Parterre: EXCLUSIVE 25% discount for Valentine’s!

Parterre have lovingly offered our readers an EXCLUSIVE 25% off discount for Valentine’s Day, and we are of course smitten…

You may have got your hands on one of the adorable 10ml Parterre Perfume Baubles at Christmas, well now is your chance to get the real thing! Get 25% off any 50ml & 100ml bottle of your favourite Parterre fragrance. To take advantage of this offer visit parterrefragrances.com  – and enter the code valentine25 when prompted at the checkout.

 

The HOUR of DUSK & GOLD

Persian wild carrot seed and angelica root are embellished with orris, nutmeg, lavender, and bay. Dusky accents of liquidambar linger on the skin, as soft as silk.

A TRIBUTE to EDITH

 A rich, sensuous rose. Reminiscent of Paris in the jazz era, this is a sultry and compelling fragrance with geranium for a modern accent.

RUN of the RIVER

A splash of refreshing lemon and lime mingles with aromatic elements of bergamot mint and lemon thyme layered on clary sage and orange flower.

ROOT of all GOODNESS

Warm and enveloping with an aromatic heart and a touch of citrus and spicy ginger, this perfume is a celebration of Parterre’s English grown vetiver.

 

With the cold weather (and all of us in desperate need of a treat), the code will be valid for TEN DAYS (expiring on 23rd February 2021). So what better time to explore these exquisite scents.

Why we love Parterre: When David and Julia Bridger decided to combine the ruling passions of their lives – art, gardens, travel and perfume – and gather a team of experts (literally) in their field, they set in motion a series of events that is poised to change the face of British fragrance forever. And put Parterre on the map.

David’s family had been in farming for almost 400 years, so horticulture runs in his veins – even though most of his career had been spent in marketing. Julia, meanwhile, had wide experience in advertising, going on to run a luxury villa travel company. Together, the pair (at that point based in Hampshire) began looking around for a farm of their own to buy, before stumbling across the ‘sleeping beauty’ of Keyneston Mill. It had fields – 50 acres of them. A run-down mill house and some crumbling outbuildings. An overgrown orchard. But lots and lots of potential not only to fulfill their dream of actually growing and distilling perfume ingredients right there, in the Dorset countryside – but to show visitors how it’s done, as they’d so enjoyed in Grasse.

 

Parterre workshop

 

Embracing the concept of ‘from seed to bottle’, with Parterre, the Bridgers not only set out to to grow, harvest and distil many of their own ingredients – but they also had a longing to try growing crops that had never before been grown on British soil. Even including – astonishingly – vetiver. For Julia and David, this is about ‘reinventing perfumery by taking it back to its roots.’ Parterre‘s motto: ‘Where creative botany meets artistry and the wild spirit of adventure.’

The planting now expands into surrounding fields, with crop-scale ingredients producing incredible quality yields, which are then hand-blended by Jacques Chabert – one of the world’s leading perfumers, who works in Grasse alongside his daughter, Elsa Chabert, while his elder and equally talented perfumer daughter, Carla Chabert, runs their Paris laboratory. Meanwhile, Parterre’s creative team is headed up by Virginie Daniau, President of the British Society of Perfumers (BSP), who first introduced Jacques to Keynestone Mill’s owners.

 

Parterre gardens

 

This adventure in botany has taken over four years – but the vision has now become reality. Over 2,000 aromatic plants and flowers are now being grown just 20 minutes from Poole – including rose geranium (more of which anon), melissa, hyssop, chamomile, angelica, artemisia, clary sage, yarrow, bergamot mint and red thyme. Many of them have made it into the limited edition, numbered flacons of Parterre fragrance now on sale at spiffy Piccadilly department store Fortnum & Mason, as well as via their own website.

‘Our mission is to grow the most unusual plants we can source,’ explains Julia. ‘Each plant is then trialled, harvested and distilled on site – and this process captures the very essence of each aromatic variety.’

