Question:
I was browsing through old threads and found one discussing D&G Light Blue, particularly how the scent seemed to vary fairly widely from person to person. This is certainly true for me - I was spraying the scent on a few friends yesterday and it turned out far more "light" on them whereas it would be pretty rich on me. The same goes for many other scents - what smells lighter, fresher, fruitier on a friend will smell fairly flowery, rich, musky on me...
I've heard for the most part that people with "bigger" bodies tend to retain perfumes more easily than your standard size 0, but that hasn't held up in my case, either. Certain perfumes linger forever on a thinner friend's skin while disappear within half an hour on mine, which is pretty strange. Perfumes also tend to smell very different from the bottle on my wrists - once again, certain notes always become very sharp and prominent. It's one of the reasons I tend to go for lighter scents, since I know they'll just turn "dark" on me anyways. I'm Asian and live in a fairly predominant Asian community, and I feel like I have both a different body type and scent type than most other Asians... evidenced by the fact that perfumes smell far brighter on their skin than mine.
Anybody else want to share some knowledge/experience?

Answer:
If you search the forums for "body chemistry" you will turn up a few threads. I think the jury is still out on there being a definite correlation to how a scent smells on dark/light/dry/oily skin or tall/short/thin/large person. Probably diet, blood type, and other chemical factors of the body have more to do with it than phenotypical appearance, but definitely scents smell different on people. Also different people (and skins) "hold" scent longer/better than others.
You could also do a search for "jojoba oil" as that is often discussed in terms of drier skins and as a base for holding scent on drier types.
In my personal experience, I can't say there is a standard for me. Some scents stay on me a long time and some don't (D&G Light Blue is one that lasts a long time on me; others include Chloe Narcissus, Tom Ford Black Orchid, and Gucci Rush. Some that leave me far sooner than I'd like include Molinard Habanita and Rochas Tocade).

Answer:
I simply cannot buy light perfumes; they do not last on me.
I am a small person, rather short, with a thin build.
Maybe my metabolism is fast. I blame that.
My skin has alot of yellow-orange pigment, and my hair was almost black brown before it started going, ahem, white.
So, put me down as a scent-killer with those particular characteristics.

Answer:
This is a VERY interesting question. On me, most feminine perfumes turn into a loud sickly headachey mess. My chemistry works SO MUCH BETTER with more masculine scents. For example, M7 turns very subtle and powdery on me. Also, occasionally there will be times when scents tend to differ on me from day to day. About every 4th time I wear CK be, it becomes dull and muted instead of sparkling and musky. Last time I wore Gaultier2, it became VERY loud and cloying, but I think that was because I was sweating a lot and additionally my Aunt Flo was visiting. To me, it makes more sense that frags smell different from one person to the next due to chemistry, diet, etc rather than body type, but who knows?

Answer:
This topic fascinates me as well. I'm very small - 5'2, 95 lbs., and like Purplebird7 - have a fast metabolism. (Freakishly fast, really, because I'm 41 and I have hypothyroidism). I eat sugar like crazy and I live on ice cream. It's awful, really, because I have the worst diet in the world. If I gained wait I would have to eat healthy foods. My skin has yellow undertones, some freckles, and my natural haircolor is auburn. (It's now blonde, and even blonder over the, ahem, gray strands...{{Purplebird7}})

Fragrances usually have above average lasting power on me, and the fragrances with legendary lasting power, (Angel, Nuits de NoHo, Fire Island, etc.) last through showers on my skin. Sweet scents tend to get overly sweet and can nauseate me. It's probably a reaction to all that sugar in my body, LOL!

One thing that may factor. I'm an avid gardener and I spend a lot of time outside. Sunshine intensifies fragrance on my skin - so maybe that's a factor as well? When I'm cold, (like when I'm stuck inside and some idiot has set the air conditioning to sub-zero temperatures), my fragrance disappears, and is definitely less sweet.

