In perfume-loving circles we talk about how scent can evoke powerful emotion and how it seeps into areas of the brain that language is too clumsy to enter. We know that perfume can wake up memories that might have otherwise slept for good. Well, listen up, friends: if you had a rough time of it in the mid-1970s, take my advice and stay far away from Revlon Charlie.

Charlie came out in 1973 and was marketed toward the young, single, pants-wearing, tequila-sunrise-drinking working woman. While Charlie was under construction, its working name was “Cosmo”, after the sort of woman who read Cosmopolitan magazine. According to Osmoz, Charlie’s top notes are citrus oils, peach, hyacinth, and tarragon; its heart notes are jasmine, lily of the valley, cyclamen, and carnation; and its base is cedarwood, sandalwood, oakmoss, and vanilla. Osmoz describes Charlie as a floral oriental, but I’ve also seen it referred to as a green floral, or even as a green chypre…

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