Halston Classic

Finally got a bottle (2026 batch) to try this classic (alas buying a full bottle seems to be the only way to try it but luckily I rarely hate perfumes). This is the first try so it's not meant to be conclusive: The first thought flashing thru my mind was "Oh marigold smells like this!", and this note strange to my nose caught all my attention. It's floral and fruity and mossy, so the drydown part is beautiful. I'm pretty sure that many soaps I've encountered in my life had tried to follow this style. Old-fashioned (‌not in a pejorative sense) and veeery feminine.

I bid on a sealed bottle from the 70’s and won. It’s been described as Studio 54 in a bottle. It is an exquisite fragrance. Others have said old fashioned. I disagree. Top note is very deceiving as it is not what middle and base are. I love the top note and I would describe it as classic. Middle is floral and base is heavenly.

I must have used this as a teenager, but I sure don't remember it as a scent. The bottle, I remember...love the simple graphic quality of it. I like this fragrance! I love the deeply Chypre and woody tone, and the florals are JUST evident enough to keep it sweet...kinda. Mostly, the Marigold and Carnation make it spicy, and I can see it being worn in the cold around the holidays. Soapy...yes. I'm going to play around with this when I don't have 5 other fragrances on my arm, and see where it goes. Wish it were perfume strength instead of an EDT, but so it goes. It gets a thumbs up.

this has to be still a flacon from the 1980-90s I have in my Collection. in 1986 Revlon (via subsidiary Elizabeth Arden) acquiered the Licence over Halston Perfumes. here we have an 'Halston®Original Spray Cologne' Distributed by Elizabeth Arden ©EA NY. (in which I thought would be a 50mL but it contains 3.4oz100mL Cologne Spray in that quirky, by Elsa Peretti designed Flacon.) it definitely exudes a Waft of Vintage Perfume with Expensive Notes and an Intruiging Depth. "In 1975, Max Factor released Halston's first namesake fragrance for women Halston Classic by perfumer Bernard Chant." I smell an Amber focussed Chypre perfume with a timeless appeal. while it is a Cologne (i.e. an Eau de toilette) its performance is Present but also Ephemeral. yet the used notes give it a feel of Fourrure, 1970sDisco, Studio54, Cocaine, a kind of sinister, Louche & Lush Apparance to be applied inside the Disco Landscape of NY & L.A in the 1970s and 1980s. it can surely hold its ground against Opium, Y, Rive Gauche, No19, No5, Miss Dior & Poison and the later infamous 1980s Perfumes. remember that this was also available in Perfume, Solid Perfume, Body Powder et cetera. in the beginning the separate Notes are distinguishable. an obvious Green Opening adorned with the Fruits Melon, Peach & Bergamot. then the Flowers Parading ... Marigold, Carnation, Orris Root, Ylang-Ylang, Jasmine & Rose. these are both to be dissected (in the beginning) even and precisely the Marigold as also already starting a Schwung towards the Superbly Blended Perfume, Blended already thèn as also with the Grace of Time In Vitro Macerated and until Grapeness Ripened into a well seasoned perfume. there are plenty of Woody Notes lending the perfume that Vintage, Haute Aroma of a Wood Panelled Room. the Oakmoss injects this Amber Perfume with a Chypre Incentive. Cedar, Oakmoss, Vetiver, Patchouli and Sandelwood give it a rich texture. this is simply a lovely perfume to commemmorate a Fashion Designer who was as Mysterious and Deeply Affectuated as he raised Cigarette Shallowness to a Style of Life.

Love! I got a splash bottle of the original formula (I'm guessing it dates from the mid to late 80s). The bottle is so adorable and goofy looking! From what I can tell, it has kept incredibly well and has retained its original bright and sparkly character with tart, inky oakmoss. It's a refined scent, but it still has a playful quality to it and doesn't feel overly formal or mature. This means that Halston works with just about any occasion, season, and outfit (yay!). While it's an iconic scent of its time, it doesn't feel dated. It's one of those perfumes where you feel confident wearing it, yet it doesn't wear you. An easy grab.

