Barbie perfume comparison: Barbie Lush vs Zara Barbie battle

Lush x Barbie Collection: soap opera drama

Ahhh, the smell of Hollywood tie-ins! Lush teamed up with Barbie and Mattel to shower fans with a multitude of pink bath bombs, soaps and other body care products. Sounds dreamy, right? But dreams don’t always come true. A reconnaissance mission to a Lush store exposed a grim truth about the Barbie x Lush Collection – visually, it’s mostly cringe!

The high-heeled shoe, the handbag and the boombox soaps might’ve been envisioned as cute, but turned out spectacularly ugly. First, the color is not the happy and pure Barbie pink, but an unpleasantly dirty shade of faded carrot. Second, the shapes are just hideous. The molds used for them don’t work with soap. It’s strange that nobody had noticed it (or was brave enough to speak up) at a company renowned for solid detergents.

The boombox looks like a half-eaten chocolate bar, bitten and then spit out by time itself. The handbag seems caught in an identity crisis: where a graceful gap between the body and the high handle should be, soap fills the space. Instead of a chic accessory, it resembles a lopsided triangle or an aged barn lock.

The shoe is the most grotesque of the three. It seems like something you’d find in a creepy movie. The soap bar’s jagged edges, rough and distorted, remind of a desperate struggle. They look as though Barbie had made a futile attempt at flight before being intercepted by a brutal axe, severing not just the shoe but a haunting fragment of foot within too.

While the soaps are a definitely a fail, the B-shaped bath bomb actually looks cute and ticks all the Barbie boxes. The solid body balm is somewhere in-between – nice enough, but is not particularly Barbie, because there are no meaningful references to the beloved doll – it’s in real life it can hardly be called pink, and the heart shape is too generic.

Barbie x Lush perfume review

Now to the main star of the Barbie x Lush show – the perfume! The first time I visited the store, the fragrance was not for sale despite being in stock, because the staff were still waiting for Mattel stickers. And there ain’t no Barbie product without a Mattel sticker, that much is clear!

What strikes you when you see the perfume for the first time are the proportions of the bottle. It’s 30 ml, but it looks and feels like a mini-me version of a normally sized flacon. This optic illusion looks odd in the real world.

At first Barbie Lush smells nice enough. It’s sweet, but not sticky. It starts with innocent and gentle notes of lemon-scented roses and soft violet drops that are quickly joined by the denser, sweeter and creamier milky almond and hints of dark cherry coming from tonka beans. The almond-cherry accord quickly takes over and leads the way for the next 30–40 minutes, allowing only brief sparks of sweet orange fruitiness or heady floral drama.

In this initial stage of development, the Lush x Barbie fragrance matches its upbeat and carefree inspiration figure, radiating playful pink vibes appropriate for a Barbie girl, boy or any non-binary doll in the Barbie world. If it stopped here, my verdict for Lush would be a congratulatory: “Well done!”

Instead, the perfume soon reveals its true colors – it’s Lush first and Barbie second. Or even third or fourth. What began as a Dreamland joyride becomes a tour de force of a Lush warehouse.

Let me set the scene for you. Whenever you come close to a Lush shop you are greeted by a very characteristic smell of all the soap loaves, bath bombs and whatever other herby-sweet concoctions might be hidden in the backroom at once. This strong and forceful signature Lush scent hits you on the street well before you step in. Aggressive in its claim to naturalness, sweetish-sharp and slightly sickening, it’s the fragrant quintessence of the Lush experience.

After about 20 minutes of Barbie, this Lush DNA comes through. It creeps up, slowly gobbling up the other notes until there is nothing else left on your skin except the pungent mix of herbs, resins and soap shavings that every Lush store smells of.

This transition from Barbie fantasy into Lush reality makes the Lush x Barbie perfume unique and offers an authentic Lush take on the topic. That’s the positive view.

A more critical opinion (that I share) is that with Lush everything smells the same. And just like Han Solo was trapped in a block of carbonite in Star Wars, with this perfume Lush have imprisoned Barbie in a huge slab of their production leftovers.

