Obsession is the feminine eau de parfum Calvin Klein launched in the spring of 1985, composed by Jean Guichard. The brand describes it as a spicy amber: mandarin, bergamot and vanillin, jasmine, orange blossom and spices, oakmoss, musk and amber. Pierre Dinand designed the bottle; its advertising played on provocation, and Kate Moss embodied it in 1993 in front of Mario Sorrenti’s camera.
Robin (Now Smell This) finds it more wearable than she remembered; Luca Turin, a triumph of timing over substance; Varanis Ridari, a classic to smell.
Olfastory’s review
Now Smell This: less dated than its 1980s rivals
Robin, on September 2, 2008, admits she doesn’t much care for it but finds it more wearable than she remembered: one spray is still too much, a tiny dab makes it almost tame. She judges it less dated than the other statement fragrances of the decade, and quite gentle next to Poison, released the same year.
Luca Turin: timing rather than substance
In Perfumes: The Guide, Luca Turin sees it as a triumph of timing over substance: Obsession filled a very large oriental-shaped hole in the market.
Susan Irvine and John Oakes: raunch and the missile
Susan Irvine, in The Perfume Guide, reports that Ann Gottlieb, the fragrance’s art director, wanted sensuality with a touch of raunch and class with a touch of trash; she got it, Irvine judges, with the emphasis reversed. John Oakes likens it to a ground-to-air missile programmed to break through any defense.
The Scented Devil: a classic to smell
Varanis Ridari, on July 24, 2025, considers Obsession a classic everyone should smell. The review reads in it an oriental designed in the vein of Opium and Cinnabar, the amber pushed as in Tabu, over a base of amber, sandalwood, civet, oakmoss and vanilla.