I blind bought Halston because I wanted to transport back to the 70's and see if I recognize this scent from when I was a kid. I did not, but I did notice a resemblance to Arpege, my all time favorite scent. However, it smells like Arpege if you dumped the contents of an ashtray in with it. I'm not saying that's bad, but for someone obsessed with Arpege it is a bit of redundancy and when I wear it I just wish I had put Arpege on instead. I did get the 70's vibe but I'd prefer to leave it there. I'll wear this around the house when it's just me or use it as air freshener. I adore Halston and his designs and the bottle is beautiful, so it will remain on my shelf.

I still have the bottle I bought in the late 80s, lol. I only wore it in the fall and winter. It would linger on my sweaters for weeks! It has changed some obviously, but it was soooo stong! Now it seems like a very masculine fragrance to me.

Review for a New bottle not vintage. As soon as I tried this I spotted Bernard Chant's touch. Such a classic fragrance and on paper perhaps one that I would not enjoy so much. As I do love Aromatics I thought I would give it a whirl - and I am glad that I did. Initially mossy & spicy. But within minutes a softer floral peeks out - hello florals! Its not too floral though, its not sickly or cloying. You should be careful about over spraying for sure - it is strong. I can see this is going to be a well used fragrance for me - better stock up!

I bought this for nostalgia purposes because my grandma wore this and my memory of her is tied to 80’s Halston and coffee (she drank a pot or 2 a day). I got a new bottle and I was devastated that this is nothing like the Halston I remember. It’s about 25% of the strength the original is and has only a ghost’s fart of the aromatic punch it used to have. As a stand-alone, in a vacuum, it’s fine. Vintage style fragrance but there’s almost something culinary in the dry down spices. Like a hint of asafoetida . Oddly soapy opening. Balsamic woody spice in the dry down. RIP to the old Halston. Now I’m off to find a vintage bottle.

I am a fan of most of the notes and of Mr. Chant, and the modern version is well done....but this is really weird and the only time I've encountered this with a closet full of perfumes...after I apply it, I eventually scrub it back off because to me it just exudes a lonely vibe. Like permeated with sadness. Odd, huh. Smells nice though.

You have to like vintage fragrances to like Halston Classic, for sure. I love it. It’s so old money rich b who was the absolute queen in the 70s-80s. It’s LOUD loud, so if you decide to try it, be gentle! It’s sweet, a little woody, and unapologetic. To me, it’s definitely not for daily wear, but there are definitely some occasions for it. I totally get how it is not for everyone, but I dig it :)

HALSTON Classic I bought it back in 1978 in my student days. And loved it. Many bottles later, I took a break from it. Today after decades I got my bottle of the vintage from eBay for $12. I must say, after cloyingly sweet, gourmand oud and overpowering fragrances, HALSTON is a heavenly sniff for a sore olfactory system. Elegant classy and as definitive as ever. It easily goes from day to night. I love its clean edginess and seamless flow of complex notes. It’s a fragrance that epitomizes excellence in the pursuit of eternity. To be relegated to the past is an expression of our times —of fads, marketing and herd mentality. It stands monolithic in its quiet awareness of its own beauty radiating from a flacon that is impeccably designed. 10/10

I do not care that this isn't the original 1975 formula. The purists can clutch their pearls and scour the internet for evaporated bottles of brown sludge from the Carter administration if they want to. I have better things to do, because this current formulation smells AMAZING. And I don’t care that you can pick it up for the price of a sandwich. It smells expensive. It smells like it has a mortgage, a fur coat, and a lawyer on retainer. It's a mossy, earthy chypre bomb. It's notes are loud oakmoss, marigold, and aggressive green. It screams "I have arrived," and it refuses to use an inside voice. It's the only chypre that has ever elicited a "DAMN, you smell GOOD" from my husband. And it pulls compliments every time I go out on the town. It's a purely optimistic mood that demands you have a good time. Halston, you are my ride or die!

