Experimental Perfume Club Archives

Osmanthus: The Charming Blossom That Wraps the Senses

There are flowers that dazzle, and there are flowers that comfort. Osmanthus belongs to the latter — a blossom that doesn’t seek the spotlight, yet lingers in memory long after more flamboyant notes have faded. In perfumery, it is treasured not for volume but for nuance: a quietly radiant ingredient that feels like the enduring warmth of a cashmere throw.

Native to Asia, particularly cherished in China where it perfumes courtyards and teas alike, Osmanthus fragrans produces tiny ivory or golden flowers with an unexpectedly expansive aroma. Stand beneath a blooming tree and you might first notice a soft apricot sweetness drifting on the air. Lean closer and the fragrance deepens: ripe peach skin, honeyed petals, a suggestion of suede or well-worn leather, and a faintly green, tea-like freshness. It is at once fruity and floral, luminous yet gently grounded.

This duality is precisely what makes osmanthus so compelling in perfumery.

Unlike more assertive white florals, osmanthus does not overwhelm. Instead, it settles into a composition with a tender glow, diffusing warmth through the heart of a scent. Perfumers often turn to it when they seek to create a feeling of intimacy — that elusive sense of closeness between fragrance and skin. Osmanthus seems to melt into the wearer, its apricot tones softening sharper edges, its suede-like undertones adding depth without heaviness.

There is something inherently cocooning about the note. Perhaps it is the way its fruity facets recall sun-warmed orchards and late summer afternoons, or the way its tactile nuances hint at the fuzzy naps of suede and velvet. In fragrance, osmanthus often acts like an accommodating lining: invisible at first glance, yet essential to the experience. It smooths transitions between top and heart, between brightness and base, lending a seamless, enveloping quality to the whole.

Its versatility is another quiet marvel. In floral compositions, osmanthus enhances rose or jasmine with a whisper of nectar, adding dimension without turning syrupy. In woody or amber structures, it brings a tender fruitiness that feels sophisticated rather than gourmand. Even in tea-inspired creations, it can echo the gentle tannic quality of black or oolong tea, reinforcing a sense of calm and contemplation.

The material itself — osmanthus absolute — is precious. The blossoms are small and delicate, requiring careful handling to capture their scent. The resulting extract is richly complex, with facets that reveal themselves slowly over time. On blotter and on skin, it unfolds in waves: first luminous and peach-like, then honeyed and softly animalic, before settling into a warm, almost hazy glow.

Emotionally, osmanthus fragrances feel reassuring. They don’t demand attention; they invite you inward. In a world of bold statements and dramatic sillage, osmanthus offers something different: intimacy, subtlety, and a gentle embrace. It is the olfactory equivalent of lamplight on a dusky evening — golden, soothing, and deeply human.

For those who seek perfumes that comfort as much as they captivate, osmanthus remains one of perfumery’s most poetic treasures. A blossom that bridges fruit and flower, brightness and warmth, it wraps itself around the senses — and, quietly, around the heart.

Acqua di Parma Signatures Of The Sun Osmanthus is a radiant study in texture and light. Apricot-tinged osmanthus unfurls with velvety sweetness, brushed by citrus sparkle and a whisper of green. As it settles, fresh peony and soft musks glow like late afternoon sun. Refined yet joyful, it feels impeccably tailored, offering effortless elegance with a modern, understated Italian ease. Chic, poised, and quietly addictive from the very first spray.

£257 for 100ml eau de parfum libertylondon.com

Bentley Beyond the Collection Radiant Osmanthus is a cheerful, sunlit fragrance that feels like spring in a bottle. Bright osmanthus blossoms shimmer with juicy apricot and soft citrus brightness, poised between fresh and gourmand. There’s a creamy warmth that wraps around tactile woods and velvety musk, giving it a sophisticated yet light-hearted edge. Elegant without trying too hard, this is a radiant, feel-good scent that lifts the spirit with every wear.