For Julia and David, this is about ‘reinventing perfumery by taking it back to its roots.’ Parterre‘s motto: ‘Where creative botany meets artistry and the wild spirit of adventure.’

WIN a Molton Brown Fragrance Advent Calendar!

Celebrate in style this year and count down to the joyful Christmas day with the MOLTON BROWN sensational luxury advent calendar!

Christmas truly will come early this year if you’re the lucky winner of this fragrantly fabulous ultra luxury Molton Brown Advent Calendar. Filled to the brim with Deco-styled scented surprises – normal price £175, but worth £259 no less! – there are swoon-worthy treats for every day, as we count down to the big one…

Among them: the new Limited Edition Juniper Jazz eau de toilette – a must-sniff for gin lovers, its mint-frosted juniper berries sparkling with a metallic gleam over a heart of orris, warm guaiac wood and a silky sandalwood, patchouli and whisper-soft musk base.

Perhaps it’ll be the mysteriously allure of Geranium Nefertum that captures your heart? Luscious fig leaf accord fizzes with the cool freshness of bergamot and the fruity/woody delights of geranium extract and radiant jasmine. By the time the base of smooth sandalwood, labdanum, cedarwood and osmanthus unfurls, you’ll be enraptured.

And you can’t overlook their iconic Black Pepper fragrance of course! It’s a modern must-have – gender free and so ahead of their time (as always). Spicy, warm, and sure to set your cockles tingling, the addictive mix of cardamom, bergamot, coriander and lavandin melt into the generous warmth of black pepper, pink pepper, amber and cedarwood to revive your spirits. Finally, the cedarwood, oakmoss, leather and vetiver base are a balm for the very soul.

 

The stunning scents are to be found amidst a fragrant flurry of candles, body and bath oils and pampering treats, and every single day will be something to celebrate this December. A perfect calendar to ‘share’ (or at least pretend to) with a partner, we feel… but ONE lucky winner will receive this fabulous advent calendar WORTH £175!

 

For your chance to win, simply enter below… Good luck!

Oops! We could not locate your form.

* This prize draw runs from 9am on 14th November 2020 to midnight on 23rd November 2020. A winner will be chosen and contacted on 24th November 2020. This competition is open internationally; please allow up to 10 days for delivery from the UK. 

Watch our Instagram Live with perfumer Maïa Lernout

We’re thrilled that Maïa Lernout, French Senior Perfumer at Takasago, joined us recently for our Instagram Live series – and you can watch the interview with Jo Fairley, below. (It’s on our YouTube channel with the other insightful perfumer interviews, with names like Geza Schoen, Sonia Constant and more).

Maïa has created for many designer names including Elie Saab, Burberry and Kenzo – but her latest, sun-filled creation is the absolutely stunning Molton Brown Flora Luminare (Maïa is part of Molton Brown‘s Perfume Collective) – and we talked solar scents, sustainable ingredients and how she’s been creating during lockdown…

Enjoy…!

LUSH has new perfume library – and it’s in Florence!

The Perfume Society’s Victoria Evans goes behind the scenes at the (fragrance) museum…

We’ve all walked past a LUSH – it’s hard to ignore the fragranced fizzing of exploding bath bombs and perfumed wafts of delectable soaps. (Just don’t lick them, though – they don’t taste as delicious as they smell, we are embarrassed to report!) But whether you rush in or stroll on by, you’ll be interested to know that fragrance has always been at the heart – and is the continuing focus – of this now-global bath and skincare brand. So when The Perfume Society was invited to LUSH’s first stand-alone Perfume Library, a concept boutique in Florence – the birthplace of modern perfumery, no less – we jumped at the chance to investigate. Note: LUSH formerly offered their scent creations under the brand Gorilla Perfumes – but now all scents are under this The Perfume Library umbrella.)

On entering this temple to perfume on the Via dei Calzaiuoli, in the heart of this ancient city, deep fragrance notes drift towards you while bird song fills the air, in a room filled with impressive stacks of books dedicated to the alchemy of fragrance. (Think Neil Chapman, Roja Dove and reference books covering the Renaissance fascination with scent). It is, in essence, a cosy and intimate space decorated with dark woods, healthy emerald green plants and with cushioned cubbyholes you can sink into, whilst exploring LUSH‘s scents and brushing up on your fragrance knowledge.

