A Pricey but Potent Romantic Fragrance : Perfume: Retailer Fred Hayman introduces a new, sentimental-sounding scent for the ‘90s:. . . with Love.

Possession, Poison, Opium. Heavy-handed names for some of the most scintillating scents of the 1980s.

Fred Hayman, whose nose knows a thing or two about what fragrances send women scurrying to perfume counters, will have none of that. For the 1990s, would you believe the sentimental-sounding . . . with Love will make its debut today at Hayman’s ritzy Rodeo Drive shop?

This is not Hayman’s first foray into the fragrance business. He co-founded the Giorgio fragrance empire, which was sold to Avon in 1987 for $165 million.

In 1989, the Swiss-born entrepreneur launched men’s and women’s versions of the fragrance 273. Those scents, he said, will roll up estimated $20 million in sales sales this year, half of the projected figure, and a tiny drop in the industry’s $4-billion bucket.

Initially, . . . with Love will be featured only in his shop. The scent was unveiled at a glittery party at the store Thursday night, where the guestlist included longtime friends Charlton and Lydia Heston, Ricardo and Georgiana Montalban and Zsa Zsa Gabor.

As for introducing a high-priced fragrance during a recession, Hayman acknowledged that business has been “very, very difficult. Certainly in clothes, the recession has affected the wealthy.”

If . . . with Love is meant to signify the values of the good old one-on-one relationship, its fragrance nonetheless packs a wallop. Developed by perfumer Gerard Goupy of Robertet, it is fruity, floral, vaguely Oriental--and designed to linger.

At least one industry watcher said Hayman is on the right track.

“We’re in a romantic mode,” said Annette Green, executive director of the Fragrance Foundation in New York, the educational arm of the perfume industry. “The mood of the consuming public is escapism, monogamy and all those things.”

She noted that a new fragrance coming from Estee Lauder is called Spellbound, and Calvin Klein will bring out Escape.

At $300 an ounce, . . . with Love is priced between Coco or Chanel No. 5 and Bijan; it will probably be purchased only as “a major gift,” Hayman said. Also available are a quarter-ounce perfume at $95 and a 2.5-ounce spray cologne for $60.