolls, Ms.B, and a few others described it as "hippie sweat" or worse. Didn't think anything of it because I didn't really know what the scent was like. Yesterday, my wife and kids went to a Native American festival in a town nearby and one of the vendors there was selling home made soap. So, they bought a big bar and the kiddos (2 and 7 years old) both wanted the one scented with patchouli and lemongrass. This soap smells fabulous. I love the stuff. I am now looking to find shaving stuff with the patchouli scent. I was born too late to be a hippie and certainly don't live the lifestyle now, so what happened? Why the bad rap, Patchouli??? Enlighten me guys and gals... EW
That's the reason right there. People associate it with some pretty strong emotions about the era. I think it's another bandwagon to get on. I love the scent and can only figure hippies must have burned incense a lot back in the day, so this scent was on them. Along with a few others from what I've heard. I was very young during all the hippie and draft dodging going on in the late sixties and early seventies. So I wasn't there for the movement. I do remember several movies in the 90's used the term "Patchouli wearing...", when they wanted to put down an older hippie or some guy into Eastern Religions. As in "Take your patchouli wearing &#$ out of my store and go back to the commune." Maybe that's were it stuck. I don't know. I grew up in the South where burning incense and draft dodging were considered equally bad things to do. Sad, since it's a really fantastic scent that somehow got drafted into representing men who didn't want to be sent overseas during the Vietnam war.
I should mention that I've made my peace with draft dodgers and hippies. Now folks who's rich daddies pulled strings to get their sons into the National Guard and didn't show up for meetings are a different story. Doc.
Hippies and draft dodgers are before my time, so I don't have that connection. To me it smells like body odor and feet and stale pot smoke. I've smelled different blends to me and all of them don't agree with my nose.
To me it's a warm, plant smell. Like cedar or sage. People should try to get their hands on some dried leaves of the actual plant. Nice stuff.
Dunno..............I love it. I also like: Musk Vetiver Brut Polo Green Knize K-10............and other really "strong" scents. I think maybe it has to do with the amount(s) some people wear. With the Patchouli, a little goes a long way.
If I am out in public and get a whiff of patchouli, I immediately think there is a chick with hairy arm pits and legs or some dirty white kid with nasty unbathed dread locks..... patchouli is stigmatized.
Oh la, la, in ways, you are right. Patchouli to me, is smell a lot like marijuana, and if I smell that, I feel to get sick.
I think due to the strength of the oil's scent, it was primarily used to mask body odors. If I'm not mistaken (and I probably am) it originated in or around India. When Indian things became the fad in the 60's with the hippies, they adopted it. It was so prevalent that the scent just conjures up images of hippies. I wasn't around for the original movement, but any pseudo-hippy I've come in contact with lately (meaning ones my age or younger who wished they were original hippies) has smelled like patchouli oil. Personally, I like the scent. When I first started dating my wife, she used to wear it, and she was no where near being a hippy. To me, I would place it in a similar category as sandalwood - if you like one, chances are you'll like the other. Like they're cousins or something....
I'm young. And I just think it smells like sweaty feet and nastyness. And I dislike hippies. And new age hippies. There were a lot of them at school. Went to a greatful dead show with some cover band and a whole symposium. Smelled horrible. Old people, patchuli, pot, BO, etc.
I can agree with that...Sandalwood was the only "non-obvious" scent that I knew before and loved it. Later, I started enjoying Cedarwood and now got into the Patchouli. It seems like good versions of each mimic each other in certain ways.
I like Sandalwood and Cedarwood, but I'm in the crowd who can't stand Patchouli. I'm too young to have picked up the anti-hippy bias to the scent and didn't have many new age wannabe hippies living on or near Air Force bases growing up. It reminds me of sweaty feet and pot.
Great comments. I never really thought about what a draft dodger smelled like, but come to think of it...You were either a "Head" or "Straight" like me back then. My Son wanted to order some shaving soap the other day and asked me what Patchouli smelled like, and the first thing out of my mouth is that it smelled like old Hippies. It always was mixed with the smell of pot and yes it was used to cover BO "in a natural way". Right! That worked. I remember my freinds having it in an oil, incense and even in a ground snuff that you sniffed. Not a bad scent, but it certainly does have some baggage. I suspect that anyone 50 or older will have similar memories if you knew any hippies.
I've never smelled single note Patchouli, which I spelled Patchtouli for the longest time, so I can't comment. However, I do like it a lot in QED's Peppermint/Patchouli/Tea Tree shave soap. It's like one those paintings that you constantly stare at and you see something different every time. It's a complex blend but it's great.
Patchouli is one of those scents that depends entirely on body chemistry to me. It is in no way a masculine scent, so when I smell a guy wearing it it's usually a dirty hippy protester pothead that needs a bath. However, I've smelled it on some women that know how to apply it and it's a wonderful scent. It smells like earth, burning leaves, fertile soil, magical fantasy dragon sword enchantment, and any other term I can find to describe sexy little hippy chicks. Then, there's the other kind of hippy girl that doesn't like to shave or bathe and tends to drown herself in patchouli. This is when I want to gag and puke, and I entirely understand the above reference to stinky hippies. But when worn correctly (ie, one drop behind each ear on the back of the neck) by a clean woman, it's a pretty sexy scent. The problem is that most women think it's like a normal "spray it all over" scent, which it's not. It's very potent stuff, and literally anything over two drops is overkill. But a man wearing patchouli, I just don't get. Might as well pass me the Chanel No 5.
I love Patchouli; the dark, iron distilled one. Mix a drop or two into some citrus oil and it's TDF! :happy108