If you are a Lush fan, there can be no better way for you to partake on the Barbie craze than indulging in a spritz of their fragrance collaboration. On the other hand, if you are looking for a scent to give you cinematic pink and easy doll vibes, be warned – this perfume is not easy-breezy. You risk being suffocated by its Lushness.

Zara Barbie perfume review

Did Zara do a better job at portraying Barbie in their namesake perfume? Short answer – yes, it probably did.

Zara’s creation matches expectations of a scent called “Barbie” – it’s conventionally cute and sweet. It smells of soft marshmallow and cotton candy, plastic orange flowers and sugarcoated roses, cartoonish vanilla and girly powder puffs. The drydown leaves the notes of sugary florals and vanilla lingering on skin.

The scent is as pink as its box and as artificial as a strawberry Jell-O. You can easily imagine it being part of Margo Robbie’s beauty routine in the make-believe world of plastic furniture and waterless showering of Barbieland. Something a Ken would very much enjoy smelling too.

This perfume was created with lightheartedness in mind. There are no hidden ontological depths to be explored, no pyramid developments to be anticipated, and no questions about its appropriateness to be asked or answered.

Unlike the film, Zara Barbie perfume is what it is – a simple and cute fragrance for doll and/or movie fans and their children. It’s straightforward and linear, with modest projection and moderate longevity. And it can be worn any time you feel or want to feel playful and sweet.

It’s not the most sophisticated scent out there, but that’s not what a Barbie-themed perfume needs to be anyway. It’s fun, easy and charming. A perfect pop culture fragrance for here and now, an essence distilled by Hollywood, fast fashion and corporate mass production.

As a mass culture product, Zara’s Barbie fragrance was born affordable. Yet, being a limited edition and hitting the high point of the Barbie film craze, it was sold out within days of its release. The generously sized 80 ml pink bottle cost only €23, and is now resold for several times the original price on eBay. Scarcity is the only negative point about this perfume I can think of.

A friend of mine compared the experience of smelling it for the first time with opening a new Barbie box as a child – Zara’s perfume brought back her memories of the first whiff of sweet plastic coming from a brand-new Barbie doll. And what more can one wish for from a Barbie perfume than to transport you back to those happy moments?

Many people consider Barbie Zara perfume to be a dupe for Love Don’t be Shy from Kilian. I think they are quite different. Yes, both are sweet and fruity-candy-floral. Compared side by side, however, you can feel that Zara is a way more direct and simple scent. Love Don’t be Shy has more layers to it, is less sugary and more adult and sophisticated. Zara can only be considered a dupe if one doesn’t care about the details.

Zara Barbie vs Lush Barbie: picking the winner

Zara Barbie and Lush x Barbie perfumes came out simultaneously as part of the movie merch collabs. Both are dedicated to the iconic doll and have the color pink as a major design element. Both sweet scents were released as limited editions. But who did it better, Zara or Lush? After comparing the two fragrances, I have determined a clear winner: Zara Barbie.

Why? Because Zara’s version is more stereotypically “Barbie”. It smells predictably pink, reliably simple and cheerfully artificial. Barbie from Zara is conventionally pretty with the combination of sweet florals, sugar candy and vanilla. A perfect perfume if you want to have a classic immersive Barbie experience.

Barbie x Lush rendition is more Lush than Barbie. The pink and sweet Barbie DNA is barely covering the feral natural-herbs-loving Lush heart. After the initial attempt at being cute and girly, the perfume turns into a quintessentially Lush narrative and smells like a wild orgy of all their soaps and bath bombs combined.

So which one should you choose? In Barbieland terms, Lush’s fragrance matches the personality of the Weird Barbie played by Kate McKinnon, while Barbie Zara perfectly fits the Stereotypical Barbie portrayed by Margo Robbie‘s film character. Lush is more original and adventurous, Zara is prettier in the conventional sense.

Both have a place under the sun and in fans’ hearts. Lush x Barbie is edgier, costs more than double per ml (€45 for 30 ml) and is still available in stores. Barbie from Zara is pinker, simpler and was more budget friendly when it first came out. At the moment, however, it is only available from resellers on platforms like eBay.

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