I love Halston so much! I am wearing it right now under bulky winter clothing. It will transform on my skin throughout the day. I will edit this in a few hours to report its evolution. Two heavy applications in total today, the last one applied 4 hours ago. At first I smelled sharp marigolds, incense and, amber in a very thick cloud. I loved it! Punched me right in the nose! Now I smell incense, patchouli, sandalwood and amber. Pretty and sexy and warm. This is a winter bundled up stay at home favorite.

vintageのparfumとvintageのcologne 両方試した事がある人いたら匂いの違いを教えて欲しいです。 HOLSTON cologneの方は試した事ないので手に入れる価値が有るのか知りたいです。 parfumの方は誰かが言ってた古い図書館の本てのに納得です。確かにそういう匂いだけど自分は好きなんです。

I have the alcohol free spray, and it feels more like a dry oil.It warms up throughout the day and I smell it more as the day goes on: woody, musky floral. Comforting in it's nostalgia, but vintage doesn't describe this fragrance:classic is a better word. If you think the perfume is heavy, try the alcohol free spray- it is lighter but still performs well. Definitely not a gourmand! This is dry and delectable! This is one of my husband's favorites and I really like it too!

Just bought a large vintage in a thrift store for $7.00 (!) Well , this is pretty awful . Smells like an amber scented library book that was tucked in a clothes hamper. Over due; and over doo doo. BUT I like the bottle and I do like other Halston perfumes -- NOT this one . It really feels like a "drug store" perfume that was made by Jovan - Not Halston the Great !

On me, Old Spice 1:1 dries down to a subtle scent, so I need to mix in a little Evernylt, and then we'll see.

A more floral leaning Cabochard/Aramis from my limited personal experience/references. This Chypre is perfectly unisex for today's standards. The only thing I don't like about this fragrance is the bottle. While iconic, the atomizer is hard to press and the anatomy of the bottle makes it even harder... It's always a challenge to spray this, a two hands operation.

I suppose the problem with the reformulated perfimes is that they coppy them as they are already out of order, expired and smelling not verry well. Maybe the original was fantastic, but the current one is something like a death mask. Not the living one. I guess.

If it's a chypre, I'm gonna try it. If it's Bernard Chant, I'm gonna try it. If it didn't look like a novelty wine decanter dildo, I'd have tried it sooner. The plastic bottle top could be orange. It could be green. It could be anything but fleshy beige or brown, but decisions were very clearly made. I had been interested in this scent for years but hadn't tried it, despite its affordability, thanks to it's distractingly phallic design. But I finally bit the bullet and the chew is pretty satisfying. The patchouli builds and builds through the dry down and that's not a complaint. It's sexy, ballsy, and totally unisex in every respect. All it's blatant femininity is in the top and disappears within 20 minutes. I've had masculine scents with a more blatant feminine opening that lasted twice as long. I like this more and more with each application. Thank you, Bernie. You're the king of bangers and you'll live forever in our hearts and sinuses.

The bottle I just bought for 20 USD for 100ml was made 1 year ago. The box lists oakmoss and treemoss extracts. It's a great chypre with a fizzy fruity tang and lots of fuzzy moss (as SL.MS1958 below reports). Bargain, good, unique smell for 2025. It gets really good after about an hour. We have Indian Summer today and it fits the mood wonderfully.

A green-floral with an oakmoss chypre base. The green notes strain half the sweetness from the florals. Still. floral notes predominate, especially the now antique-seeming carnation. so I'm surprised that 'floral' is listed so far down on the list of 'main accords'. The fruit top notes listed must be subtly underplayed. I would not describe the opening as fruity. And surely that green 'marigold' note refers to Calendula officinalis, instead of Tagetes. Now in the 21st century this seems like a moody, introspective scent, but surely it wasn't considered in anyway esoteric back in its day. Still, I doubt this was ever truly thought of as decadent or overly hedonistic either. Halston may have been coking it up at Studio 54, but his signature scent's core demographic was not. I do like to occasionally smell this restrained, slightly melancholic scent that gives new insights into the emotional subtext of decades long past, but wearing it out and about now would just add too much dated baggage.

