Soir de Paris (Evening in Paris) Bourjois for women

I'm sorry but I cannot detect any peach, apricot, violet, OR lily of the valley in this stuff. The bottle is beautiful but the scent is SO heady and floral that it makes me sick...I really wanted to like this because I love the old-time fragrances... I have a bottle that is about 2/3 to 3/4 full...if anyone is interested in a swap or purchase, feel free to yell to me at abyss1001@mhcable.com !

loved this as a child - the blue bottle was so special somehow, and the fragrance evocative of my mother who would wear it going out ... she would kiss me goodnight and the fragrance would linger in the air after she had gone

This is my first review. I don't know much about notes and openings and what not. So, here goes my take. I am/was looking for a classic perfume. I made the mistake of buying a full bottle of Shalamar before smelling it. I was scared to make that mistake again. But, the look and the reviews of Evening in Paris intrigued me. I found a few unbroken viles from the 50s or early 60s. I put it on this morning. I actually like it. I feel like I smell like a very classy old lady. :) Though most of it has worn off, the scent is still lingering a bit. I would like to get a full bottle, but have read the reviews saying that it has changed. I am rather frightened to buy a big bottle and not like the change. Can anyone tell me if it has changed drastically?

Are there any perfumes that have been around the last 50+ years that hasn't changed?

This is for the original vintage.
I have finally got my hands on a 1940s bottle of the real deal.
With so many fakes although I knew I had the real bottle and box I have only now ventured to put the juice to the test. It's difficult to find any real clear info' on the notes of the original but as soon as I dared to open it I was hopeful. I have the Parfum. French not in English.
This is it! Wafts out and stays around hovering without even applying so much as a precious drop.
Everything people say about the nostalgia and sheer charisma is true.
You are transported back to war time longing and desperate romance. Red red lipstick, powder, stockings and underlying sexual frisson.
The earlier years from it's first creation in 1928 between the wars holds true for the emotional feel too. Glamour, the past horror of WW1, women asserting their power and confidence with the huge changes yet to come.
All this in one tiny blue bottle.
Now wearing it for the first hour:
From what I can find through research there were originally some citrus in the top notes with aldehydic floral predominantly violet flitting in and out of jasmine, some kind of rose and down to an animal note with sandal or other wood softly in the base.
It's so much more, complex but stable throughout.
I think mine is too old to have kept the top notes totally so not in balance but it doesn't matter for what comes in immediately is rich, deep creamy seductive. A heady waft of old time Hollywood. Amazing for a fragrance 70 years old compared to today's vastly expensive offerings which will go off within a few years!
Then something dark and deeply elusive but downright sexual. I've read speculation on dark carnation but it's more than that. Something pure animal here lurking and flitting. Probably one of the old forbidden real extracts. I don't know but we just don't get this in fragrances any more.
For sure this blows C no 5 out of the water despite supposedly being of the same family.
It's never sharp, acidic or asking time to adjust itself for it's next phase and stays constant in presence throughout.
Takes no prisoners for sure but stays true despite many barely realised tantalising glimpses. Now I'm getting spice but even as my nose searches for it again it's gone. For a moment cinnamon then demurely settling into Muguet for a while before that dark sexy animal faint suggestive note comes back. This lady is definitely a bad bad flirt with the confidence that she holds an impeccable pedigree and is wholly in command. As has been said many times the astonishing thing is it's unchanging presence throughout.
I'm stunned by the complexity and nuances however.

More spice now but subtle within the lingering florals smoothly floating down into some gentle light woodsy tone laced with something I simply cannot define. Certainly not the vanilla which is poured with a heavy hand into so many base notes now including the reformulated joke they have made of Soir de Paris.

They sold this for how much!
I'm blown away. Thinking of what we have to pay for anything half decent now and all this from what was a cheap little scent. It makes me realise how very formulaic modern scents are. Boring, same , same, same.
I bought this as a historical piece for my collection expecting very little but some powdery overhyped nostalgic floral pong.
Oh how wrong I was.
Worse though!
I'm simply not going to be able to resist using it sometimes. Secret weapon? Yup. Those ladies definitely knew what they were doing dabbing a little of this behind their ears and knees.....

This is possibly the most well known of vintage fragrances, as everyone remembers a mother, grandmother or aunt who wore this. To me this is a delicate compositon of soft florals, mostly violet, with a touch of powder, and has a bit more muskiness in the drydown than I was expecting. This smells very ladylike, and gives an impression that there was a time when a lady didn't leave the house until her hair was perfect, her face was powdered, and she had a slick of matte lipstick. This is an understated beauty, an everyday sort of beauty, a perfume to wear because a true lady is simply supposed to smell pretty. This fragance is a classic soft floral scent and doesn't seem dated to me. I like this scent and I'd love to have a bottle for the pure nostalgia and occassional wearing. My review is for the original eau de cologne.

i never owned/knew the original formulation of this so this is a review of the modern fragrance. after spraying it, it went through about 3-4 distinct different phases in about 5 minutes....it seemed to be trying to make up it's mind what it wanted to be :) i got a bit of lily of the valley, a bit of violet and a little (wish it was more) iris. it was powdery in an old make-up sense. it reminds me of oscar by oscar de la renta but more wearable for me. it's well blended but overall i think i found it's composition just a little dated for me. i can see why it was so popular and i can see why people love it. i think i might even grow to love it but at first sniff it didn't wow me. it died down to a musky, vanillary-ness which isn't the best for me so maybe that's it. i'm thinking that it's strictly an evening/winter scent for me which isn't something i usually stick to... i like my fragrances to work hard in whatever season we happen to be in. lasts ages. having seen the pictures, it's a shame the new bottles are nothing like the originals too.

