freshness for the summer

When the sun starts peering through the rain and summer is around the corner, I commence my search for the holy grail: an original, fresh and not cloying cologne!
 I grew up in Spain where children get plastered with eau de cologne as they go out . You can buy eau de cologne for children and adults in litre size plastic bottles(at no great cost), so you can imagine the daily consumption. Nowadays thanks to to internet, you can buy them online and I no longer have to ask Spanish friends to carry several litre bottles in their small holdalls!

Nenuco, is for small children and medically approved, but many adult women wear it for its lovely fresh, innocent and clean smell, I transpose the cologne in purse size sprays and keep the plastic bottle in my bathroom, where I use it every morning splashing it on, my small daughter has taken over the ritual and splashes it over her hair.

If you want a drier mediteranean scorching countryside smell, try Puig "agua de lavanda"( with very dry lavender and aromatic herbs such as thyme ), it has great lasting power too.Another wondeful old fashioned citrussy fresh but very feminine cologne is that of Myrurgia's original "colonia1916", this too I have seen available online, the bottle is classy and it has a lovely old fashioned label, which will look great on any dressingtable. All of these are not heavy on your purses, so enjoy splashing them on! 

If you want to splash out on eau de toilette editions of the cologne variety here are several I really enjoy; "Roma" by Laura Biagotti, grapefruit with thyme and other aromatic herbs; the original Bulgari "cologne du thé vert"( I don't like the more concentrated version it seems more cloying and the tea element too overpowering to give freshness). To those that love the fresh smell of clean cotton freshly washed, try  Thierry Mugler's cologne,it really gives off a dry laundry fresh smell, great for really hot days. My final choice is Loewe's take on the orignal Spanish cologne but in a concentrated version, that will last all morning; "Agua de Loewe". Be sybaritic!