Scent & Skin
There’s a reason why a fragrance never smells exactly the same on two different people. It’s not marketing. It’s chemistry. Your body chemistry to be exact.
Scents are deeply personal—etched into the body and enhanced by quite primal factors like your skin’s pH and what some will argue as pheromones. These primal factors are like invisible messengers. They don’t announce themselves loudly. They whisper. They draw others in without saying a word. And when fragrance meets your unique body chemistry? That’s where the magic begins.
Below we’ll discuss the in’s and out’s of pheromones, how your natural scent shapes a perfume’s behavior, and why no one will ever smell exactly like you.
Pheromones 101
Let’s start with the basics. What even is a pheromone? If you’re an abstract thinker, you can think of it as a biological subconscious language. If you’re more right-brained, you can digest pheromones as chemical signals our bodies naturally emit—undetectable in the traditional sense, but deeply felt. Unlike perfume, pheromones are not about “scent” as we understand it. They’re instinctive, subliminal. They influence social behavior, mood, and even attraction.
There are different kinds—alarm pheromones, territorial pheromones, etc.—But the ones you’re probably most familiar hearing about colloquially are attraction and social bonding pheromones that send subvert signals through our sweat and sebum. Now, it’s important to note that pheromones in humans is still a highly debated topic with wide postulation on a range of potential steroids that could be classified as pheromones. Pheremones are picked up by the vomeronasal organ in our nose, which is quite underdeveloped for humans. As a result, pheromones are much better established amongst other species.
But for now, we’ll go with what we know and that’s that your body is constantly communicating in some way, and we’re going to explore how perfume joins the conversation.
How Fragrances Interact with Your Natural Scent
When you spray a fragrance, you're not simply wearing it. You're co-creating with it. In Layering 101, I discuss at length how perfume interacts with the oils, hydration levels, pH, and bacteria on your skin. This is why means the same fragrance can pull warm, spicy amber on one person and soft, creamy musk on another. This alchemy is why your signature scent doesn’t only exist in the bottle—it also exists on you.
For example, if you have oilier skin, a fragrance will hold longer and tend to amplify warmer base notes like sandalwood, oud, and vanilla. What you eat, how stressed you are, and your menstrual cycle (yes, really) can all affect how your body emits scent and how fragrance binds to it. Even your skin’s acidity can subtly shift how top and middle notes express themselves. If your skin is more basic (i.e., higher pH), fragrances tend to smell sharper, drier, or more metallic. This can make citrus and fresh notes seem harsher and less rounded, while woody and musky notes might come across as powdery or even slightly sour. On the other hand, if your skin is more acidic (i.e., lower pH), fragrances tend to smell sweeter and smoother. This can enhance the warmth of vanillas, ambers, and florals while softening any potential harshness in citrus or green notes. So in short, basic skins makes a fragrance sharper, while acidic skin makes a fragrance sweeter. For fun, you can always go to a pharmacy and get pH test strips to see where you land on the scale.
Understanding your Natural Scents’ Strengths
With this rudimentary understanding of how fragrances interact with your natural scent, you can start to play around with enhancing your own natural scent. Ultimately with any fragrance, the goal isn’t to mask your natural scent, but rather to complement or magnify it with intention. There were always be trial and error when trying any fragrance, but there are a few scent famillies that have been said to play well with pheromones. Trialing with these families can give you insight into how fragrances with that ingredient as a base note will smell on you. Musk, ambers, and soft woods and resins are all good starts.
Musks are the closest thing to a "second skin" in perfumery. White musk delivers a clean, airy sensuality, like freshly washed skin with a hint of warmth. Ambrette seed, a natural musk derived from hibiscus, carries a slightly fruity, softly animalic depth that mimics the effect of pheromones. In general, musks are highly reactive to body heat and tend to feel cozy, warm, and slightly powdery as they settle in, so you’ll get a good sense of that clean, sensual affect.
Soft woods and resins are another great group to try. Unlike harsher, dry woods like cedar, soft woods like cashmere wood or sandalwood / santal blend seamlessly with skin, creating a velvety warmth. Benzoin, a resin with vanilla-like qualities, adds a sweet, ambery depth without becoming cloying. These notes melt into your natural oils rather than sit on top, making them feel like an extension of your body’s warmth rather than a separate layer of fragrance.
Now, this conversation wouldn’t be complete if we didn’t touch upon the new wave of pheromone fragrances, and especially the synthetic molecule Iso E Super that’s been garnering a lot of attention recently. Iso E Super is a minimalist synthetic molecule that doesn’t necessarily scream for attention. It gives off a soft, woody warmth with a slightly cedar-like tone, but its real magic is supposed to be in in how it interacts with your skin as it’s meant to amplify rather than mask your natural scent. In my eyes, I see it as the synthetic version of a musk designed to enhance allure on a nearly imperceptible level. Many people experience it as a "phantom scent,” sometimes detectable, sometimes disappearing.
That said, the popularity of Iso E Super has sparked a wave of interest in “pheromone-infused perfumes", with Eccentric Molecules being one of the more popular brands within the space. These fragrances contain lab-made analogs meant to mimic the subtle chemical signals our bodies emit. While the science is still emerging, many people, including myself have tried these in an attempt to see what sticks. Below are the four fragrances I’ve tested within the pheromone-forward category that I would recommend for wearing alone to explore your natural scent or as a subtle base for layering.
Molecule 01 by Escentric Molecules: This is probably the most well known Iso E Super fragrance mean to create a “your skin but better” aura.
Musk Therapy by Initio Parfums Privés: I love this musk one its own but you can also use for layering. It’s a creamy blend of white musk and hedione, an ingredient that’s supposed linked to attraction pathways in the brain.
Not A Perfume by Juliette Has a Gun: This is another best seller, and it' truly has just one ingredient, Cetalox, which is meant to play nicely with your pheromones.
Cheeky Smile by Jusbox: This is my favorite out of all four. Inspired by London’s acid house scene, it’s a wild-card, Iso E Super-forward fragrance. Mixed with amber notes, it’s gives off a fresh but smooth and strangely addictive smells that bonds really nicely with your skin. It’s also a fun bonus that the bottle glows in the dark.
Remember, these scents are meant to hum more than scream, so don’t be surprised if at first you don’t smell them as strongly as anticipated or as much as others may smell it on you. Ultimately, these fragrances are meant to be a fun exploration into highlighting you as the base note.