£165 for 100ml eau de parfum harrods.com

Experimental Perfume Club Jasmine Osmanthus is a lustrous duet that feels handcrafted and joyous. Creamy, solar jasmine meets soft, apricot-kissed osmanthus in a fragrant harmony that’s both elegant and lively. A delicate citrus lift keeps it fresh, while warm frangipani and tiaré add a sensuality. Light yet richly textured, it dances beautifully on skin—refined, wearable and quietly uplifting, a perfect memory of sun drenched holidays.

From £35 for 10ml eau de parfum experimentalperfumeclub.com

Ormonde Jayne Osmanthus is an intriguing, graceful bloom with real personality. The peachy-tinged osmanthus unfurls with a nuance of fresh citrus and green notes, polished by soft, elegant woods. It’s beautifully balanced—neither too sweet nor overly heavy—but rather fresh and effortless, like dewy spring morning. Subtle musk and a hint of spice lend depth without overwhelming. A sophisticated, modern take on a floral classic.

From £50 for 10ml ormondejayne.com

Oman Luxury Belfiore feels like a sunlit stroll through a blooming orchard. It opens with a sprightly burst of apricot sweetness lifted by an earthy carrot subtlety, leading into a soft floral heart where osmanthus and gardenia dance with gentle charm. As it warms, suede and oakmoss lend a lush, grounded warmth, with honeyed undertones that feel both sumptuous and comforting. Luxurious, stylish and quietly dignified.

£150 for 100ml eau de parfum jovoyparis.uk

Fragrances For Winter Sports

Going for Gold: Matching Winter Sports Events to Fragrance

There’s something about Winter Sports that feels inherently perfumed. The bite of cold air, the hush of snow underfoot, the metallic scrape of blades on ice—these are sensations that live close to scent memory. At The Perfume Society, we’re forever matching moments to molecules, and what better spectacle to scent-pair than the drama, precision and poetry of winter sport?

From the adrenaline rush of alpine skiing to the quiet intensity of curling, each event has its own tempo, texture and emotional register. Here’s how we’d bottle them.

Alpine Skiing & Snowboarding – Montblanc Vetiver Glacier

This is speed, attitude, and crystalline air. Alpine skiing and snowboarding are all about courage—speeding down mountainsides with nerves of steel and lungs full of frozen oxygen. The scent match has to be sharp, bracing and quietly powerful.

Montblanc Vetiver Glacier fits the bill beautifully. Vetiver here is cool rather than earthy, polished rather than muddy, with a mineral freshness that feels like sunlight refracting off ice. There’s a sense of altitude in this fragrance: crisp woods, aromatic clarity, and a clean masculinity that doesn’t boast. Like a perfectly carved turn down a black run, it’s controlled, elegant, and thrilling all at once.

This is the smell of frost on goggles and the deep breath before the drop.

£130 for 125ml eau de parfum harveynichols.com

Curling – Kingdom Scotland Albaura

Curling is the thinking person’s winter sport. It’s unhurried but intense, social yet strategic, and steeped in tradition. There’s also something wonderfully intimate about it—players leaning close, voices low, the rhythmic sweep of brushes across ice.

Kingdom Scotland’s Albaura captures that spirit with quiet confidence. Rooted in Scottish landscape and heritage, this fragrance feels warm, grounded and quietly soulful. Notes unfold gently, like a conversation that reveals more the longer it lasts. There’s softness here, but also resolve—much like the sport itself, where patience and precision trump brute force.

Albaura smells like history, camaraderie, and the comfort of multiple layers against the cold. It’s curling in olfactory form: skilful, nuanced, and deeply satisfying.

£140 for 50ml eau de parfum in our shop

Figure Skating – Versace Bright Crystal

If any sport demands sparkle, it’s figure skating. Sequins catch the light, blades trace calligraphy on ice, and emotion is written into every movement. This is theatre, artistry, and athleticism combined—and it calls for a fragrance with radiance and grace.

Versace Bright Crystal is pure elegance in motion. Luminous fruits and florals glide across the skin, creating a scent that feels airy, feminine and impossibly polished. There’s a softness here that mirrors the illusion of effortlessness, even though we know the strength and discipline beneath the surface.

