Is it time you bought a hair perfume?

Jo Malone and Roja Parfums have launched their first hair fragrances... could it be time to scent your tresses?
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Chloe Street18 July 2019

Where do you spritz your perfume?

Your wrists, your décolletage, the nape of your neck… your hair?

When it comes to feeling heaven scent and perfectly perfumed, there’s nothing nicer than a delicately bouquet-ed barnet.

However, the high proportions of alcohol in most fragrances means they’re not entirely mane friendly.

Is perfume really bad for your hair?

Trichologist Anabel Kingsley, daughter of the late ‘Hair Doctor’ Philip Kingsley, recommends you avoid spraying perfume directly on your hair or scalp. “It could be drying for the hair if the chemicals are harsh and mostly alcohol,” she explains. Instead, she recommends you use “a product specifically designed for your hair type and texture with a nice smell – a spray that has heat protection, a cream to smooth flyaways or a deep conditioning hair mask.”

But what if there was a product that could do both? Enter, the hair perfume.

A hybrid product with fewer drying ingredients than your regular scent, many of the best hair perfumes contain conditioning actives and nourishing oils to rejuvenate, protect hair and fight frizz... all while letting you top-to-toe in your favourite floral. Some, like Sachajuan’s Protective Hair Perfume, even protect your locks against harmful UV rays.

(Roja Parfums Supreme Hair Mist, £95. Shop it here
Roja Parfums

“Scenting your hair is such a luxurious way to experience your fragrance, as its beauty trails behind you on the breeze,” says Roja Dove, founder of Roja Parfums, who has recently transformed six of his Roja Parfums creations into a collection of scented hair mists. “The idea of bringing these to the market is to enable fragrance-lovers to indulge in a new and elevated method of wearing scent.”

Hair perfumes are also a far more affordable way to spritz your favourite fragrance, without the heavy price tag. Roja Parfum's new hair products, for example, cost £95, while a bottle of same-scent Roja Eau de Parfum will set you back £375.

On July 1, Jo Malone also launched its first Hair Mist in two of its signature scents; Dewy Wild Bluebell and mellow English Pear & Freesia, both of which cost just £38 and contain Argan Oil and Vitamin B to protect and nourish locks.

“The Hair Mist is a totally different formula that we created, the mist is very respectful to the hair,” explains Celine Roux, Global Head of Product Development at Jo Malone. “It’s filled with nourishing and conditioning ingredients yet is very lightweight, leaving your hair with a slight sheen and a delicate scent. You can wear the Hair Mist on its own, combined with any of the Colognes or your signature scent – anything goes!”

And given that Net-a-Porter has seen sales of hair perfumes grow 41 per cent compared to last year, it’s clearly an increasingly popular step in our spritzing routines.

Jo Malone Hair Mist, £38, Shop it here.
Jo Malone

So how should you apply hair perfume?

“The best way to ensure you are beautifully scented is to first apply your normal perfume: apply to wrists and neck from a distance of about six inches,” says Dove. “Never rub your wrists together as this can crush the scent molecules and affect the way they project. Follow your perfume with a scented body lotion – this locks the scent in and gives it an added layer of loveliness. Finally, finish by spritzing your Roja Parfums Hair Mist through the layers of your hair, spraying from a distance of six inches.”

For Tamara Eccleston an allergy to ordinary perfume inspired her to include a hair fragrance in her first ever SHOW Beauty haircare collection when it launched back in 2013. “I wanted to create a Hair Fragrance when I launched the SHOW Beauty collection because it’s a lighter way of wearing it and I missed the luxury of a beautiful fragrance,” she explains. “You just spritz it on the hair and it lasts until you wash it again. People are always commenting on how great my hair smells. I like to use it on the days between washes and it keeps it smelling fresh - it’s particularly good to throw in your gym bag or to take on holiday.”

You can double down on your favourite cologne with a matching hair perfume or layer different scents (Jo Malone recommends you create ‘a sensuous and mellow pairing’ with a spritz of English Pear & Freesia Hair Mist over their flirtatious Peony & Blush Suede Cologne), but a really great hair perfume should be lovely (and long-lasting enough) to be worn on its own. The mane event, if you will.

Click through the gallery above for amazing hair perfumes to spray all summer long.

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