Femme (1945) (Parfum de Toilette) by Rochas

Bottle Design:
Marcel Rochas

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….. wenn Farbe und Licht - das Grau durchbricht :)) 🍁 (by IrisNobile)

wogende Magie spinnt ihre Fäden - schön, dass Ihr dabei seid 🫶 (by Skydiver19)

Femme Rochas 1945 Parfum de Toilette

Version from 1945

9.0 / 10 46 Ratings

A popular perfume by Rochas for women, released in 1945. The scent is floral-chypre. The longevity is above-average. The production was apparently discontinued.
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Main accords

Floral

Chypre

Spicy

Animal

Woody

Fragrance Pyramid

Top Notes

Bergamot

Lemon

Cinnamon

Plum

Rosewood

Peach

Apricot

Heart Notes

Iris

Clove

Immortelle Jasmine

Jasmine

May rose

Ylang-ylang

Base Notes

Amber

Benzoin

Leather

Oakmoss

Civet

Musk

Patchouli

Sandalwood Vanilla

Vanilla

Perfumer

Edmond Roudnitska

Ratings

Scent

9.046 Ratings

Longevity

8.139 Ratings

Sillage

7.540 Ratings

Bottle

8.649 Ratings

Value for money

8.318 Ratings

Submitted by Sniffer · last update on 12/02/2025.

Source-backed & verified

Variant of the fragrance concentration

This is a variant of the perfume Femme (1945) (Parfum) by Rochas, which differs in concentration.

Smells similar

What the fragrance is similar to

Femme (1945) Parfum

Femme (1945) Eau de Cologne

Diaghilev Parfum

Mitsouko Eau de Parfum

Mitsouko Extrait

Salome

Reviews

5 in-depth fragrance descriptions

06/19/2024

Krmarich
230 Reviews

Krmarich

2

Mae West

After years of searching for the right bottle, I found the bottle of Femme with my name on it. I have determined it to be from the 1970s. No UPC code or long list of ingredients. At long last I tried my first spray and was completely taken to a magical place. One that doesn't exist anymore in our world. This is Haute Couture in a bottle. This is as high as you can go! I feel completely magical wearing this, like Endora from Bewitched. Glamorous magic with no boundaries. Yes, its empowering!

Fortunately, this was mass produced over the years and so many bottles waiting to captivate the curious buyer. So many other classics have been lost. Here is a bottle that captures a lifestyle and the rarest of beauty. The comparison to Mitsouko is inevitable. It is so much darker and seductive than Mitsouko or any other comparisons other than Gem, now completely lost to time. Femme towers above so many others. She is an acquired taste. She generally doesn't conform to modern trends and seems to be a bit old fashioned...

Haute couture means black patten leather pumps, floral stockings, a black velvet tubedress and black veiled hat. Wearing elaborate jewels and Femme Rochas sets the mood. The harkens back to the time when women would spend one day shopping, the next at the salon and the rest of the week showing off her beauty. Working 7 days a week was unheard of...True, this is a fairy tale of the 20th century. Some may find this world contingent upon sexist archetypes. Not really. Many women would find themselves in control of their destiny. The Parisienne femme is a unicorn for many women in this world. Working 7 days a week at Walmart just doesn't get it. Keep dreaming, focus on what you want and who knows?

Oddly, Femme can be easily worn by Hommes. Its not very floral, however rose and jasmine peeks out occasionally. Its dark woody/leather/ patcholi/oakmoss accord lends more of a gender bender appeal and may even scare off modern noses. The bottle is simple and as elegant as its contents. If you are curious, by all means search for a bottle of this beauty. Its perfect for autumn and winter holidays.

⁝

Updated on 06/19/2024

03/25/2025

7.5Scent 8Longevity 6Sillage

shengnu
94 Reviews

shengnu

2

More complex modern gourmand predecessor.

What surprised me the most about this is how sweet and juicy it is. One of the most common claims about modern perfumery I hear is how sweet everything now is compared to the past.
And maybe that's true. But Femme PdT opens up with a beautiful, slightly tart, almost photorealistic peach. I can almost taste it, even though the bottle must be 40 years old by now.