You can then slip through a clear dividing curtain into the ‘LUSH Lab’, to explore a conveyor belt of their best-loved fragrances in body spray form. This also features ‘fragrance showers’ (in true fun LUSH style), where you can literally be enveloped by your scent of choice, while being played the song or songs which inspired the creation of the scent. All fragrances, it turns out, are created at LUSH while listening to an inspiring playlist – and these showers showcase that beautifully. You almost feel as though you are part of the process.

The birdsong mentioned is a fusing of founder Mark Constantine’s bird watching passion-slash-obsession, and a nod to the Renaissance belief that such sounds balanced and calmed the spirt. It is that fusing of LUSH values and Renaissance inspiration that makes this concept store so unique and thrilling to explore. Inspired by such legends as Catherine de Medici, who brought perfumery to new heights under her sphere of influence during the 16th Century, Lush wanted to place their Perfume Library in this wonderful city to pay tribute to the birth of modern perfumery.

When speaking to Mark (quite the Renaissance man himself, actually), he revealed that LUSH itself actually came to fruition (in 1995) because of his impulse to create fragrance. ‘I realised I could express myself much more effectively through fragrance than I could music, literature, poetry, whatever…”. With this deep sentiment for fragrance and Florence, The Perfume Liberary have also developed five new exclusive fragrances for the ‘concept store’ (like you need more of an excuse to plan a visit…): Nero, Fresh As, Sappho, Frangipani and Confetti, created by perfumer Emma Dick.

 

Nero is inspired by Princess Nerola, who was said to have fragranced her gloves and baths with the happy scent of neroli. It is bright and uplifting and develops on the skin to reveal woody tones. Then there’s Frangipani, already the bestseller in the store, filled with tuberose, almond oil and frangipani. It takes its name from the story of a wealthy 16th Century Italian family who in a time of famine gave bread to the poor, which happens to be where the word Frangipani actually comes from: frangi (break) and pani (bread).

We also adored Confetti, a deeply romantic scent with coffee, pear, rose and violet. LUSH co-founder Rowena felt is smelt like sugared almonds, and therefore this celebratory confectioneary, traditionally enjoyed at weddings (and also popular in Italy) gave this fragrance its name. Sappho was coined after the famous Greek poet Sappho, a heavy iris-based fragrance that is a homage to this very Florentine flower. Heavy, powdery and filled with tonka absolute, vanilla absolute and tobacco absolute, it is an almost deep dangerous fragrance, that has real staying power on the skin.

 

But they didn’t stop drawing on the Renaissance tradition there. You can experience fragrance profiling based on your temperament and bodily state, taken its lead from the Renaissance belief in the Greek physician Hippocrates’s four ‘humours’: blood, yellow bile, black bile and phlegm (!), and their influence on the body and its emotions. So when you sit down for your profiling, you may both decide that a bright, hot and dry fragrance is best suited if your ‘humour’ is phlegmatic (that’s grumpy, wet, sad or irritable!)

Taste also plays a big part in the Renaissance fragrance prescriptions; it was common to create sweets that acted as medicines filled with essential oils and herbs to cure you. LUSH expands on this, prescribing a sweet and flavoured sugar cube which turns into a (quite frankly delicious) tea, with dry ice for fun and dramatic effect. It is enjoyed while fragrances are personally selected for you from the collection, based on your preferences and needs.

This in itself is a very fun and surprisingly revealing experience, My own fragrance prescription was cult classic LUSH fragrance Cocktail, to dampen my choleric nature (those humours again!), in the hope of achieving more balance. It is a very modern approach to selecting fragrance, and a fun way to draw on ancient traditions to arrive at a fragrance partly chosen to delight the senses, partly chosen to promote wellbeing. A thoroughly inspiring way to choose fragrance, in a whole new way.

