Fragile

The best perfume of Jean Paul Gaultier, ever!

Very sexy in the most sensual, provocative meaning of the word. Tuberose and jasmine supported by ginger and ylang ylang, veiled with gauzy vanilla and cinnamon creates the impression of real naked skin that is somehow naturally perfumed.

I remembered seeing this perfume many times at cosmetic counter when I was a kid. Always triggered with the bottle because it looks like snowball decoration that is popular in 90s and I just realized this was created by Francis Kurkdjian. Hope I could find it somewhere

I had this one totally forgot about it, I was very young, it was very mature and strong to me, wearing it felt like obligation. Spicy, warm, woodsy and heavy, glad it’s gone.

this was my signature for a while before i'd even heard of fragrantica. i would have never guessed all of the notes, it just smelled nice and floral/mature to me :)

I have a used bottle (125ml), the shimmering oil, the miniature and a special display box for sale

It is best when tried from the big bottle the 125 ml. I had in a smaller size bottle too! The big one is the one I love! Impressive bottle! If you find a vintage big bottle, consider it as a GEM!!!!!!!

I spent a shameful amount of money on a bottle of this and I have to say it's not as good as I hope for given all the praises. The scent opens very beautiful and luscious with a fleshy white flower bouquet that led by tuberose. However, the floral part quickly disappears to give way to a rather generic and cheap smelling woody, musky base - somewhere along the line of the base of Cristalle EDP but not as complex. The bottle is beautiful but very very hard to use. This one is nowhere near the best white floral fragrances I've smelled and also not as good as other JPG masterpieces like Classique, Gaultier2, Fleur du Male, etc. Only spend money on this if you want a decorative piece in your collection, the scent is very mediocre.

last time i used this was in 2005, amazing fragrance, last's on you all day and muliple days on your clothes. Its the best perfume during my childhood.

Fragile is a magical scent, an ode to feminity! It is currently my signature scent and it accompanies my imagination! It has a floral sweetness mingled with some green notes as in several vintage floral perfumes from the early 80s! It is smoother and more reserved than Michael Kors, the first signature scent of the brand... It brings to mind, early mornings, the sweet colors of a beautiful dawn or even a sunset, but more the dawn sensations, colors scents and feelings! Recently, I mixed a couple of sprays of the sensual provocative l 'agent by agent provocateur with fragile by Gaultier and I was mesmerized by the sexiness of the tuberose notes mingled with spices coming from each perfume! Love 💋

It's a shame it can't be found anywhere today. I was 15 years old when I tried it at Rive Gauche (russian Sephora) To me back then it smelled like buckwheat, was an unusual fragrance.

Of all the bottles of the "hooligan" Jean-Paul, I like this one the most. A surefire marketing for the market, a hemisphere reminiscent of a decorative Christmas ball, which, when turned over, you can gaze for a long time at the enchanting winter landscape, myriads of slowly falling snowflakes, a time of year so beloved by many. The graceful silhouette of a lady in a black dress in the gold of an evening sunset. Just shake the bottle and golden sparkles will slowly and smoothly swirl. The bottle, which is undeservedly for the creator of the fragrance, many will buy not for the sake of the fragrance itself, but for the sake of beauty. I like the smell of orange blossom and mandarin (here it's tangerine), ginger, coriander, jasmine, tuberose, ylang-ylang, amber and many other things, but today I smell, in addition to those listed in the ingredients, lily of the valley, which doesn't seem to be there at all. I want to wear this fragrance to the theater, opera, ballet, and special events, and I've tried it out both in summer and winter, and it's very worthy.

A gorgeous, complex floral in a gorgeous bottle that is not that easy to use. Mainly tuberose, but softened by carnation. With spicy ginger. Good for special occasions and for a signature. Perfect boudoir scent thats sensual, fresh and caressing. In spring it is rather shy. It loves autumn.

I can't rate because I don't remember how it smells, but my cousin has it when I was a child and I was so fascinated with the bottle! Prettiest perfume bottle in history.

I have a bottle of this for sale, let me know if anyone wants it!

Possibly the most beautiful perfume bottle of all time and the sparkling gold liquid inside is so intoxicating, so surreal, so other worldly. Her time was fleeting, she was here and then she was gone. Best of the JPG scents. Unique, strong, fragile and unforgettable.

Its glorious. The bottle is beautiful of course but the scent itself manages to capture all the fleshiness of tuberose but surrounding it by this beautiful, delicate cloud of orange blossom, jasmine, ylang, rose, carnation and other flowers with hints of spices (coriander and anise) to keep it bright and interesting. This is a truly beautiful perfume. I wish I had appreciated it more when it first came out but I had not grown into tuberose yet to fully appreciate it. Now this beauty has become difficult to find, dancing delicately in its gold flecked world..

