Note Profile
Irish moss is a marine note, not a mossy one. It is a red seaweed, and every source that describes its smell uses one word family: sea-like. In perfume it reads as salty ocean air with a faint vegetal edge, and brands place it low in the composition rather than at the top.
Sea-like, and that is nearly all any source will say. The aquatic_ozonic character is the whole note: wet weed on rock, ocean air, the smell of the dried plant once water hits it. A mineral saltiness runs under it, which is the one other quality named directly, though Best Botanicals names it as taste rather than smell. A faint green vegetal edge and a thin briny sulphurous trace are carried at low values because a seaweed that smells sea-like almost certainly has them, but no source found says so about this species.
Read off the wheel, not a label applied to the note.
CAS 9000-07-1
Chondrus crispus extract (IFRA NCS I2.13, whole plant). The note says plainly that Irish moss is a red seaweed and a marine note, not a mossy one - so this must not be linked to any Evernia or Pseudevernia oakmoss material.
Irish moss is Chondrus crispus, a red alga harvested from intertidal rocks in the North Atlantic. It is not a moss. Oakmoss and treemoss are lichens, so the shared word is a naming accident and nothing more. The species is farmed and gathered mainly for carrageenan, a gelling agent, not for scent, which is why odour writing on it is so thin. Wikipedia records that 'when softened in water it has a sea-like odour'. Best Botanicals lists the dried herb as 'Appearance: Light brown to cream. Aroma: Seaweed-like. Taste: Salty, mucilaginous.' MakingCosmetics describes the cosmetic extract only as a 'light to medium amber liquid, characteristic odor'.
Measured in the perfume data on 2026-08-23: 30 Parfumo placements across 24 brands, and 28 of those 30 print it as a base note. The notes it appears beside are aquatic and fresh (Aquatic 13, Fresh 16, Musk 11, Citrus 7, Marine notes 3), never oakmoss or a chypre base, which confirms brands mean the seaweed and not a green forest moss. Perfumers use it as a salty marine floor under citrus and ozonic tops, in the same slot a seaweed absolute would take.
A selection of reviewed perfumes where Irish Moss appears prominently.
No perfumes featuring this note have been reviewed yet. Check back soon.
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