The LUSH Perfume Library is a treasure trove of fragrance – and actually rather hard to leave. Dedicated to LUSH’s longstanding mission to inject fun and magic into smell and the senses, we know it will spark joy into anyone who passes through its doors. And if you are lucky enough to be in Florence, make sure you explore this Library. Jump into a fragrance shower, peruse the fragrance conveyor belt – because no one does a fragrance experience quite like LUSH!

Via dei Calzaiuoli, 94, 50123 Florence, Italy

Visit the website here

By Victoria Evans

Jonathan Ward

Fragranced candles don’t get much hotter than Jonathan Ward‘s… metaphorically speaking, of course, but we were wowed from the very first time we smelled them.

You see, British candle maker and fragrant auter, Jonathan Ward, likes to do things differently. Having begun in the fashion world and created fragrances for others, Ward crossed over to the light side with his own fragranced candle house at last, and now has perfumistas filling their own homes with his scents.

As you might imagine, we’ve had our noses on a fair few scented candles in our time. The Perfume Society offices are contstantly aglow (candle-light is so flattering to the features, don’t you think? Especially when you’ve lost that post-holiday glow!) and currently we have Halcyonic wafting its magic. Inspired by the Bright Young Things of the ‘roaring 20s’, we felt it was just the thing to have burning after watching the Downton Abbey film. And as you’ll see, below, even the wayhe describes the notes feels like the an entire world and cast of characters, captured in scent…

Top
Steam Iron Lapel, Smoked Lipstick Kiss, Tea Rose, Amber
Heart
Crab Apple, Honeysuckle, Prickle Pear, Wet Jasmine
Base
Black Amber, Black Salt, Tuxedo Musks

Fragrance expert Stephan Matthews regularly cites Ward’s creations among his favourite in the whole world  (and as we know, there’s a lot of candles out there!) and recently caught up with this coolest of candle makers to discover his scented heritage. We Wear Perfume, meanwhile, fell madly for the literary and mythological inspirations behind the brand, waxing lyrical (sorry, couldn’t resist) about the ‘complex and captivating stories for his artful scented candle collection that are akin to miniature novels.’

Indeed, these are no ordinary candles – Ward creates scented spaces into which we can escape at the flick of a flame. He likes to ‘…ignite the olfactory legacies bequeathed by artists, visionaries, prophets and poets—bringing fresh light to their thoughts and ideas.’

Where we think these candles excel is the fragrances have just as much complexity (and time spent on them) as a bottle of personal perfume. In fact, Ward admitted to We Wear Perfume that he sometimes dabs a bit of the fragrance oils he composes for the candles behind his ears, apparently even combing a bit through his beard! But be in no doubt: here’s a man who takes the compositions of these scents really, really seriously.

Another point of difference is the added benefit of the candles being completely clean-burning – Ward is one of the founders in the promotion of natural waxes, with the wicks attached using an artisan candle technique that fixes them without using glue or resin.

When Jonathan asked if we’d like to learn how to create your – completely bespoke – candle we leaped at the chance. And now you can join us

We’re not talking about pouring some already created scent into some wax and adding a wick, here. We mean blending your own custom scent using professional perfumer’s accords, then practice making your very own candle; from mixing the oils to pouring the wax it’ll be a hands-on experience (and a new life skill).

The workshop will be led by the immensely talented Jonathan Ward himself, who will undoubtedly share invaluable candle-related knowledge throughout the day. This will be an unforgettable workshop where guests will enjoy refreshments and take home their personally scented Jonathan Ward candle, along with being offered an incredibly generous and exclusive discount of 15% off Jonathan Ward products on the day.

Tickets for this unique day’s custom candle course are £65 and can be purchased here:

Saturday 5th October 2019
Times: 11.00 am – 2:00 pm
Venue: Johnathan Ward Candle Studio, Regent Studios, 8 Andrews Rd, London E8 4QN

By Suzy Nightingale

A magnificent five!

We thought our wishlist was complete until we discovered these five new perfume launches…!