I have a whole collection of this --- lucky me i guess i loved it so much and heard they were going to phase it out i bought a whole bunch from a fragrance store that was closing --- used up two or three bottles maybe have two or three left plus the oils --- not bragging but am glad i bought them coz it smelled so good -- it is my signature perfume --- love the snow globe too --- its time to open the next bottle --- sigh !

This is the essence of me. I miss it so much. All other JPG fragrances are dull and average. Bloom by Gucci kinda reminds me of it, and that's why I got a bottle. I suppose because of the tuberose. Also, Radiant Tuberose by Jimmy Choo. But they don't take me on a magical and mysterious journey every time I smell them...

I wore the heck out of this in my 20s. The globe design was unique and stunning. The scent was so me back then; spicy, delicious and captivating. I has almost forgotten about this perfume until I saw the picture and a warm fuzzy feeling welled up within me. Oh, those good old days of perfumes being perfumes that make a statement. I am not surprised to discover that this perfume was created by Francis K. It’s seems he is a perfumer that speaks my scent language and I vibe with a lot of the perfumes he has created long before I even knew who he really was. Great job FK. Miss you Fragile 💋.

My mum had this when I was a kid and I was always so fascinated by the bottle that I would spray it not much caring for what came out (low and behold very precious perfume). Years after she passed I came upon small 5ml in Chinatown SG. Whilst unlikely to be authentic I was so happy to recognise the bottle I bought it on the spot. I don’t much care for the scent, the colour has gone a deep amber but it’s floral and a bit spicy. Definitely of an era and for a certain age bracket. It’s a nice reminder of what legacies perfumes can hold and how the scent memories they make can be not just for ourselves but the people around us. 💗🌷

not a fan of the scent, but it definitely feels likes a spicy . practicality is up to the wearer ultimately, but its a treasure regardless of why you have it . lucky to have gotten this for free!

I just came across a 25 ml bottle that cut me back around 120 dollars. The juice is old and turned a deep amber. Its a spicy tuberose thats for sure. Much more subtle than i imagined. Almost like a magnolia scented lotion. Honestly not sure how I feel about it.

Fragile is a rich, sensual, and intoxicating form of tuberose. The heaviness continues for an extended period of time. A sophisticated spicy flowery one. A little soapy and light, yet sweet, flowery, mature, seductive, and lovely. The first note is a very powerful, yet delightful, feijoa fruit, which quickly gives way to jasmine, yang-ylang, and tuberose. It lasts all day on me and has a modest sillage.

I bought a secondhand bottle mostly for the novelty. I have gotten very into JPG frags suddenly and have always been a bit of a vintage collector, so when I found a partially used 1.7oz for under $100, I jumped on it. So many here talk about the bottle, I’ll skip right to the scent- I’m a huge tuberose fan and went on a real kick trying out different tuberose frags awhile ago. I hoped I’d like this scent, but I wasn’t expecting much. Well, despite testing a vintage bottle that seems to have lost a few top notes, this still manages to be a great scent that many people would love. I’m not getting much orange blossom, as that’s a note that often fades quicker than others in perfume, but I do believe I’m getting the rest of the notes in the order they’re voted here, with tuberose and jasmine taking the spotlight. Despite the many notes, this scent is pretty simple and beautiful, and many frag heads have probably come across a few smell-alikes. I will say this blend is very lovely. I like it more than most of the similar scents I’m going to list, and if it weren’t discontinued and were a bit more affordable, I’d keep it in my collection over most of these— I’d say this is very similar to Fracas. It’s slightly spicier, but definitely is in the same family. This tuberose in Fragile is soapy, and also reminds me of a nicer version of La Vie La Mort by Tokyo Milk or Bora Bora by Liz Claiborne. I’d say Fragile is actually closest to fracas, bora bora, and La vie La mort the most. People who like this scent but want something lighter and a bit more simplified might look into Gucci Bloom or one of the flankers-I think this reminds me most of a combination of the Ambrosia and Profumo Bloom flankers. This also slightly gives me the vibes of Le Labos Lys 41-only more cool and soapy with jasmine. Lys 41 is probably my favorite tuberose I’ve ever smelled and is the only one on this list I’d keep if I could replace the others with Fragile. It’s a modern beautiful work of art and most frags can’t achieve that much magic, but Fragile reminds me of it slightly. If you dislike these scents, Fragile may not be for you. If you love these scents, you should definitely try out Fragile. The projection and silage on this scent is insane, I never encounter tuberose scents that last like this anymore. Most are whisper soft and gone in a few hours, yet are somehow rated as strong and eternal here on fragrantica… the first time I tried Gucci bloom I was certain I had a counterfeit bottle with pathetic weak watery juice that disappears in 5 minutes. Turns out, that’s exactly what the $100+ bottles that most raters think are extremely strong are supposed to smell like! I would have hated on Bloom more but the flankers redeemed themselves as they are significantly better blends. Fragile actually IS strong and eternal. Man, they really don’t make them like they used to… I may start collecting backup bottles of Fragile if I ever finish the 10 large similar tuberose perfumes I already have.

