As an interesting corollary to last week's Sexy Perfumes poll, check out today's Sunday Times (UK), which has a great article by Luca Turin on perfumes as romantic bait:

Can perfume really help a woman get her man? After all, by the time a guy is hooked, it matters little whether she’s wearing Novaya Zarya’s Lights of Moscow or Chanel’s Cuir de Russie. There’s little hard evidence to suggest scent is any more powerful than other dating tactics, such as laughing at his jokes and showing a bit of cleavage.

Yet the power of attraction is one of the foundations on which the fragrance industry is built — spray on our perfume and you’ll be irresistible.

Read the rest here. More reading: Marcello's review of Luca Turin's Secret of Scent.