Bright Crystal feels like a perfect spiral: light-filled, dazzling, and designed to be admired. It’s the scent equivalent of a flawless free skate—uplifting, emotional, and expressive.

From £61 for 30ml eau de toilette thefragranceshop.co.uk

Luge – Experimental Perfume Club Soleil d’Hiver

Luge is not for the faint-hearted. Athletes hurtle face up, feet-first down icy tracks at terrifying speeds, guided by instinct, muscle memory and nerve. It’s raw, elemental and strangely beautiful.

Experimental Perfume Club’s Soleil d’Hiver (“Winter Sun”) captures that tension between cold and warmth. There’s brightness here, but filtered through a blurred light—wind carving through a frozen landscape. The fragrance feels modern, abstract and quietly daring, much like the sport itself.

This is not a cosy winter scent. It’s challenging, luminous, and a little bit unsettling—in the best possible way. Soleil d’Hiver smells like adrenaline under snow, the flash of sunlight on ice at 90 miles per hour.

From £35 for 10ml eau de parfum experimentalperfumeclub.com

Ice Hockey – Wales Perfumery Iverni

Ice hockey is visceral. It’s speed and strength, teamwork and rivalry, noise and impact. The air in the rink is charged with energy, metal, sweat and cold—a heady mix that demands a bold, characterful fragrance.

Iverni by Wales Perfumery rises to the challenge. Named after the ancient people of Ireland, it has a rugged, outdoorsy soul that feels primal and alive. There’s freshness, yes, but also depth—something earthy and resilient beneath the surface.

This is a scent that can take a hit and keep going. It smells of winter landscapes, physical exertion, and hard-won victory. Just like ice hockey itself, Iverni is unapologetic, powerful, and deeply addictive.

From £27 for 7.5ml eau de parfum walesperfumery.com

The beauty of scent matching is that it allows us to experience familiar things in new ways. The sports played in winter may be fleeting, but with the right fragrance, the chill, the drama and the glory can linger long after the medals are won.

WIN online fragrance creation sessions with Experimental Perfume Club!

WIN the opportunity to create your own custom fragrances for you and your loved one!

Share the LOVE this Valentine’s Day by entering our incredible GIVEAWAY in collaboration with the Experimental Perfume Club! You and your chosen loved one will receive 2 x fragrance creation sets each and an exclusive online perfume blending session to enjoy together (worth a total of £360)!

What’s more, Emmanuelle Moeglin, Head Perfumer and Founder of Experimental Perfume Club, will personally be guiding you via an online session through the creation process to ‘find the fragrance that tells your story’, all from the comfort of your own home(s).

You’ll be in expert hands as Emmanuelle Moeglin trained at the French perfumery school of ISIPCA, worked as a Scent Design Manager for various global fragrance brands, and went on to become an independent perfumer, based in London. In 2016, with a desire to demystify the often confusing (and still quite closed) world of perfumery, she started the Experimental Perfume Club – a small but airy studio in London Fields, where she first developed workshops to help people understand scent better!

To be in with a chance of winning this amazing prize, enter your details and the details of the person you’d LOVE to share this experience with below…

GOOD LUCK!

T&Cs – This prize draw is open to residents of England, Scotland and Wales only and runs from 1pm on Monday 8th February 2021 to 23:59pm on Saturday 13th February 2021. A winner will be chosen and contacted on Sunday 14th February 2021. The winner will then liaise direct with Experimental Perfume Club to organise the timing of the video session; please allow up to 10 days for delivery of the kit. NB There is ONE joint online session for the winner and their chosen person; both of you will be sent the physical blending sets to use in the digital session. There is no cash alternative to this prize.

