Dried Fruits is an umbrella accord that evokes a mix of raisins, prunes, dried figs, apricots and dates, with a rich, sweet and slightly boozy warmth. It is always built by the perfumer and is used mainly in amber, gourmand, tobacco and chypre perfumes to add depth and a comforting, festive character.
What does Dried Fruits smell like?
A dried fruits accord smells dense and sweet, like fruitcake, mince pies or a bowl of dried fruit soaked in rum. Expect raisin and prune facets, a jammy apricot note, a toffee-like caramel sweetness and sometimes a slightly fermented, winey edge. Compared with individual notes such as dried plum or dates, the accord is broader and more rounded, with no single fruit in charge.
How perfumers create Dried Fruits
Perfumers combine damascones, which give a characteristic jammy, raisin-and-rose depth, with lactones for apricot and peach softness, maltol and furaneol for caramelised sugar and crotonate esters for prune-like tones. Natural materials such as davana oil, tobacco absolute, immortelle and cognac oil can add a boozy, aged nuance.
- Also known as: Fruits secs, dried fruit accord
- Fragrance family: Fruity, gourmand
- Type: Accord (created by the perfumer)
- How it's obtained: Blend of damascones, lactones and caramel-like materials
- Key aroma molecules: Beta-damascone, gamma-undecalactone, maltol
Dried Fruits in perfume history
Dried-fruit effects have quietly enriched ambers and chypres for much of the twentieth century, but the named accord became more visible from the 1990s and 2000s, when Serge Lutens and other niche houses built fragrances around dried fruit, spice and wood. The damascones, identified in Bulgarian rose oil by Firmenich chemists around 1970, were crucial in making convincing dried-fruit effects possible.
Dried Fruits in modern perfumery
The accord remains a favourite for autumn and winter fragrances and appears regularly in niche ambers, tobacco scents and oud blends. It also works as a bridge between fruity top notes and resinous bases.
How Dried Fruits wears and what it pairs with
Dried fruits sit in the heart and linger into the base. They pair well with tobacco, rum, cinnamon, clove, labdanum, benzoin, cedar and vanilla.