DIOR
J’ADORE ABSOLU
When creating this new twist on Dior’s iconic J’adore, perfumer François Demachy recounts: ‘I wanted the full intensity of jasmine to shine through. It is animalic, fruity and brimming with sunshine.’ So he fused jasmine sambac with sun-drenched Grasse jasmine, garlanding the duo of white flowers in in orange flower and rose, for ‘more nectar-like, lush accents’, adding a whisper of magnolia absolute. (Do watch out for the fah-bu-lous Charlize Theron ad, too.)
£81 for 50ml eau de parfum
dior.com

ESTEE LAUDER
BEAUTIFUL BELLE
Beautiful Belle is ‘inspired by today’s modern bride, who challenges tradition, making her own rules in love and life.’ We’d say the first rule to break is that you need to be a bride to plight your troth to this addictive floral Ambrée, effervescing with lychee, rose petals, pear blossom, mimosa, orange flower and gardenia, closed by layers of Ambrox, orris absolute, a blush suede accord and an unexpected twist in the tail of marzipan musk.
From £52 for 30ml eau de parfum
esteelauder.co.uk

TIFFANY
EAU DE PARFUM INTENSE
This is a richer – and yes, more va-va-voom – version of 2017’s long-awaited Tiffany launch, now a global bestseller. In the same diamond-faceted flacon, it echoes the original with notes of green mandarin, pink peppercorn and fields of iris, summoning its strength from the pulsing sensuality of benzoin and amber which underpins the construction. What else makes this special – and seasonally perfect – is the option to personalise the bottle with custom engraving, exclusively on the Tiffany website.
£57 for 30ml eau de parfum intense
tiffany.co.uk

VALEUR ABSOLUE
HARMONIE ESSENTIELLE
Inspired by cherished memories of childhood, this sways around the joyous central note of neroli, an ingredient renowned for its simultaneous ability to soothe and uplift the senses, harmoniously blended with bergamot and a deeply addictive vanilla. Harnessing the belief in the beneficial properties of amethyst stones to further calm the soul, fans of Valeur Absolue’s vegan scent collection will be thrilled to learn the new Valeur Absolue trio – in which this features – is organically-certified, too.
£66 for 50ml eau de parfum
valeurabsolue.com


ÉDITIIONS DE PARFUMS FRÉDÉRIC MALLE
DAWN
The counterpoint to Frédéric Malle‘s Night – which was first unveiled exclusively in the Middle East, where its oudh-iness went down a storm – Carlos Benaïm now turns his attention to the start of the day, again using that traditional Arabic note as the pivot point. The signature agarwood heart is ‘orbited’ by pink pepper, cedar, labdanum and frankincense, with a sea of Turkish rose offering ‘an ode to dawn’s rich colours’.
£550 for 50ml eau de parfum
At Harrods

We’re celebrating 40,00 times over!

We’re over the moon that The Perfume Society just notched up 40,000 fragrant followers on Instagram. (Above, see some of our most-liked posts.) And we’d like to celebrate with you with a very special offer!

For 40 hours (from 1 p.m. on Wednesday 7th November to 7 a.m. on Friday 9th November), when you spend £40 on perfumesociety.org, you can take advantage of a 15% discount on anything you buy – our own Discovery Boxes, our portfolio of boxes from fabulous fragrance houses, print copies of The Scented Letter and more.

We also invite you to join our band of #Insta followers, if you aren’t already one of them – find us @theperfumesociety, or just click here.

Just use this code at checkout: INSTA40

New! Tom Daxon Discovery Collection Two!

As Collection One has been so well-loved, we couldn’t resist bringing you a second set of the wonderful Tom Daxon fragrances. This time, it celebrates the woody and darker fragrances that we think are perfect for the colder months.

Tom Daxon is a rising star in British fragrance, championing scents inspired by the ingredients themselves. Tom grew up around fragrance; his mother – creative director for a leading fragrance and cosmetics name for over 30 years – ‘would often give me new shower gels to try, fragrances to sniff.’ So it was no surprise that by his mid-twenties, this perfume prodigy had already launched his own signature fragrance collection – which we invite you to explore.