Femme fades down almost immediately away from those sweet-tart top notes, to a powdery, peachy-woody musk. It's two perfumes in one - a peach gourmand, and then a skin musk (with chypre elements).
Maybe this is why it's not like modern gourmands. It changes, but modern gourmands start and end very sweet.

I can barely detect the oakmoss. But it's there, providing a slightly bitter-vegetal depth, especially at the end. I also get scratchy woods. As for the rest of the pyramid, I really couldn't say. I don't get cinnamon, immortelle, or any of the other things that make people say this perfume is so complex and rich. It's not all that layered to me - please don't be upset, it's possible I just have an old sample.

I do know it's classical perfumery, though, with its obvious progression, long accords list, and inclusion of oakmoss, civet and musk (probably civettone and nitro musk, to be honest) and probably some amount of real sandalwood. All of which, due to scarcity, health concerns that cause IFRA prohibitions, and simple taste, are not much in use today.

Genuine question for perfumery history buffs. What came first: the health concerns and resultant regulations, or the change in taste? I don't know, and I would love help finding answers.
It bothers me how narrow taste has gotten, even in the niche world - pushing toward strongly sweet, not complex fragrances. Especially on places like TikTok.

I wish we were more interested in our history. Instead of buying things like Bitter Peach Eau de Parfum...a peach gummy ring fragrance...we could spend far less money and be adventurous with a vintage like Femme.

12/27/2022

10Scent 7Longevity 8Sillage

Marieposa
90 Reviews

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Marieposa

Top Review 45

The Triumph of Beauty

April 25, 1943
Dear Mama,

Paris has become sad and gray since the Germans arrived, but you will see, one day the guns will rest and the sirens will fall silent. Just wait, perhaps next summer we will harvest peaches and late plums again, laughing in the sunshine as their sweet juice flows over our hands. And no, don’t ask me what nourishes my optimism. I only pass on the little notes when I see the double cross. I am not cowardly, but I am also not crazy.

Do you still remember the man from the third floor, whom I told you about in my last letter? At first glance, he always seems so lost in thought, but I have long seen through what a keen observer he is. He never tires of hauling clinking bags into his small apartment, and sometimes he murmurs incomprehensible strings of letters and numbers to himself when we greet each other on the stairs. I often hear his window closing two floors below my attic room when the smoke from the paint factory drifts over again. As if the garbage dump on the other side of the house weren’t already bad enough... For a long time, I have thought that he cannot bear how ugly our world has become. Not to mention the biting stench.
Yesterday, he gently touched my sleeve on the stairs and pressed a mysterious little bottle into my hand. “This is for you, Mademoiselle. For a woman like you.” I only murmured a confused thank you, but he had already disappeared into the darkness of the stairwell. I studied the vial for a long time, and when I finally opened it, a scent emerged that was entirely me. I can hardly put it into words and have been wondering ever since: How could a complete stranger look so deeply into my soul?

Take care of yourself, dear Mama,

Yours, F.

**

One could accuse Edmond Roudnitska of blind escapism, as he had nothing better to do in the midst of World War II and during the siege of Paris than to create his first perfume. While the world around him sank into chaos, he set his mind on capturing the essence of beauty in a bottle, as if he could at least patch up the cracks that ran through his time a little bit. Raw materials were hardly available, but perhaps it was exactly this scarcity that spurred him to achieve greatness.
Femme leans on the structures of Guerlain's Mitsouko, and I strongly doubt that it is a coincidence that Mitsouko was born right after the first and Femme immediately after the second World War. The fragrance embodies the perfect balance between dark flowers, ripe fruits, creamy sandalwood, and cool moss. Femme smells of warm women's skin and ripe peach, and is surprisingly not sweet. It is sensuous and beautiful in a way that is almost painful. And every time I wear the scent, I wonder why I even need anyone else. But perhaps that is precisely the crux: Sometimes it brings my stubborn heart, which always carries so much longing, to its knees.

As with all older fragrances, the reformulation bug has naturally also gnawed at Femme. I do not know the 1989 version, which was made over Roudnitska's head and without his involvement, but the scent is said to be well done. The current version is rather anemic and has lost its curves. However, with a bit of imagination, one can still sense the old brilliance, and personally, I would prefer this version of Femme to none at all, even though I rejoice with every spray that another bottle of the original is waiting for me in my cabinet.

