It’s very easy to be snobby about perfumes. There are a lot more words to describe a bad smell than a good one: It pongs, it kiffs, it stinks, it reeks, it honks. And there must be a lot more. Even if you say, “It smells”, the implication is usually that it smells bad.
Rive Gauche, certainly does smell – but not necessarily in a bad way. It’s one of those scents that if somebody holds a baby whilst wearing Rive Gauche, then the baby emits Rive Gauche for the rest of the day. Both my babies are happily smelling of Rive Gauche today – which is probably better than they usually smell.
RG reminds me of being a teenager the morning after a party. Probably for two reasons. Every mother’s bathroom cabinet was almost bound to have a bottle of Rive Gauche in the 1980s. (When you’re 17 it’s rude not to have a quick test.) Secondly, it’s probably the only fragrance that would permeate the morning after and still be going strong.
Rive Gauche is a floral fragrance. Although to me it just smells like an archetypal ‘scent’. It’s not intrinsically offensive, but you’d have to really love it to wear it. Perhaps it would be polite to ask the people around you if they like it too.