Answer:
I'm half-Chinese, half pallid English and a bit porkier than I should be. The two people I most often go perfume shopping with are my mother (extremely pale blonde, pale skin, also a bit porkier than she should be - I pray she doesn't read this) and a very good friend who has a collection even larger than mine. (Unaccountably, she doesn't post here.) She's very pale and very, very slim, with gorgeous red hair.
We have all stood together and sniffed things in unison. Frequently they've turned out very differently - my friend and I had the most extreme difference with one of Roja Dove's limited editions of 100 bottles (sorry, but I forget which number it was; it was the lovely citrusy one with remarkable staying power, if that's any help), which was *entirely* different on the pair of us. On me it was very transparent and light, on her much darker. Benjamin, the very knowledgeable and lovely SA at Roja Dove was so surprised by the difference that he spent about five minutes smelling us both in amazement. She also can't wear cumin; it's much sweatier on her than it is on me.
I wear a lot of Apres l'Ondee, and my mother loved it, and decided she wanted a bottle. She tried some of mine - and again, where it's transparent and almost metallic on me, it's sickly and almost powdery on her. That said, she has much better compatibility with Caron perfumes than I do. On me they smell a lot sweeter.
I feel lucky. On the whole, I *like* the way things smell on me.
A note on the greasy skin thing (and I'm going to regret admitting this). I had some ovarian problems which led to me putting a lot of weight on, and have been taking Xenical, the weight loss pill that stops your body from digesting fat, for several months (a total success - I'm positively sylph-like now). My skin's a lot drier since I've been taking it, but I've noticed no difference at all in the way my perfumes smell or last, which surprised me.

Answer:
Originally Posted by Tovah [font=Georgia]. . . . My skin has yellow undertones, some freckles, and my natural haircolor is auburn . . . . Fragrances usually have above average lasting power on me, and the fragrances with legendary lasting power, (Angel, Nuits de NoHo, Fire Island, etc.) last through showers on my skin. Sweet scents tend to get overly sweet and can nauseate me. I have similar colouring (auburn hair, freckles), although my body type is very different; I'm fairly compact and muscular, and my metabolism is not particularly rapid. My skin also brings out sweet notes, however, though not to an extent that I find offensive; sweet notes do tend to bury herbal and green notes (as in the lavander in Jicky or Musc Ravageur). My skin also magnifies even the slightest hint of powder in a fragrance, so it ends up smelling dessicated and as though it had been buried half-unstoppered at the back of a drawer for 50 years.

Answer:
This is very interesting. I'm quite small, just below 5' 3" and slender. I have neutral undertones, brown hair with a red tinge and very fair skin that burns easily. My skin is very dry, I have to apply body lotion every day or it will become flaky, my face is also very dry and craves constant moisture. I have a high metabolism and are restless and want to move around a lot.
Many perfumes become too sweet on my skin, it's amost as if my skin has a vanilla tone in it to begin with. The same perfume applied to my arm and to my mums arm, will always become very sweet and vanilla on me, and much more flowery or fruity (and better) on my mother for example.
Perfumes stay very long on my skin. D&G The one, stayed more than 14 hours, two showers and a vigorous scrubbing (wanted to get rid of it), CK Euphoria stays at least one shower and almost 24 hours. Strong perfumes can stay more than 24 hours on my skin. Very few disappear within a few hours. I almost never have to apply perfume a second time during a day and I'm used to smelling them faintly even after a shower.

Answer:
Yes, it is interesting. I'm medium height (5'7), and my body type is a "modified" English pear. I say modified, because I've spent the last 20 years in the gym adding muscle to my upper body to balance it out. My arms are positively Linda Hamilton-esque, but I still have jiggly thighs.
I have pale, yellow-toned skin that burns atrociously in the sun and never really tans, beyond looking slightly dirty. Brown hair, dark green/hazel eyes. I had greasy skin and hair as a kid and spots for most of my life.
Perfume never smells as cloying on me as it does on most other people. I can put Hypnotic Poison on and after the topnotes have burned off, it smells like a tasteful man's cologne.
However, very little has any sillage at all on me.
Light summer scents last two seconds and don't project at all.
I feel the cold a lot more than most people, despite exercising. I put on weight easily.

Answer:
I'm 4'8" (yes, yes, let the short jokes commence) and...134 pounds (MUCH porkier than I should be...but fear not! I'm on WeightWatchers!). I'm also Filipino, and have had extremely dry skin for the past few years. I have a hard time with florals..they tend to go very thin and shrill on me, and also a very VERY hard time with certain musks (particularly the musk used in SJP Lovely). I find the characterization of larger body/darker skin = long lasting doesn't hold true for me. I'm a pudgy, brown-skinned Filipino girl and certain scents just will not last. Instead of coloring, skin type my be a better expression of body chemistry...as I do have dry skin.