Just loved it when I was a little girl in the 1960s. Can't stand the reformulated version. Costs too much and smells not much more impressive than household air freshener. I wish the vintage one would reappear by magic. I would buy lots of it.
Speaking of household and air-fresheners, I read somewhere that more than 85% of the world's fragrance output goes into household detergents and other cleaning materials!

I cannot forget my grandmother with this very blue 1928 classic. She always had some on her vanity and I always believed genies lived in it! I add a drop to my pillow and feel she is near. When she left the world in 1968-EIP oddly vanished with her. She reminded me of Coco Chanel, who loved EIP herself ironically!

It is a very French perfume-blue, stately, and elegant. It followed in the footsteps of all of the classics and was marketed for the masses. The reformulation was acceptable and overpriced. It was not the same! Perhaps that is why it flopped?

As a fragrance, its rather linear and decidedly "blue"-lots of violet and vanilla. Gone are the fur collars, heeled shoes with nylons, sensible dresses, face powder and EIP. This is truely from a bygone era...

It was my grandmother's scent! She never asked for anything, but this was an exception. She must have loved it. She was a delicate person, she loved to play the piano. She came from a time when dreaming of Paris and its artistic atmosphere was a vital part of existence, a full time occupation. I don't remember if she ever went there, but the spirit of Paris was very present in our house, it was an ideal that I never seem to find when I go there. Now I see why I got the perfume gene, scent is probably the fastest way to travel in time. It's beautiful!

We were not rich but my mother had and still has at 96 years old, lovely taste, and made all our clothes. She was petite with beautiful Veronica Lake hair and she always wore Evening in Paris. I would put on her sweaters and swan around the house like a movie star.

Evening in Paris was inexpensive but very well made and although today's formulation is not quite the same, it's still worth owning if your a collector. It's nostalgic in all the right places.

For many years this was bottled at a factory in my hometown, Rochester, New York. My sweetheart's older brother got a job there in 1968 while he was still in high school and before he got a car so he rode the bus. He positively reeked of E in P and said he could ALWAYS get a seat on the bus because people would move away from wherever he was standing. His friends teased him with the nickname "Rosebud"! Powerful stuff!

The little bottles were so inexpensive at Woolworth and at Neisner's, two "five and dime" stores, and as a little girl I could literally save my pennies, nickels and dimes and be able to afford to buy a bottle for my mom for special occasions. Beyond those first dabs from the bottle after she unwrapped my gift I don't think she ever wore it again, forever cementing the idea in my mind that with gifts it's surely "the thought that counts."

Powdery jasmine, lily of the valley and sandalwood, this is the fragrance of a quilted satin handkerchief box or the sweet scent of a lingerie drawer where little pillows of sachet have been tucked in.

Not a fragrance I'd ever wear (or give!) again, but for me it's 100% concentration of nostalgia in a bottle and I'm glad so many people remember it fondly, even if for the memories instead of the scent.

Bottle #3 (in photo of EinP bottles in the marvelous article in the Vintages section here) was sold into the 1960's -- it's the one I always bought for my mom. I think it sold for less than fifty cents.

oh!! i'm teary-eyed right now, that was my grandma's signature perfume, i used to know she was coming before i could even see her from her scent (my inner vampire senses maybe!!)... aaaah!! i really can't dare to try it because it reminds me of her so much, i still have the last almost-empty bottle she used though -untouched- just perfectly saved, the bottle itself is kinda decorative... anyways, great lingering distinct scent, nice bottle, wonderful memories :)

( Vintage Soir de Paris Cologne )

Is easy to know why this beauty was the most "The Most Popular Fragrance in the World". Ernest Beaux is a genius.

While vintage Chanel N5 opens with a touch of intense creamy-lemon and neroly notes, Evening in Paris is dominated by a gorgeous combination of peach-Violet and Iris, Once this notes fade, here comes a wonderful violet/rose-vanillic drydown.

Soir de Paris (Evening in Paris) is a warm, plenty and pleasant floral scent, with a complex base that makes this more interesting.

Vintage Eau de cologne is extremely close to the skin, last about 2 hours, this is very good for a Eau de cologne.

The blue cobalt bottle is Magic :)

I have both the new version and the old version. They are totally different. The new version is very harsh and smells chemical. I can't abide it and was disappointed when I opened the bottle. You see this was my mother's perfume when I was a very little girl and I remember a bottle was always on her dressing table. When I bought a bottle on e-bay of the vintage perfume I did not hold many hopes. But I opened it and at once remembered the smell of my mother on a Sunday morning. It is a soft beautiful floral with aldehydes. It's hard to believe this was a dime store perfume. The new version is a real dis-service to the old version. They should have named it something else.

