I started writing this a while ago & planned to do much more research before letting it out into the wild. As my fur child isn’t well I haven’t had time to do more work on it. Please do comment though
Who has ever had a rash or other actual allergic reaction to a fragrance?
I’m not talking headache or nausea, they are intolerances, but full blown allergic reactions.
My answer is yes, just once, to SL Fleurs d’Oranger. I got a rash exactly where I had applied it & nowhere else. I went away with washing it off, antihistamine tablet & cream.
I get allergies & develop new ones all the time. Drugs, some foods, plant saps (not just ivy & giant hogweed), tree pollen, rape pollen. Idiopathic urticaria. My immune system is hyper. Yes I’m one of those annoying people. Yet only once have I been allergic to a perfume.
This isn’t an IFRA rant or even an anti EU Regulator rant (I miss being in the EU, so many things that make life easier & more pleasurable have been lost). It is simply an enquiry about how many of my tiny audience of fragrance wearing audience have had an allergic reaction to fragrance.
In today’s world perfumes of the past with there dead animal ingredients, known carcinogens etc are never going to be re-released. Nor should they be. I want musk deer, beaver & civet cats to thrive not die so I can swap out my body odour for theirs. Getting melanoma from large amounts of bergamot isn’t a great idea either, so I accept some regulations are a good thing.
Tom on Perfume Posse is all for labelling perfumes with allergy warnings like products that contain allergens like nuts & mustard. He also posits that fags & booze are known killers but are still on sale with warnings. So why not fragrance? He is not alone, others have made this suggestion too.
Did you read Pia Long’s & Christophe Laudamiel’s excellent open letter to the regulators in 2023? What are your thoughts?
alitykescents 
I need to read that letter. As far as fragrance reactions go, I haven’t had a reaction yet, which is probably more luck than anything as I have eczema (speaking of rashes) and my skin is quite irritable. However, I’ve recently discovered a food allergy that I didn’t know I had, and that was goats cheese. I ate it many times as a kid, but the last two times I’ve eaten I’ve broken out in hives. So, I’ve cut it from my diet. My dad has a peanut allergy so he needs to be careful around some foods too.
Wow! Goat milk & cheese is often recommended to people with lactose intolerance. Dairy & eczema have a known link.
Good that you haven’t had a a fragrance induced rash.
Yes, you must read the open letter, it is long & quite technical but very informative
I’ve never had a rash or other reaction to fragrance, but a couple have caused headaches, mainly because I hated them and couldn’t scrub them off soon enough- LOL
I would be very upset if I had an allergy to goat’s milk as I love goat yogurt and goat cheese. That would be tough for me. I have to have lactose- free cow’s milk.
I hope Mr Jarvis will be OK?
My nemesis is tree pollens, and this year I’m increasing the amounts of medications I’m taking for my allergic rhinitis. As for rashes, one of the first things I learned when I started dabbling in perfumery was never to put undiluted essential oils directly on skin – I never did that, but I did use pretty high concentrations in blends that were probably not diluted enough, and eventually I developed a rash on the spot on my wrist that I always use to test blends. It doesn’t itch or hurt and it goes away after a couple of days by itself. However, now if I put any perfume on that spot, there’s a chance that rash comes back, so either it’s hypersensitized or that perfume isn’t IFRA compliant (I don’t remember which one set it off most recently).
Undiluted EO’s aren’t safe despite being “natural”, as you know. That “natural” & “clean” are better in some was is such a load of bull****. The open letter addresses that too.
Once, to Eau de Love in the 70’s. Just like you said, a rash only where I’d applied it. Very disappointing, since I really liked the scent.
Good JuJu coming Mr. Jarvis’s way, Alityke. Like Daniel said, I need to read that letter.
I started to read this post and immediately ran to my fragrance cabinet, and pulled out Serge Lutens Fleurs d’oranger and gave it a generous spritz. It’s such a beautiful perfume, and one of my favorites, but I digress. I did not get any skin reaction from the perfume, nor do I ever remember getting one when wearing it. I will continue to watch it, and report back if I do. I’m sorry this was your experience. If it is a fragrance you enjoy, the reaction can be completely frustrating.
I will say this. I have suffered from psoriasis, and for almost 8 years. It came up out of nowhere, and never had this issue previously. I’m a nut, and don’t really believe in modern medicine much. I also didn’t want a doctor throwing prescriptions for $800 creams at me, or some oral medication to attempt to remedy the issue. I decided to take matters into my own hands. Guess what, it worked.
I found out that the catalyst for the psoriasis was two plant groups, nightshades and stone fruits. That’s a gigantic group of foods that seemed to encourage my psoriasis. I decided to take some radical action, eliminating everything in these two categories from my diet. The result? The psoriasis completely went away. If I eat potatoes, fresh tomatoes or peaches. I’ll get a reaction within 12 hours. If I stay away, nothing. The only strange exception is cooked tomatoes. I can eat those, fresh, no way.
For someone who is grew up on potatoes, and who is 29% Irish, and 19% Scottish, not being able to eat a potato is just cruel. I hope your reaction can be identified. If you can’t enjoy Fleurs d’oranger on skin, there is always paper. Sorry, Alityke.
SL Fd’O became my scarf scent or I wear it on clothes that don’t touch my skin.
There must be a compound in tomatoes that gets broken down in the cooking process. Anyway, cooking increases the lycopene content of tomatoes. Lycopene is specifically good for men.
I worked in clinical research for most of my working life!
Yeah, every now and then my skin gets very red and heats up when I wear fragrances but I’m pretty sure it’s me. Never the same fragrance twice. So I’m thinking I might eat, breathe, do something that changes my tolerance.
Portia x