L'Amour est Beau

405 - Lamour est beau is Rosa Salas' take on Lancome's La Vie Est Belle, the 2012 fragrance that helped popularise the modern gourmand-iris genre. The original opens with black currant and pear before an iris-jasmine-orange blossom heart and a praline-vanilla-patchouli-tonka bean base that gives the fragrance its sweet, powdery, unmistakable identity. Rosa Salas swaps the top notes for blackberry and melon - a cheaper, more generic fruity opening than the original's specific blackcurrant-pear pairing - but from the heart onward the match is close: iris, jasmine and orange blossom mirror the genuine composition almost note for note, and the base of praline, vanilla, patchouli and tonka bean lands the same sweet spun-sugar-and-iris signature the original is famous for. Customer reviews are enthusiastic here, with wearers describing it as smelling beautiful and just like the original for a fraction of the price, and reporting compliments from people who assume they're wearing the real Lancome bottle. Given La Vie Est Belle's own reviewers note the sweetness can feel overwhelming at full strength, this dupe's slightly softer overall intensity may actually suit wearers who like the concept but find the genuine version a touch much. One of the stronger matches in the Rosa Salas range from the heart down.