I am a summer person. My favorite thing about spring is that it’s almost summer, and my favorite thing about fall is that sometimes, the summer days linger on longer than expected. I have nothing good at all to say about winter. But we take turns writing the seasonal Top 10 posts for Now Smell This, and somehow it has worked out that I’ve only done the summer list twice, in 2005 and 2007. Either one of those lists¹ would take me happily through a summer even now, all these years later, and truth be told, summer is when I wear the least perfume anyway.² Many days, a light layer of scented lotion is enough fragrance for me, and there are many more days when (horrors!) I wear no fragrance at all.

For this year’s list, I’ve avoided repeats by emphasizing post-2007 fragrances. Most, but not all, of my choices are unisex, and I’ve included niche and mainstream and indie, cheap and not so cheap…

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