This Discovery Collection features five x generous 4.5ml sprays (see below for details), allowing you to discover, explore and enjoy the exciting second instalment of the Tom Daxon range at your own pace.The five incredible scents featured in the Discovery Collection Two are:

VSOP – VSOP recreates an impossibly seductive setting in which cognac is being drunk, via a green citrus top note which melts into a simmering warm base of spices, woods, musks and a cognac accord.

Riven Oak – layers of smooth woods. A heart of oakwood absolute – rich, sophisticated – is lifted with bergamot and pimento berries and refined with rum, amber, and vetiver.

Vachetta – all the notes of leather; amplified. A Lapsang Souchong accord – smoky, dark and delicately spiced – combines with a bright heart of jasmine for floral lightness.

Sicilian Wood – a citrus grove warming in the sun. An effervescent, hyper-real citrus top note settles into a base of seductive woods.

Resin Sacra – constructed around the captivating frankincense: the only ingredient that smells both sensual and ecclesiastical at the same time. In addition to embracing its resinous nature with benzoin and cistus, a suede accord was added for heightened tactility.

 

Feel the Mugler AURA as 'botanical meets animal'

ANGEL, ALIEN, A*MEN and now… AURA. Invited to the press launch of Thierry Mugler‘s latest perfume in the alliteratively fragrant lineup, we just had to sniff out this place where ‘botanical meets animal’, all housed in the most gloriously decadent green bottle that resembles something from The Wizard of Oz’s Emerald City.
Intrigued? Join us as we get up close and personal in a steamily-scented jungle…
Created by the fantastically talented foursome of perfumers, Daphné Bugey, Marie Salamagne, Amandine Marie and Jean-Christophe Hérault, working together on the project under Mr. Mugler’s guidance; this is the first major new fragrance launch for Mugler since Womanity in 2010. No wonder the perfume world has been holding its breath in anticipation of this latest – Mugler are known for their groundbreaking (some may even say deliciously weird) perfumes that cause olfactory ripples and, eventually, become absolute icons.

Mugler describe the new fragrance as being a place ‘…where animal dominance meets the power of plants. A divine, new concept of femininity – a call to follow your instinct and obey your senses, to tap into your deepest desires and unleash the inner force waiting to break free.’ Well, goodness. But what exactly does Aura smell like? To be honest, we’re just not entirely sure! Greenly sweet yet freshly smoky, it’s an harmoniously blended scent that’s difficult to define and a definite all-day wrist-sniffer your nose keeps going back to for another hit of gorgeous peculiarity.
Let’s try to nail this down…
Thierry Mugler says: ‘Aura is the irresistible charm unleashed by the fragrance’s allure…’
The tang of rhubarb leaf melts into the intriguingly named – and rather mysterious – ingredient named ‘tiger liana’. Trying to pin down exactly what this magical note may be proves tricky as it’s a top-secret and apparently never used before in perfumery, but having assiduously sniffed, we think the uniquely green woodiness must be (in part) down to this… But the surprises aren’t done with, yet, for a soft breeze of orange blossom seemingly floats above a cannopy of trees before plunging down to the creaminess of bourbon vanilla and earthily smooth and fur-coat like warmth (and exclusive molecule) ‘Wolfwood’ in the base. A hazy sap-laden mist that swoops and glides, this is something you absolutely have to smell – and give time for the oddness to kick-in. Perhaps not a room-filling perfume bomb that will divide the crowds in the way ANGEL and ALIEN certainly have – there’s perhaps a less obvious, deep level of olfactory intrigue at play here, and one that’s well worth your while exploring…

Thierry Mugler AURA from £49 for 30ml eau de parfum
Available nationwide from 30 June 2017
Written by Suzy Nightingale

Perfume: A Sensory Journey Through Contemporary Scent opens at Somerset House… follow your nose!

