Review | Issey Miyake L'Eau d'Issey Summer 2016

One of my favorite springtime fragrances for a few years now has been the Issey Miyake L'Eau d'Issey Florale which is a delicate daytime scent with lily, rose, and mandarin notes. The reason why I particularly enjoy Issey Miyake's fragrances is because they're really modern and clean. Issey Miyake is a Japanese clothing and fragrance designer that is known to apply technology, minimalism, and nature into his creations. One of his many creations is the annual limited edition version of the beloved L'Eau d'Issey which features different notes and beautiful artwork on the bottles each year. 

This year's Issey Miyake L'Eau d'Issey Summer 2016* fragrance is in collaboration with artist Michelle McKinney and perfumer Alberto Morillas. Alberto Morillas is a very influential Spanish perfumer who has always thought out of the box when it comes to creating scents. He's responsible for creating Bvlgari Omnia, Flower by Kenzo, and Carolina Herrera 212 just to name a few. Morillas signature spontaneity can definitely be noticed in L'Eau d'Issey Summer 2016 mixture of fresh summertime fruits and deep wood notes.

L'Eau d'Issey Eau de Toilette pour L'Été features lychee and grapefruit as the top notes, so upon application the lychee is quite distinguishable. This fragrance starts off as a very fresh and clean scent and as time progresses you will start smelling more mellow fruits such as guava and passion fruit. The bright and playful fruity notes in this perfume magically transports me to a day bicycling along the beach. It is a beautiful and fresh scent that's perfect for teens, young women, and mature women who enjoy lighter fragrances during the summer. The vanilla and woody notes aren't too strong in this case, so they won't alter the fresher fruit notes.

As much as I love the scent, my biggest complaint about the Issey Miyake L'Eau d'Issey Summer 2016 is the longevity. I get around 2 hours of wear with this fragrance which is standard for an eau de toilette, but it makes it much tougher to justify spending $78 on it. The fragrance is a bit too light to linger on your skin, which is certainly a big drawback for me.

Ultimately I believe the Issey Miyake L'Eau d'Issey Summer 2016 is a beautiful fragrance, but it's more of a collector's item in my opinion. I do love how fresh and fun this scent is, but the longevity isn't particularly the best. If you find L'Eau d'Issey a bit too strong, then you'll really love the L'Eau d'Issey Summer 2016 but my personal favorite is still the L'Eau d'Issey Florale.

What is your favorite limited edition scent? Let me know in the comments.