Experimental Perfume Club launch online perfumery course

One of the most frequently asked questions we get, is: ‘how can I learn to become a perfumer?’ And now, Experimental Perfume Club is launching a learn-at-home perfumery course, with all the equipment, materials and step by step instructions in online video tutorials! And there’s a FREE mini-course of three lessons – scroll down to find out more…

Emmanuelle Moeglin is a classically-trained (ISIPCA) French perfumer who moved to London and opened a workshop in order help people have access to materials and tuition that would either be incredibly expensive, or impossible to gather on your own. These workshops were so popular, it allowed Emmanuelle to create and launch her own signature fragrances – innovatively presented as perfume ‘Layers‘ that could be worn alone or mixed at home to achieve unique results.

But the Covid-19 pandemic has hit independent fragrance houses hard, so they’re having to innovate and try new things to survive. Explains Emmanuelle: ‘Like so many other brands, we’ve been impacted pretty badly by the crisis as 90% of our business was client facing and almost nothing online.’

Now, those workshops have been put online, so you can have the kit sent to you and learn at your own pace, from the comfort of your own home! With all the mateirals and tuition you need, this is a unique opportunity to take your love of fragrance and interest in perfumery further – perhaps even something that might make you consider a change of career when all this over…?

Available as a two-week / 12 lessons Fundamentals of Perfumery begginer’s course, you’ll have access to a series of how to and tutorial videos and a workbook that will help you awaken your sense of smell and develop an in-depth understanding of the most commonly used ingredients in perfumery. You’ll start by learning proper smelling techniques and how to accurately describe and categorize perfumery ingredients by family, volatility and type. You’ll then learn to compare and contrast these ingredients to deepen your understanding of the scented world around you. You will receive the ingredients you need to follow this course including a selection of 30 of the most commonly used perfumery ingredients and laboratory materials including scent strips, pipettes and bottles.

Or, you can choose to study a more advanced six-weeks / 36 lessons Fundamentals of Perfume Creation course. ‘During this 6-week course, you’ll be getting a series of videos and a workbook that will help you to understand the fundamentals of perfume creation and gain the knowledge to start creating fragrances. From the ingredients to the formula, you’ll be taken on a step-by-step learning journey that will give you the necessary information to get started in perfume creation – whether it is for a hobby or professional purpose.

Each week, you’ll receive a set of how-to videos, practical demos and theory courses to help you gain a broad understanding of the fundamentals of perfumery. You will start by awakening your sense of smell by learning to recognise, describe and organise a large selection of the most commonly used perfumery ingredients. You’ll then explore the fundamentals of professional perfumery practice including the basic equipment of perfumery and setting up your own laboratory at home. You will end the course by learning the creative process behind a fragrance brief and developing an in-depth knowledge of fragrance creation across a variety of applications by composing both simple and complex fragrance formulas.

You will receive all of the materials you need to follow this course including a wide selection of perfumery ingredients and the necessary lab equipment, including scent strips, a scale, pipettes, empty bottles, and solvent.’

Intrigued? We certainly are. And you’ll be glad to hear there’s a FREE mini taster session of THREE free classes online, so you can get a sense of what you’d be learning, and how it would work.

Whatever level you want to start at, you’ll come away with a new appreciation for the art of perfumery, for each fragrant ingredient you smell, and for the skill of the perfumers whose creations you spray every day. So why not take this as an opportunity to learn a new creative skill, and to distract yourself in the most pleasant was possible while adding another scented string to your bow…?

By Suzy Nightingale

Experimental Perfume Club’s bespoke fragrance space at Selfridges

Experimental Perfume Club have launched a LAYERS pop-up lab at Selfridges, London, where customers can now design their own bespoke fragrance from almost endless combinations and have it blended instore, just for them! It’s one space, but with two scent experiences – and it’s shaping the future of fragrance as we know it…

The Formula Library

How it works: ‘Create individual blends using our six LAYERS Eau de Parfums in multiple combinations, you can compose over 50,000 unique, personalised fragrances. Our LAYERS App features an in-house algorithm which enables us to understand your personal tastes, before recommending 3 possible formulae that match your unique olfactory profile. You can either choose your favourite blend from the shortlisted selection or customise the fragrance further with the help of our Fragrance Curator. Once you choose your final blend, our Fragrance Curator will formulate your unique fragrance in front of you. And, for the ultimate bespoke touch, you can choose a name for your fragrance and a personalised label for your 50ml bottle.’

