Megan surfing with CoreysWave Professional Surf Instruction, Summer 2018. Image courtesy of CoreysWave.
A Dirty, Sexy Perfume for Nights,
Days, and Even the Beach
Megan O’Neill is the senior beauty editor at goop. Which is another way of saying she has a passion for clean products, loves anything that reduces stress, and will happily guinea pig herself in the name of wellness.
I’m sitting in a circle, barefoot, in a sex workshop in a loft in Los Feliz. We’re talking about what makes us feel sexy. “What makes you feel sexy, Megan?” asks the teacher. The whole class is now looking at me. Do I start talking situations? Positions? We’re here to get intensely personal, and I’m sweating already.
“Summer!” I finally blurt out, relieved and actually meaning it. I’m thinking of one of the best trips I’d ever taken, to Kauai, and the ambrosial ripe mangoes I devoured walking down the beach every morning. The days were searing, and I’d bite in, and my eyes would practically roll back into my head it was so good. I’d stroll down the sand, the juice trickling down my forearms and stomach in orange rivulets, bound into the ocean to rinse off once I got too sticky and hot.
I decide to elaborate: “And eating a juicy mango on a hot beach.”
Mangoes are sexy: I love their luscious melting texture, their blazing marigold color, the way you’ve got to suck the meat off the pit—and ohmygod that scent. So I can’t stop with this new perfume called Dirty Mango from Heretic, which smells of mangoes, but also of summer itself, juiciness, and skin gently warmed by the sun. The scent is swirled with mandarin, sandalwood, and lemon, which temper the sweetness. Even the “dirty” part of the name is pure lust.
For years, I wasn’t interested in perfume; conventional ones always gave me a brutal headache. But Heretic alchemizes natural plant essences and essential oils into incredible, hypnotic scents that bubble over with organic, botanical splendor. Even their alcohol base is organic, derived from non-GMO grapes and sugarcane.
Conventional fragrance, on the other hand, is one of the most-toxic-ingredient-laden categories in the entire beauty industry. Brands hide hormone-disrupting chemicals like phthalates, parabens, and pretty much anything else they don’t want to disclose on the label under legal-loophole terms like “fragrance” and “parfum.”
But I can spritz on Dirty Mango with abandon: on my wrists, the nape of my neck, into my puff of curls, and at the backs of my knees (because a fashion editor once told me she sprayed her perfume there). Sometimes I’ll spray some on when I’m trapped at the office feeling strangled by deadlines. Or I’ll take the very portable bottle out of my purse for a refresher midway through a wedding after swirling around the dance floor, dizzy from tequila shots. So yes, mangoes make me feel sexy—but dirty mangoes? Even better.
