Joy by Jean Patou can be described as the quintessential vintage fragrance overflowing with rose, aldehydes, and civet. The civet is definitely loud and dirty, but it blends with the sweet, juicy aspect of the rose rendering it velvety and luscious. When I wear Joy, I conservatively apply it and keep a modern appearance. I’d love to meet someone who swims in this fragrance :)

This review is for the pure parfum.
This is the Summer of my quest for a signature scent and so far it has been disappointing. After years, and years of being a perfume junkie I am going back to the classics, trying to find that scent that will "just do it" for me. My latest expenditure was Joy pure parfum. Again, relying on the book Perfumes the Guide, and their raving review of Joy parfum, I threw all fate to the wind and spent the $275. Well, 3 days later I am still asking myself - What were you thinking? It goes on pungent, I mean really pungent! Very hard to take. So pungent, you don't want to be around others so as not to offend anyone. After 30 minutes a bouquet of florals opens up - rose, jasmine, tuberose - but not distinct. Bold, overpowering. I was waiting for a smooth symphony of bold florals, something to send me soaring, but it never came. I kept waiting for that beautiful aroma to waft up from my wrists that would sooth me, make me feel sensuous - nothing. Then came the dry-down. I can only describe it in one word - horrid. On me, the low note comes across as a strong civet. Repulsive, cat pee repulsive. After the third day of wearing it, waiting for something different to happen each day, I gave up. I cannot wear this again. What an expensive lesson to learn. There is never the pure parfum on display in the store as a tester. I shoud have tried the edp and then made a decision. Thank God my husband was on a business trip and was not around to question "what the hell are your wearing now/'

Oooh this is such a vintage, classy smell. When i first got this for Christmas, i couldn't stop sniffing it, and i wear for daily use or going out, it is an amazing perfume worthy of it's amazing reputation, i love telling people i own a perfume that used to be the costliest perume in the world! :)

a most boring floral. Not even worthy of me wasting my thoughts and words. It stinks like a gazzillion flowers. Lacks originality and complexity. If you love carrying armloads of bouquets, this one is for you. Long ago, it was a gift from my mother-in-law. I loved her, but hated this gift.

Ok this will sound crazy but when I apply this I actually hear it rolling down, like someone sliding his hand down the strings of a cello, and then a hushed thump of a bass drum. It rolls out the rose, sort of wheels it down a red carpet. It then continues to evolve and morph, showing various angles of the rose garden and jasmin blooms. And talk about money! If you could actually smell what being rich and of the top echelons would smell like, this would be it. It's intimidating. There is not a woman on earth that I am aware of who could possibly live up to the heights of elegance and goddess-like sophistication this incredible fragrance displays (possibly Catherine DeNeuve now that I think of it). I have to wear my hair in a French Twist and have my skin and eyebrows perfect when I wear this. It is SO worth the money for the real perfume, if being transported to a higher realm is important to you.

Joy has earned iconic status in France ever since its introduction, in the 1920s, and is probably Jean Patou's most prestigious perfume to date - famously known far and wide as the most *expensive* perfume in the world. If I have so far neglected to review it, I must have had a very good reason. I hesitate to write about any scent I do not wear myself, no matter how impressive or glorious it really is. Joy, sadly, is just such a scent. I still have a nearly full bottle of the pre-reformulation Joy which I treasure, yet hardly ever reach for. I cannot tolerate jasmine very well, and Joy does feature a huge bouquet of jasmine blossoms whereof the accompanying roses are fairly muted, not to mention any other flowers; nonetheless, I detect some precious woods and a major civet backdrop. Sounds grand? It is. This perfume epitomizes the woman I never was and in all probability, never shall become. Nothing girlish, tentative, shy or demure about it, rather it evokes a very knowing Mother Earth sort of presence, portrait of a lady who has seen it all, done it all, triumphed over it all, and remained a solid figure, complacently ever-present for the rest of us mere mortals, ready to reassure, comfort, and offer sound advice in dire straits.
It may be noted that this fragrance is very powerful even in EDT form - one spritz is quite sufficient to transform my whole house into a dreamy log cabin hidden in the wilderness, somewhere in the remote depths of an undiscovered country, on a warm sunny day, where the air is redolent with moist earth, dry woods, and beautiful flowers at the very height of their bloom. Too rich for my blood or my skin, admittedly, but if, upon spraying a little in the air, I should happen to accidentally spill some on my hands, it would be the sort of lucky accident of which I may never complain.

I'm afraid the bottle I got from a swap was probably a few years old, or had "it's day in the sun" already, so to speak, but this was pretty rank. It was an EDT. It reeked of old lady civet, perfumey enough not to even smell animalic, and then a drydown of stale, aging, decaying jasmine. Not freshly blooming jasmine, but jasmine that had been picked, and turned all brown, and then rubbed all over your body. I get the "old-lady talcum" another reviewer described as well.... thank God I sprayed this on a friend!!

I've only tried the parfum but my, what a masterpiece. True luxury. Rich, seductive and deserving of being one of the greats. Not at all old fashioned. Pure luxury

Candy tuberose with aldehydes. Goes on gloriously sweet flowers with only the faintest edge of mothballs, which my skin always brings out of Tuberose, Jasmine, Gardenia or Lily of the Valley. Unfortunately, heavier application makes this scream of mothballs on me, and it's awful. I will keep my sample for times when I need to be reminded of how bad this can be on me. It really started so nicely.

I have a Nordstrom sample of the Eau de Parfume. Glorious on the tester card; a riot of creamy spring flowers caked with buttery yellow pollen. Unfortunately within minutes on my skin it breaks down into nothing but rose. A very pretty, true-to-life rose, but it makes me feel very scrubbed clean with high quality French soap and really I'd rather shell out a few dollars for a bar of soap rather than over a hundred for this. So close, but F- on the follow-through.