Flora is lighter, the floral scent of course evokes a younger consumer, and she has a hedonistic, daring side. I don’t want to say that Flora is the daughter of Gucci by Gucci but maybe the younger sister.*

That’s Frida Giannini, Gucci’s creative director, explaining how Gucci’s new Flora fragrance fits into the larger scheme of things. I’m guessing she didn’t want to call Flora the daughter of Gucci by Gucci because she didn’t want to position Gucci by Gucci as so very old as all that, but in fact the two are light years apart — as near as I can tell, the “woods for women” / “masculine notes for women” (or whatever you want to call it) trend that Gucci by Gucci rode in on is over almost before we had time to adjust to it. Flora smells very of-the-moment: it’s light, clean, fresh and pretty, which I hope is what perfume consumers were after this spring because there’s plenty of it on the counters at the moment.

The notes for Flora are listed as citrus, peony, rose, osmanthus, pink pepper, sandalwood and patchouli, but they don’t matter too much: this is a sheer, almost-sparkling floral, very pale and clean, in which nothing stands out other than the peony…

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