Perfumes with tea scents are aromatic and uplifting – just like a brew | Sali Hughes on beauty

For someone so hopelessly addicted to both perfume and tea, I’ve been surprisingly late to sate both cravings in one hit. That is until last month, when I was given an early sample of Maison Francis Kurkdjian’s Aqua Media Cologne Forte (£110 for 35ml), a perfume equivalent of a cold compress on a sweat-beaded forehead. Iced matcha tea, fizzy citrus, fresh coriander and pale woods lead my already frazzled, overheated brain to a nice quiet spot in the shade. I adore it.

Aqua Media inspired me to look for other tea fragrances that hit the same mark within a more inclusive price bracket. We should start with Elizabeth Arden, partly because the brand made tea-themed fragrances mainstream, but also because their Green Tea eau de parfum is the creation of the aforementioned master perfumer, Francis Kurkdjian, yet sold for a comparative song.

Arden’s Green Tea is a pleasure – fresh, uplifting, lively but never rowdy, and the perfect antidote to hot, humid, city days. Unlike many other citruses, tea-infused or otherwise, its vibrancy and sharpness doesn’t outstay its welcome. Instead, Green Tea sort of settles down to an afternoon nap, becoming cosier, muskier, a little warm. At just £20 for a whopping 100ml, it’s well worth a go.

A little pricier but truly delicious is L’Occitane’s Thé Vert. Back by popular demand after a heartless discontinuation, Thé Vert (£60 for 50ml) is cooling, more organic-smelling than the others, and eminently wearable regardless of age or gender. I get herbaceous borders, warm, spicy nutmeg and sweet, delicate, aromatic tea leaves. What I don’t get is green tea – and thank goodness, since to me that smells overwhelmingly of fish.

A leftfield favourite is Le Labo’s Thé Matcha 26 (£157 for 50ml) – unexpected because it’s an unapologetically fruity affair (think Twinings fruit infusion rather than a builder’s brew) that might ordinarily turn me off. Sweetness here comes from figs, made temperate with musk and creamy, cedar wood sap. The combination is glorious, gender neutral, somehow tactile and calm. If you love Le Labo’s now close-to-ubiquitous Santal 33, this is a safe but lesser-known stand-in (they also make Thé Noir, a black tea fragrance that is overtly sexier, but for me less good than both).

Finally, if you like your tea authentic, no-nonsense and frill-free, The Library of Fragrance makes a realistic linear Black Tea, for an honest £21 (30ml), that may be exactly your cuppa.