My Guide to Halloween Fragrances

When October begins, my desire for deeper and richer scents soars. However, the fall mood wouldn’t be complete without fragrances that nicely match the dark and playful Halloween spirit.

Below is an extensive selection of fragrances for this time of the year – vintage, classic, niche, and indie choices that will satisfy multiple genders, whimsies, and adventures on Halloween.

Some are my personal picks for witches, ghosts, and infamous villains, while others evoke spooky ambiances and unsettling atmospheres, bring the surreal to mind, or blend the cute and the creepy.

Lancôme Magie Noire (vintage)

Dark and mysterious with flashes of piercing green, this vintage classic is a perfect choice for a cunning witch who uses black magic to haunt. Notes of galbanum, blackcurrant, opulent florals, oakmoss, as well as animalic undertones magically come together to create an enigmatic sensation of opposites.

Nobile 1942 Malìa

This elixir is dedicated to a modern and unconventional witch who seduces with her intoxicating beauty and quirky intelligence. Narcotic fruits and piquant osmanthus are blended with pink pepper, marjoram, vetiver, and woods to create a dazzling, bright, and ever transforming composition.

Wit & West Rosa de Bolero

This fragrance pays homage to the bolero dance through a dark rose adorned with spicy and aromatic accents. Its deeply herbal and unusual character would suit a sorcerer brewing a potion of piquant osmanthus petals, enticing spices, and poisonous plants while burning incense in a garden of black roses.

Ormonde Jayne Woman

Dark, unctuous, and penetrating, this unusual brew of woods, violets, and spices with grassy nuances makes me think of a witch walking in a dark forest picking hemlock to make a deadly potion.

Darren Alan Sweet Repose, Hekate, and Bathory

Sweet Repose exudes a nostalgia for bygone times and calls to mind graceful ghostly ambiances. It’s a black and dense orris painted with strokes of lavender, lilies, and violets. I love the contrast between the sweetness of vanilla and tonka and the cool minerality of incense and myrrh.

Dedicated to the goddess of magic and spells, Hekate is mysterious, soulful, and autumnal. It smells of spices, wet leaves, and damp soil with touches of honeyed apricots. I detect soft animalic vibes later in the development. This is witchy and dark with a comforting feel.

Named after the noblewoman who allegedly bathed in the blood of young women to preserve her youth, Bathory is a vampiric rose drenched in spiced honey, leather, and potent animalic notes. This is the boldest and most dangerous creature of the three.

Black Baccara Witch’s Veil, Undead, and Bygone

A fascinating and meditative concoction of resins, woods, vanilla, and frankincense evokes the smell of dripping candle wax on a floorboard. Witch’s Veil may also call to mind the aroma of a potion’s remains in a witch’s cauldron.

Undead smells like incense, dried flowers, burned wood, and the stone walls of an abandoned cathedral. A touch of extinguished candle wax is here too. Cooling and a little musty, this is what the breath of a ghost or undead creature may smell like.

Inspired by a nostalgia for old Hollywood, Bygone is centered on a solemn grapefruit note with heady jasmines and crisp apples. This is the scent that might exude from the ghost of a diva visiting an abandoned movie theater.

Molinard Habanita (vintage and modern)

Fashion-loving witches as well as villains like Cruella Deville and Ursula will surely know how to showcase this brooding, timeless classic. You can picture them spritzing Habanita while sitting at a dark and sumptuous boudoir and, later, leaving a daring trail of fruits, flowers, powder, and resins, as they make their grand entrance at a gala party.

John Galliano John Galliano

Fizzy aldehydes set the stage for a gothic bouquet of roses, violets, and peonies surrounded by powdery iris, fluffy musk, and dark incense, woods, and amber. This rare and discontinued gem might fit someone like Mother Gothel, from the fairy-tale Tangled, who alternates cheerful and maternal tendencies with a vicious and controlling nature.

Tom Ford Black Orchid

Many fragrance lovers know this lavish and polarizing creation dressed in opulent flowers, black truffle, Mexican chocolate, and woods. This is what I imagine Morticia Addams would wear – her looks and mannerism always sumptuous, elegant, and poised with a touch of sweetness and comfort.

