“A desolate path of fruit rinds and discarded favors and crushed flowers”

I love New York on summer afternoons when everyone’s away. There’s something very sensuous about it —overripe, as if all sorts of funny fruits were going to fall into your hands. — Daisy Buchanan in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby

I feel the need to reread, or at least skim, The Great Gatsby every year as the weather inches from late summer towards early autumn. The subtitle about the fruit rinds symbolizes the casual materialism of Gatsby’s world, and the quote from Daisy (which rings through my mind every August) signals erotic possibility. I like both of them.

I received a pre-launch of Jordan Samuel’s aptly named Ferragosto a couple of weeks ago, and it made me think about other fruity scents I’ve been wearing lately. Here’s a handful (with links in the titles).

Dawn Spencer Hurwitz Agua Fresca (Sherbet Water Collection #1) (2024): I still remember the first time I ever drank a tall glass of watermelon agua fresca. I’d stopped into a taco joint in my neighborhood on a very, very hot day and, in that moment, it was the best thing I’d tasted in my entire life. This fragrance is a perfect balance of sweet watermelon and crisp mint, grounded with a sprig of aromatic rosemary. I like the water-based body spray formulation and the roll-on oil.

ERIS Parfums Delta of Venus (Antoine Lie, 2023): I kept hearing that 2025 was “guava-girl summer,” but Delta of Venus pre-dated that trend by two full years, reimagining Eve’s temptation in the Garden of Eden through “a kaleidoscope of carnal tropical fruit notes.” (It’s named for one of Anaïs Nin’s erotic short story collections, another scent-idea that’s been around longer than you might think.) You can practically bite into this guava accord — it’s definitely “sensuous” and nearly “overripe,” with a few indolic jasmine petals floating by on a summer breeze.

Clarins Eau des Jardins Treatment Fragrance Spray (Sophie Labbé and Juliette Karagueuzoglou, 2010): This is just the right olfactory remedy for a heat wave: you can spray it all over yourself and you’ll feel instantly refreshed but not overly perfumed. It’s a straightforward composition of grapefruit, red currant, and leafy green notes and a big bottle costs less than $50, so you could even use it as a linen spray or a room spray. I mentioned it recently in an interview about summer fragrances.

Anna Sui Sundae Mellow Yellow (Christine Hassan, 2023): From the original trio of Anna Sui’s Sundae collection, Mellow Yellow lets “sugared lemon and passionfruit pulp play with bright osmanthus, jasmine and creamy vanilla.” It goes from tart to sweet, staying light enough to be a summer-appropriate fruit-gourmand. I own a mini splash bottle and it’s adorable: the “cherry” on top is actually the cap.

Jordan Samuel Ferragosto (Luca Maffei, 2025): Named for the traditional mid-August holiday in Italy, this fragrance evokes “sun-warmed apricots, fresh cut grass, figs split open by hand, laughter still lingering from lunch, and the breeze shifting just enough to remind us the season is starting to slip.” The grassy topnote is startlingly realistic, and cardamom adds warmth to a tantalizing stone-fruit heart. Figgy fragrances often smell coconut-y or too musky-sweet to me, but this fig note reminds me more of the seed-stuffed flesh of the actual fruit, and it’s paired with a creamy sandalwood base.

Dancing Midnight Crush (Frederick Bouchardy, 2024): Midnight Crush, one of three fragrances released last year by a Sonoma-based mother-and-daughter winery, was “inspired by the experience of walking deep into an underground wine cave.” It’s an ideal summer-to-fall scent, from the juicy-sweet grape accord of its opening to the gradual unfolding of its more mineral heart — reminiscent of damp soil and cool air — and its oak-wood base. I know very little about wine, but I do prefer red wine in the fall and winter, and Midnight Crush makes me crave a glass.

Have you been wearing any fruit-inspired perfumes lately? Tell us!

Additional reading: my picks for pineapple perfumes and cherry perfumes.

Image: Neysa McMein, advertisement for Adams California Fruit Gum (cropped), 1920.