When I first learned about Oh My Dog!, a perfume formulated for dogs (and its kitty counterpart, Oh My Cat!) by Dog Generation, I thought it would be cool to smell but didn’t go out of my way to look for it. We crossed paths again recently when this long-discontinued curiosity came up in a search for osmanthus perfumes, and I was intrigued enough to order a set of minis online.
It was originally marketed as “unisex” and “specially adapted to all breeds of dogs.” This apparently meant a budget equivalent to that allotted for Givenchy Pi and a stringency greater than that of the development of a perfume for babies. Oh My Dog! is intended for dogs and their owners, which an old Chinese article in a magazine from Hong Kong dubbed (in English) “uni-species.” Perhaps to illustrate their point, each of the 4 minis in the set features a different-sized pooch.
Having 4 different dog silhouettes was what motivated me to get this set rather than a full-sized bottle, which would have featured spikes on the sides and a metal plaque. To my pleasant surprise (as I hadn’t seen it from the photos), the minis have spikes as well.
I should pause to explain that I love dogs à la folie, especially the “extra-large” ones that are so huggable… but I don’t have a dog. The people I know whose dogs I sometimes get to pet are not obsessed with perfume like I am, so it may be a while before I get to test this “Eau de toilette for Dog” on its ostensible target.
On myself, well… it smells like what I might expect of a dog shampoo. Of the listed notes of freesia, orange, osmanthus (!), palisander rosewood, and vanilla, I only get the first 2 in the form of inoffensive but artificial sweetness. And maybe a bit of vanilla. I’m not sure what the solvent is, but it’s not alcohol, so it stays on the skin for a while before getting absorbed. I imagine it might mesh with the natural odor of dog to produce a richer scent. Or possibly my batch has gone off a bit, but I have no way to verify.
It’s also been fun to browse the media library of Dog Generation, an archive of ads and news articles about Oh My Dog!. I would love to see a resurgence of dogs as fashion models.
To close the loop, it’s been fun taking a gander back in time through this cleverness that I missed when it first came out, but I’m happy to report that I found a proper osmanthus perfume for the royal we: Parfum d’Empire Osmanthus Interdite.
Nose Prose 
I really wonder how my dogs would react to perfume on them. Both of them have excellent noses – my German Shepherd astounds me frequently with his ability to find the tiniest morsel of food that has fallen behind furniture or whatnot. We play a game of Find Your Treats throughout the house – great for mental exercise when the weather outside is poor. And every new smell is investigated thoroughly by both him and my female Border Collie (and the GSD always has to do a quick taste test too 😆). So I worry that they’d be bothered by having any scent on them, “surrounding” them.
Besides, they both smell wonderful just as they are. Kinda like a newborn baby smell that you don’t want/need to cover…, they smell of the outdoors, happiness and clean(ish) fur 😊.
Dog fashion models definitely get my vote! 😄
LikeLiked by 1 person
German shepherds and border collies are such beautiful and smart dogs! I would probably prefer to smell them as they are as well (with appropriately frequent baths) most of the time, although I imagine I’d be tempted to perfume them occasionally just for fun, if they didn’t mind it—but not necessarily with Oh My Dog!.
LikeLike