House of Matriarch Violet Flame

In this haunting and elegant composition, violet and orris butter are surrounded by a slightly medicinal licorice root, herbal arnica, spicy Ravensara, and deep oakmoss. Evoking a synesthetic experience of purples and blacks with a touch of witchy poison green, this is my violet fragrance pick for cunning and icy Evil Queen, Grimhilde.

Baruti Dama Koupa

Thick and decadent, this fragrance weaves nutty macarons and powdery irises into a rich amber base. The Queen of Hearts would wear this dark, almost gourmand juice with spunk and confidence (Dama Koupa is the Greek translation of Queen of Hearts). The fragrance makes me think of rich purples and golds with specks of red, and evokes Alice in Wonderland’s tea and cake parties, bizarre adventures, and surreal atmospheres with a dark undercurrent.

Eris Scorpio Rising

The latest release by Eris Parfums combines a blaze of spices surrounded by an enthralling cloud of smoke, leather, and sandalwood. It may evoke the nightmarish, unsettling, and seductive atmospheres of Suspiria, Inferno, and Mother of Tears – the horror trilogy by director Dario Argento. Its bold and fiery nature might seem harsh at first but dresses the skin like velvet, ready to awaken the powers of the Ladies of Darkness, Sighs, and Tears.

Sous le Manteau Vapeurs Diablotine

This rich mélange of warm and cool spices, smoky woods, dry herbs, and opulent amber may suit both Hades in his flaming Underworld, and Vecna in the bat-infested, vaporous ambiance of the Upside Down. The effect is diabolic and smooth with a haunting trail.

Etat Libre d’Orange La Fin du Monde

Pennywise, the creepy clown from IT, draws you in with his red balloons and playful demeanor, only to reveal his sinister and blood-thirsty nature. Similarly, this seemingly sweet fragrance lures you with its nutty notes of carnivalesque popcorn, creamy sandalwood, and dainty iris, but also hides a sharp, smoky gunpowder accord.

Masque Milano Romanza

I’d recommend this elegant fragrance to Dorian Grey or any finely dressed dandy with a shady personality. Its debauched and ghostly nature evokes the darker side of love through an original interpretation of the narcissus note. The heady and animalic floral heart is embellished with gothic violets, dark woods, cool myrrh, and bitter absinth.

Vireo Perfumes Draugr Noir

An ode to tomb zombies and undead mythical creatures from Scandinavian folktales, this fragrance combines eerie, tongue-in-cheek, and contemplative elements by blending herbs, spices, and woods with myrrh and several types of frankincense. It brilliantly evokes the cool aroma of catacombs and crypts with hidden mummies.

DSH Perfumes Foxy

In this daring fragrance, boozy, animalic, and spicy notes are sweetened by peaches and apples, rounded by beeswax, and deepened by ambergris to convey a Hitchcockian vibe. This feral and sumptuous creation would fit both Grace Kelly holding a pair of brandy snifters in Rear Window and Tippi Hedren in her iconic fur coat in The Birds.

Kamila Aubre Villanelle

Inspired by a nineteen-line poetic form that features a pastoral theme (called the villanelle), Kamila Aubre Villanelle is an all-natural blend of herbs, purple florals, and vetiver with bitter and earthy nuances. The brand describes it as an interpretation of the rural and idyllic with a dark and obsessive twist. It comes as no surprise that Villanelle, the charming, obsessive, and dangerous villain from Killing Eve, would pull this off quite well.

Bourbon French Voodoo Love

A combination of cinnamon and amber; this fragrance is a sweet, captivating, and enveloping love potion with an earthy depth. This is what Marie Laveau, Voodoo practitioner and herbalist, would wear and prescribe to the people she heals.

I hope you enjoyed my selections. Let me know your favorite fragrances for this time of the year!

Also, what would Michael Myers spritz on Halloween?

All fragrances are part of my personal collection and were purchased by me, except for Eris Scorpio Rising and Wit & West Rosa de Bolero, which were kindly gifted by the respective brands. The fragrances are a mix of EdT, EdP, or Extrait, except for the Black Baccara selections, which are perfume oils.

Photos taken by me and Sarah.