06/09/2023

10Scent 10Longevity 7Sillage

Jakoparfum
55 Reviews

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Jakoparfum

Top Review 19

“Spicy Chypre“

Femme by Rochas is one of the most important chypre fragrances in the history of perfumes.
A spicy, oriental, warm, and enveloping chypre. Over the years, the animalic notes (the original formula by the great Edmond Roudnitska) were replaced by a wonderful caraway note (formula by Olivier Cresp from 1990). This is one of the rare reformulations that maintains the structure of the original perfume without distorting it.
Warm and spicy opening with caraway, spices, and a delicious note of ripe, juicy peach. Then it becomes smoky, spicy, and woody. In its further development, it is very difficult to distinguish the individual notes. When the notes in a fragrance are indistinguishable, you are almost always dealing with a masterpiece!
There are great similarities with Diaghilev Roja and Jubilation 25 by Amouage.
In 1944, there were no spicy and oriental chypre fragrances yet. Femme was the father of all these fragrances and will remain so forever.

Updated on 06/10/2023

09/26/2025

10Scent

Sapho
23 Reviews

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Sapho

Helpful Review 7

An Epitome of Divine Femininity

Edmond Roudnitska met Marcel Rochas at the end of 1943. Not only was that year coming to an end, but also World War II and a difficult time for French perfumes. There was a lack of money as well as raw materials. It was during this time that Rochas wanted to create something truly special, a fine, sensual, feminine fragrance for his beloved wife Hélène. Roudnitska was a talented perfumer, but at that time he had little experience with fine, feminine scents. He drew inspiration from the infamous actress Mae West, with whom he was friends. Later, the Lalique bottle of the perfume paid tribute to her beauty.
As the main component of his new fragrance, the perfumer used a scent accord he developed based on Prunol, which smelled fresh and elegant like peach and plum. Shortly thereafter, the end of the war was celebrated with ‘Femme’. This was one of the first French creations of the post-war period and a symbol of a newly blossoming femininity.
The fragrance itself has already been extensively described on Parfumo, and so I expected to smell juicy peaches and ripe plums that are strangely floral-dusty and to perceive a sharp, almost spoiled erotic note over time. However, that is not the case; I only notice a warming cloud that embraces me and protects me from the whole world. The perfume whispers to me that I am beautiful, and in those moments, I believe it. This is a scent a woman can rely on, not ostentatious, very intimate, a perfume just for her. Many wonder how to interpret the name ‘Femme’; for me, it is an expression of divine femininity. This concept can be found, for example, in Hinduism. The Hindu goddess Shakti represents divine feminine energy and is the creative force of life. As the warrior Durga, she rides a lion or a tiger. Correspondingly, we find civet in the fragrance notes. As the fearsome Kali, she symbolizes death and simultaneously frees souls from their suffering. For me, a dusty iris fits perfectly with this. As the sensual Parvati, who smells of musk and amber, she represents love and devotion, while as Lakshmi, with precious flowers in her hand, she embodies opulence and abundance. As the intellectual Sarasvati, she loves immortelle and is highly creative. And then there is Tripura Sundari, the highest beauty. She cannot be described; one must feel her. When I wear ‘Femme’ on my wrist, I carry Tripura Sundari in my heart.
My thanks go to Midnights for the opportunity to possess this treasure.
A small addition: my review pertains to the fragrance from the time before 1989. In that year, Oliver Cresp revised this perfume. As we know from Roudnitska's son, his father regretted this deeply and lamented that his ‘Femme’ had been stolen from him.

Updated on 09/30/2025

Statements

9 short views on the fragrance

shengnu

11 months ago

7.5Scent 8Longevity 6Sillage

1

Juicy tart peach, then sweet, peachy-powdery skin musk. Not the bee's knees. But better than a lot of gourmands out there.

Floyd

1 year ago

9Scent 7Longevity 7Sillage

50

47

Your scent of the day
On peach skin
White blossoms turn to hay
Across summer
Sneaky cats
Will let moss grow
Over the wounds of time

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Skydiver19

4 months ago

9.5Scent 8Longevity 7Sillage

31

41

Velvet Night
Eros Fruit Magic
for goddess powder flower skin
with gold resin aura
rises from the throne
balsamed leather garment
love ambush
in the veil forest

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