Ingredients · Florals · heart note

Hydroxycitronellal

Say ithye-drok-see-sit-ruh-NEL-al

Soft, sweet lily of the valley with fresh linden-blossom and green petal tones.

What it is

A molecule made in a lab.

When you smell it

Heart: the first hours.

What perfumers do with it

The classic muguet backbone; rounds white-floral hearts, especially lilac and lily of the valley.

Worth knowing

Lily of the valley yields no commercial extract, so every muguet perfume is rebuilt from molecules like this one.

Known in

Quelques Fleurs (Houbigant, 1912)

Rules

Limited. IFRA limits (51st Amendment, 2023); EU-labelled skin allergen

Also called

Cyclosia; Laurinal; 7-hydroxy-3,7-dimethyloctanal

On the label of 81 of the 232 perfumes read so far

No. 5Chanel · printed “Hydroxycitronellal”ShalimarGuerlain · printed “Hydroxycitronellal”MitsoukoGuerlain · printed “Hydroxycitronellal”Eau SauvageDior · printed “Hydroxycitronellal”Good GirlCarolina Herrera · printed “Hydroxycitronellal”LibreYSL · printed “Hydroxycitronellal”

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