The perfume world has been abuzz with news of the Somerset House summer exhibition –always a treat, this one had fragrance fans practically fainting with pleasure at the mere prospect…
Perfume: A Sensory Journey Through Contemporary Scent seeks to explore modern perfumery in an artistic setting – bringing together (hashtag alert) #PerfumePioneers renowned for their challenging, ground-breaking work. Treated to a press preview yesterday, we packed into the East Wing Galleries and couldn’t wait to follow our noses…

10 landmark fragrances greet visitors in the first room of the show

Somerset House say: ‘These pivotal perfumers have been carefully selected by Curator Claire Catterall and Lizzie Ostrom, the fragrance writer also known as Odette Toilette, for the creativity and ingenuity they bring to their work. Whether self-taught or classically trained, each perfumer within the exhibition challenges a long-held convention in scent-design – from creation and communication, to gender and good taste – pushing their craft in daring olfactory directions.’
The 10 perfume provocateurs in the exhibition are a veritable who’s-who of contemporary perfume: Daniella Andrier, Mark Buxton, Bertrand Duchaufour, Olivia Giacobetti, Lyn Harris, Antoine Lie, David Seth Moltz, Geza Schoen, Andy Tauer and Killian Wells… We could list all the perfumes featured but don’t want to spoil your scented surprise, because as you walk in you’re handed a blank sheet for impressions. And knowing what they are definitely shapes your impressions.
The room setting for Daniela Andrier’s Purple Rain for Prada

So what can you expect? Well, again, we don’t want to give too much away – this truly is an exhibition where you need to encounter the scents first hand (well, nose). But during your fragrant travels you will encounter rooms reflecting the inspirations of the scents in their design – from the heat of the desert to the wild Scottish Highlands, with a lover’s boudoir (ooh la la!) followed by a trip to a Catholic confessional, and even a water theme-park! Each fragrance is experienced in a differing, uniquely interactive way, and taken out of context (with no bottles or perfume notes guide) you really are forced to challenge your expectations and concentrate on the smell alone.
It’s not all about the newness, though. Homage is paid to the classic perfumes that have shaped the way we feel about fragrance, fittingly arrayed in the first room you come to – an olfactory time-travel through ten of the most trailblazing scents of the time, one for each decade of the 20th Century.  Beginning with the legendary L’Origan de Coty (1905) – a hallmark perfume, now out of circulation, but specially recreated by Coty for the exhibition – this whisk through the ages ends with ck one (1994), the original ‘unisex’ fragrance that gave us the whole ‘clean’ scent trend.
An original bottle of Coty’s iconic L’Origan

At the end of the exhibition there’s even a mini perfumers’ lab, complete with noses going about their business of carefully creating fragrances, weighing the materials and more than happy to explain the process and let you sniff as they do.
A working Givaudan lab has been transplanted to Somerset House

Following our noses all the way to glorious gift shop, we must admit swooning somewhat at the plethora of perfume books, scented postcards (genius idea!) fragranced pens – with, we’re delighted to report, many of the fragrances available to buy.
Blogger/journalist Persolaise makes sure to exit via gift shop

If the world of fragrance used to be a stuffy old secretive place, we believe the past few years have seen a tide-change, with perfumers stepping out from their laboratories and becoming superstars in their own right. The Somerset House exhibition is a fragrant tour de force that continues this wave of accessibilty: the very ethos of The Perfume Society, in fact!
The organisers worked in association with Coty and Peroni Ambra, with additional support from Givaudan and Liberty London – clearly many hours (weeks, months… years!) have gone in to making this a feast for all the senses.
We cannot urge you enough to go along and sniff for yourself.
Perfume: A Sensory Journey Through Contemporary Scent 21st June – 17th September 2017/tickets £11 (or £9 concessions)
Somerset House, East Wing Galleries
Written by Suzy Nightingale
Pictures by Jo Fairley
A confessional has been created for Bertrand Duchaufour’s incense-rich Avignon

Paints and a classroom have been chosing as the setting for Andy Tauer L’Air du Désert Marocain