Orchid Cactus

Note Profile

Botanical

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About

Orchid cactus is the night flower of Epiphyllum, and despite the name it is neither an orchid nor a desert plant. It is an epiphytic rainforest cactus. The flower opens after dark, smells sweet, waxy and faintly green, and is finished by morning.

Scent Profile

Orchid Cactus smells sweet and white floral, light and faintly waxy with a green, succulent edge. A soft, musky warmth runs underneath, giving it an ephemeral, fading quality since the flower opens only after dark. A waxy petal note sits at its centre. It reads as a simple sweet floral body, gone again by morning.

ScentWheel

Breadthbroad

EnvelopeHeart · ~4h lasting

Family Floral

Read off the wheel, not a label applied to the note.

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Materials That Can Make This Note

Perfumers can build Orchid Cactus from materials such as:

Geraniol rose · floral · citrus

Smell words come from published sources.

Allergens perfumes with this note can list: Geraniol, Benzyl alcohol, Methyl Salicylate

A given perfume with this note may use some of these, or something else, and may or may not contain the allergens above.

Origin

No commercial essential oil or absolute of Epiphyllum is produced. Première Peau states this outright, so every perfumery use is a reconstruction. The accord is built from light white-floral materials such as linalool and lily-of-the-valley synthetics, a trace of waxy-green notes, and clean musks for the fleeting, nocturnal quality. The living flower of Epiphyllum oxypetalum was measured in a 2025 study. At full bloom, geraniol made up 72.5% of its scent. Geraniol smells sweet and rose-like. Benzyl alcohol and methyl salicylate, which smells of wintergreen, came next.

Usage in Perfumery

A light heart-note floral. Three Fragrantica placements and none on Parfumo on 2026-10-10. It gives a nocturnal and tropical reference without the narcotic weight of tuberose or night-blooming jasmine. Première Peau makes that comparison twice, and it is the reason a formula would choose it over either.