Fidji is Guy Laroche’s first fragrance, launched in 1966 and composed by Joséphine Catapano. The house classifies it as a green floral chypre: an opening of galbanum, a bouquet of ylang-ylang, jasmine and rose, a spicy heart where carnation shows through, and a base of sandalwood, musk and patchouli. Its slogan, “The woman is an island, Fidji is her perfume,” has endured for decades.
Elena Vosnaki of Perfume Shrine praised a beautiful scent in 2011, fresh and slightly bitter, less tropical than its name; in 2020 Viktoria Vlasova judged the current eau de toilette excellent despite a lighter formula; in 2021 Neil Chapman found in it an airy, masterfully rendered musk.
Olfastory’s review
Elena Vosnaki, Perfume Shrine
In February 2011, Elena Vosnaki considered Fidji a fragrance that shook up the industry, and above all a beautiful perfume. Its opening left her with a slightly bitter freshness and a cool rather than warm heart of flowers, where hyacinth peeks through.
She finds it hardly tropical despite its name, sensual through the milky sandalwood and the musky trail that linger. The modern eau de toilette seems thinner to her, still pleasant and well above many recent launches; she recommends the older formulas.
Viktoria Vlasova, Fragrantica
In March 2020, Viktoria Vlasova recounted her long quest for Fidji, discovered as a teenager in a magazine. She describes the vintage extrait as a warm, light and subtle green floral, deepened with patchouli and resins, with a hint of exoticism.
She defends the current eau de toilette: more floral and greener than the extrait, less full, with a simplified base, it keeps in her view the backbone of the original and its old-fashioned spirit. She notes that it lasts a full day on fabric.
Neil Chapman, The Black Narcissus
In February 2021, Neil Chapman found Fidji instantly recognizable: an airy floral musk, green and aldehydic, over sandalwood and amber. On a vintage extrait, he relished the opening of flowering foliage and hailed Catapano’s feat, a tropical air seen through the prism of French perfumery.