@guillermostf I agree. People are baffled and come up with all kinds of unlikely reasons for why they think stuff was discontinued, but it's likely regulations, coupled with not enough demand for a perfume to trust that a reformulation that smells different will sell.

This is a personal first: Fragile, for me, is all about the bottle design, and what the perfume itself smells like is almost irrelevant. I found a 50ml dome-style snowglobe bottle on eBay, complete with its crate-style box, and I am in love. It is the most wonderful bottle - depicting a figurine of an elegant lady encased in a snowglobe, with the perfume serving as the liquid within. Gold glitter pieces float in it, and although the perfume has grown amber with age, it doesn't impact too much on the beauty of the piece. However, I will admit that it is impractical and fiddly - it took some trial and error to open. I don't typically rate Gaultier fragrances too highly, but this scent is not bad at all. Fragile, created by the consistently good Francis Kurkdijan, is a big while floral fragrance, featuring tuberose prominently, in the manner of Poison. Fragile has a strong white floral opening, with orange blossom and tuberose most dominant. Balsamic fruity notes round it out, and ginger emerges after a little while. The white florals are bold, waxy and quite indolic. As it develops, the florals of the opening are joined by indolic jasmine, sweet ylang ylang and some sweet rose, forming a heady floral heart. I get lily in there too. There is a nice spiciness, thanks to the clove note and spicy-sweet ginger, adding a nice edge to the heavy white florals. It becomes powdery as it develops, perhaps thanks to the iris note. As it dries down, sweet, smooth vanilla adds a creaminess to the florals. Warm and spicy, sweet and powdery, the white florals are at their best here - they are less potent and the volume is turned down. Clean musk adds a soft animalic quality as it fades, eventually becoming a sweet, musky, amber-vanilla skin scent. With day-long longevity and enormous sillage (I sprayed the merest amount to test, and still smelled it for hours), the performance is excellent. The scent is as bold and extroverted as it should be, coming from such a bottle. At the same time, it is essentially a straightforward sweet-yet-heady tuberose scent. Glamorous and excessive, Fragile encompasses Gaultier's typical theatricality perfectly. Style over substance, but in the very best way. 3.5/5

This wonderful perfume, in its unique bottle, felt like a gift made of golden glow when I first received it. It had just been released, and from the start it was something precious to me. I remember sitting by the window, shaking the tiny golden flakes that floated through the thick liquid, watching them drift around the little figurine inside. In my mind, she was a Hollywood diva from the 1930s, frozen mid-pose on the red carpet — timeless, glamorous, and utterly untouchable, captured in her world of light and luxury. When I wasn’t in the mood to wear it, I’d place it back on its shelf, where it seemed to whisper softly, “You know where to find me.” But on the nights when I was, I’d spray it onto my wrists and behind my ears, and it felt as though the little lady in the bottle came to life — lending me a touch of her charm, her confidence, her shimmer. On special evenings, perhaps even more than a touch. I associate this perfume with so many luminous moments — evenings of laughter, days filled with excitement, memories gilded with its scent. I never wanted the bottle to empty, so I wore it sparingly, and I’m glad to still have it with me. Fragile is a perfume that’s both bold and delicate — radiant and unmistakably present, yet tender at its heart. Heavy enough for everyone around you to notice, but graceful enough to never overstay its welcome. Simply put, it’s glorious

For the love of god JPG, bring this back and EXACTLY HOW IT WAS!!

I once bought a slightly used bottle off ebay. It was a time when I blindly bought a lot of classic used perfumes, just to try. This one was also bought blindly as it was going to be discontinued. These times that you still can buy it quite cheap, especially used ones. I sprayed it today. I tried to spray it and panicked my bottle is faulty. It was not working, and I wasnt sure how I am supposed to hold it to spray. I even thought for a minute that my toddler broke it. This perfume is in a box he likes to play and is allowed to do it. But watched by me or dad! He just loves to play with my perfumes. I finally managed to spray it, once into the sink and once onto my neck. And I like it a lot! It is so sunny and positive fragrance! A lot of white heavy flowers but mixed very well. It is probably more evening/night perfume, but I do not care, I do not have day/night, winter/summer perfumes, I wear them whatever the weather or season. I also blindly bought edt, cannot wait to compare them as I just read below edt is awful! I cannot say more now as it is hard to sniff own neck:) hope I will be able to spray it normally soon. I am really glad I bought it blindly when it was still possible.