If you really want the true Evening in Paris your grandmother/mother wore try e-bay, garage sales and flea markets.

this was my grandmother's signature fragrance. she gave me a little dark blue bottle of this in the late 60's. my 1st perfume. i always loved this soft, powdery beautiful scent. i would like to find this again. i don't know if it will still smell the same to me, or on me, but as a child this was the "it" scent for me. i was so intrigued by the scent and the midnight blue bottle. memories!

This was my very 1st perfume. My mom gave me a bottle (the one that has the striped/acorn looking top)when I was about 6.
I remember I wore the hell out of it, but can't for the life of me remember what it smelled like.
I know it was a very commom cheap 5 & Dime (that's a drugstore for those under 40)fragrance and probably cost all of .50 cents or less.
I've never smelled it since and probably won't unless I run across a free sample somewhere which isn't very likely.
Ah, youth!

@guest_
You can get this through the mail order catalog Vermont Country Store. They also sell it online. It is located in Vermont USA.

Is there anywhere you can buy "Evening in Paris" in Paris? I saw it a year ago in Monoprix, but this year
it was not to be found anywhere? Hopefully, you
can tell me if anyone carries it in Paris.

Merci
Jan

This was THE perfume to give as a gift back in the mid-century days of the 40s 50s and into the 60s. It came in wonderful gift sets that were affordable .
The blue bottles hinted at a more exotic perfume but the scent was powdery and did not have a strong over bearing smell. This was probably the reason it had such universal appeal. Pretty much any one could wear it and they did ! I think every lady had a bottle on her dresser received as a gift as I recall. Then the world changed and Evening in Paris disappeared from the shelves. The lovely blue bottles were pushed aside and replaced with Faberge and Charlie and the ghastly musk oils of the seventies. Women wanted to be noticed and not wear the lady like scent of Evening in Paris. I still keep a vintage bottle of Evening in Paris as a memento of a different time. It reminds me a time when mothers cautioned their daughter to not talk too loud , make sure their slip wasn't showing , not act boy crazy or wear strong smelling perfume. Evening in Paris was the ultimate ladies perfume.

In the late fifties I bought this at Woolworths and proudly gave it to my Mom. I too am sentimental about this one. I don't remember the smell but I do remember the beautiful cobalt blue bottle. Here I am getting all misty about my Mother, now gone, and those long ago days.

When I whas younger my grandmother gave me a bottle. Its such a special scent that I can not compare with anything else. Sweet and powdery.

My great-grandmother always wore the original version of this, it is a scent that always brings back fond childhood memories. For many years I had a throw pillow from her house, I keep it stored in plastic bag to keep the scent. For years I would take it out and smell it and remember that wonderful, colorful lady from my early childhood who always made me feel special and beautiful.

This is a review of the vintage cologne, dated early 1940's. The scent starts off like most classic perfumes, with a burst of citrus and a high concentration of what seems like aldehydes. Then it quickly transitions to the heart notes. I smelled a lot of Iris, Jasmine, Lily of the Valley, and a soft rose somewhere in there. Though powdery, this perfume not a pure baby powder scent. It's an unoffensive powder, with a unique note that somehow makes it stand out. It might be the Heliotrope. When it finally transitioned to it's base notes, much of the heart notes were still there. However, I could smell a hint of musk and a slight sweetness due to vanilla. It was a beautiful fragrance to experience.

The sillage is amazing for a cologne. I put two drops underneath each ear yesterday night around 9:00, layered with a small coat of talcum powder. The next day, I rubbed my wrists underneath each ear, and I can still smell it on my wrist at noon!

As a 17 year old girl I am suprised how much I like this fragrance. It does not smell old fashioned once it hits the heart and base. It's a very classic fragrance, but women of any age can wear it. The fragrance is sensual but not provocative. When you catch a whiff, it draws you in with it's soft femininity as if saying, "Come hither, but be a gentleman if you do." Evening in Paris will never lose its style, elegance, and appeal.

I so rememeber this because apparently the previous owners of the victorian I grew up in dumped their trash in the backyard. My brother & I loved to dig up treausures from out backyard, and I found several EIP bottles, some still w/ fragrance in them! I remember it to be a bit powdery and it had a familiar floral that I liked (sort of violet-ish). My favorite bottle was a bullet shaped bottle w/ a tassle.

Evening in Paris started out alot like a Chanel fragrance, very French and aldehydic, but it faded fast to a nasty Jasmine-Lily of the Valley scent that always smells like rotting white flowers on me. Then it dried down finally to a faint, pleasant, sandalwood vanilla musk. When I washed it off, it left a faint taint like vintage dusting powder. It smells strangely like a mock of itself: I 'French' scent that everybody wore because it was affordable. Well worth visiting for the vintage-vacation alone. Not sure it's worth a full bottle, however. The true vintage of this, if you can find some that hasn't turned, is very layered, rich and ringing with formal elegance. It dries down a bit powdery, too, however, though it still hints at a beautiful made-up face, with lipstick and powder, furs and perfumes.