Alex "Sane-Witch" Osipov's recent appreciation made me want to wear Halston Classic today, even though my city is experiencing a heat wave now, and a complex '70s-style leathery chypre is probably unwise. My formulation--a fairly recent one, maybe two years old--smells better than I remember, if not quite as mossily magnificent as its original incarnation, which I mostly remember smelling on teachers' coats when I was small. But considering what it costs, it's a wonder--and better than many expensive designer and niche frags on the market today, especially if you like classic chypres and won't go through sugary-gourmand withdrawal. I can't say I'm crazy about the melon note, but fortunately the oakmoss (synthetic, I'm sure) overpowers it. To the contemporary nose, I'm sure this smells rather masculine (if not like Halston's lover's jockstrap, and thank goodness for that), but I categorize Halston Classic with other chypres and chypresque perfumes. It reminds me a bit of another Chant masterpiece, Aromatics Elixir, as well as Patou 1000 and a teensy bit of Chanel No. 5 and Eau Arpège. When it comes right down to it, maybe this wasn't a bad choice for hot weather after all. I'd rather smell like a fine old saddle and some dusty marigolds than, say, an ice-cream sundae topped with marshmallows and caramel. Smelling like food when it's this sickeningly hot is a grave mistake, if you ask me.

A forever love...She's a classic & arrived at an unbelievable time! Thank you, Halston & Bernard Chant! 💛💋

Such a lovely green mossy scent. Smells exactly like the seventies and early eighties. What it takes me back to is that time between 1979-1984 when the eighties was just finding its stride, when late seventies punk and new wave felt fresh, when MTV had just launched. Such a creative, uninhibited time. Halston does not make me think of a disco because I was elementary age when disco was popular and never went into a disco. Besides, my brother and his friends and I were in the anti-disco crowd. It does make me think of early teenage years and CPO jackets because I didn't wear this but many of my friends did, even into college. This is a dry, green bitter aromatic chypre. Definitely feel the marigold and moss. The smell of earth tones, earthy, like something outside in nature, like an old shed, in a good way. If you are a gourmand wearer, this will strike you as disgusting and will remind you of an old pickle jar someone thought they washed out, but didn't really. It takes time to transition from the sugar high of today's popular fragrances to these old mosses. If you have the inclination to take up wearing chypres and retro green scents, you will be rewarded with a much more educated nose. You might try reading a book and turning off your screens while you wear this for a few hours of time travel. Try to imagine that place a few decades ago when this was new, when bitter green scents were a shock compared to the florals that had preceded them. Maybe listen to some old songs from back then, too. This scent is so very different from what people wear now. Keep an open mind. Pro tip: do not accidentally layer this with sweet or fruity body lotions because that will clash like toothpaste and orange juice.

I feel like this doesn't smell like it used to. They've changed something. I bought a bottle of this way back in the very early 90's and had it for several years before it ran out. I replaced it a few years ago and it does not smell the same at all.

Always happy to find half full 45 year old bottles at my local outdoor flea market (even though people are so SICK of hearing me go "You should not have those out in direct sunlight". LOL) This is a mossy / Ambery wonder than has a nice projection . It's a very "grounding" scent and I can NEVER understand the Studio 54 connection with Halston perfumes and colognes - they are very organic / natural smelling / polite . Nothing CRAZY , decadent or electric. At all. This set me back $5.00 which would have been the cost of a mixed drink at Studio 54 in 1977 (and that would be TOP DOLLAR at the time for a bar drink!)

Halston is Studio 54 in a bottle, a party in a bottle! The very first time I sampled it, I was transported back to the 80s, the smell of a busy mall, cigarette smoke in the air in almost every building, fluorescent lights, and general debauchery. It literally was a time machine that took me back. The scent itself is a gorgeous sultry woody musky chypre. It smells like sweaty sex and a night at the club. It's one of my go-to club scents, wear it if you're on the prowl!

wanted to love this one since all the reviews are super awesome and i loved the bottle. But... For me it straight up smells like pine sol and incense with a mix of soap. It's strong but in a way where it smells a bit outdated...like a hippie grandma. I respect those that love this perfume, but it was my first "bad" blind buy. :(