The Refill Fountain

How it works: ‘Being eco-conscious has always been at the heart of what we do and we strive to source and manufacture responsibly. Our goal is to reduce unnecessary packaging and waste and enable loyal consumers to reuse their packaging again and again. Our first refill service will be available exclusively at the LAYERS lab at Selfridges, London. A place where you can reduce your carbon footprint by bringing back a bottle of your empty 50ml fragrance to be refilled for a reduced price. Looking after both your pennies and the planet.’

Emmanuelle Moeglin, founder and perfumer of Experimental Perfume Club, said: ‘We love to provide unique olfactory experiences for consumers who are becoming more and more invested in what goes into their products. The LAYERS pop-up lab will take our bespoke perfumery offering to the next level with more formula choice than ever before where customers will be guided in creating their own bespoke fragrance. We are also proud to be a company striving for sustainability with our perfume refills, and are one of only a few perfume brands offering this eco-friendly service.’

If you can’t make it to Selfridges to experience the fragrant fun first-hand, don’t fear! You can get the feel for layering up the fragrances in your own home by trying the Experimental Perfume Club Blending Boxes for £90 – fine fragrances to wear alone or blend at home to your own bespoke formula, with all ingredients and instructions included.

‘A set of three pocket fragrances and a personal blending bottle. Choose three fragrances from across the collections to customise your own fragrance; one Top, one Mid, one Base eau de parfum. Follow one of the suggested blends or let your imagination run fly!’

Crowdfund some fragrant fun with The Experimental Perfume Club

What we’ve been observing at The Perfume Society is a growing fascination with how perfumes are actually made. Mostly, that happens behind closed doors. But The Experimental Perfume Club, in London’s East End, invites you to take part in hands-on sessions which explain the technique, allow you to create your own perfume – and almost certainly, walk away more fascinated than ever, with an enhanced appreciation of professional perfumers and their art.
You can read more about our experiences at this innovative scent destination here. But now you’ve a chance to have a teeny scented stake in the future of this space, which was originally set up as a pop-up for six months by classically trained perfumer and fragrance expert Emanuelle Moeglin (she trained at ISIPCA).
To secure the future of the venture, to improve the breadth of materials available to students and to spread the word, Emanelle has now launched an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign, with various ‘benefits’ for supporters. Her target is £14,000 (at time of press, that was 66% funded) – although the dream would be to raise £20,000.

There’s just over a week to go for the campaign – so you’ve still a chance to back this Access Perfume Lab and take advantage of one of the many perks on offer…
For instance, if you pledge £15, you’ll receive an Experimental Perfume Club tote bag.
We can see that might not pique the interest of our community of dedicated sniffers, though – so you’ll want to know that £25 (plus shipping) will secure you The Budding Perfume-Making Kit, containing five x 2.5 ml vials of different ingredients, a 10ml empty bottle, pipettes and blotters. It comes with a card that details ingredients, together with ‘recipe’ ideas for at-home fragrance blending.
Or for £40 (plus shipping), there’s The Quirky Ingredient Set. As Emanuelle puts it, the box ‘contains 12 ingredients that have a quirky edge and not often used: incense oil, Iso Butyl Quinoline (tarmac), iris absolute, rose oxide (metallic rose), myrrh resinoid etc… They are diluted in alcohol, come with a booklet, pipettes and empty vials.’
The Perfume Lover Ingredient Set contains 16 vials of ingredients (seven naturals, eight aroma chemcicals), again with info about how to use them and suggested blends.
Or for £85 backing, you can enjoy an Apprentice Perfume Workshop, allowing you to delve into the world of ingredients and make a bespoke perfume from scratch at the Club’s HQ. It’s a saving of £10 on the usual price – so if this is something you’ve had in mind for a while, this seems like the perfect opportunity to support The Experimental Perfume Club and help them Indiegogo-go for it.
Click here for more info about the campaign.
experimentalperfumeclub.com
Written by Jo Fairley

Tag: Experimental Perfume Club