Fragrances For… fall-ing in love with autumn

Hailed as ‘the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’, the start of autumn means golden sunlight, soft cashmere sweaters and a chance to snuggle up in scents that take a cosier turn. We’re hailing these new-season scents as a reason to celebrate fall (see what we did, there?) in love with some new fragrances again…

FLORIS
GOLDEN AMBER

Just 200 bottles have been hand-poured of this limited edition, portraying a summer stay at La Garda – ‘the home of ever-changing sunlight, the aperitif lifestyle, and the picturesque destination for many legendary Floris customers.’ Freshly amber-y, it bursts open with cassis and bergamot, with milky fig and sparkling aqua notes, riffled by a breeze of flowers and with an ambery finale of tonka, patchouli, almond blossoms and sandalwood that’s warm, wonderful and wearable.
£200 for 100ml eau de parfum
florislondon.com

 

 

FURLA
Preziosa
A glorious first collection of fragrances from the renowned Italian luxury goods house, the elegant curvature of the bottles is based on the arch of their historic 18th-century HQ in Bologna. This one’s a stunning saffron and pink pepper atop rose and geranium in the heart, but it’s the base that will have you swooning – creamy yet never too sweet vanilla caressed by chocolate-y suede. We adore the 10ml & 30ml sizes, too.
From £17 for 10ml eau de parfum
next.co.uk

 

 

JULIETTE HAS A GUN
Pear Inc.

A twist of muskiness and juicy yet crisp pear, another element we found prominent here is the milky heart (milk fragrances, too, are trending of late), laced with Ambroxan for a distinctly modern touch. Neither totally green or fresh due to the gauzy gourmand vibe throughout, it’s ‘a heavenly fragrance evoking happiness, sunny days and positivity,’ which founder Romano Ricci wanted to be ‘like the promise of a beautiful summer.’ (or autumn, we feel – seasons being interchangable now!)
£85 for 50ml eau de parfum
harveynichols.com

 

 

VAN CLEEF & ARPELS
Orchid Leather
You may think you know leather, but you’ve not yet smelled this, which conjures up a supple, almost silken floral around that note. The vanilla bean (fruit of the orchid) here feels lithe and smoky, while cardamom and plum deliver opulence – but there’s something animalic, too, a subtle snarl tangled amidst the cistus and a swirl of incense in the base. We’d also adore this on a man’s skin.
£130 for 75ml eau de parfum
harrods.com

 

SALVATORE FERRAGAMO
Intense Leather
Surging with freshness then taking an unexpected twist into supple, sensuous leather, perfumer Antoine Maisondieu fuses summer’s sparkling mandarin and crisp apple with flecks of pink peppercorn’s fizz. The heart sings of spring, meanwhile – lily of the valley’s verdancy dusted with a sprinkle of orris – and proving a scent for all seasons, the base is a warm autumnal hug of nuzzle-worthy oakmoss and musk. Beneath it all the leather invites caress, closeness, all you’ve been missing…
£56 for 50ml eau de parfum
ferragamo.com

Fragrances For… The Last of the Summer Sunshine

Last of the Summer Sunshine? Well the last few days the weather’s actually been more ‘summer’ like than it has been for several weeks! As the last days of summer slip into autumn’s more golden light, it can be hard to mark where one season ends and another begins – these fragrances are filled with a glorious luminousity that captures those gilded days and helps us cling to the sunshine a while longer…

 

 

 

GUERLAIN
Aqua Allegoria Flora Salvaggia
Who hasn’t fantasised about running through a meadow of wildflowers, wind in our hair? That’s the vibe that Guerlain seek to evoke with this second of 2021’s Aqua Allegoria, composed to conjure up the ‘poetry’ of the scent of wild flora, lifted by a drift of clean musks. We know many a collector of these Guerlain creations, who’ll be thrilled to add this gilded bottle (with its lavender-tinted juice) to their summer scent wardrobe.
From £69 for 75ml eau de toilette
guerlain.com

 

 

HOLLISTER
Canyon Escape For Her
Another trend we’re noticing in fragrances this year is a shimmering sunrise of desert-themed scents – the olfactory oasis here blooming with rose, orange blossom and dusty iris, freshened up top with juicy mandarin, blood orange and a ripple of cool cactus, smoothed beneath by cedarwood and a soft waft of musk. We imagine sun-blushed skin, floral crowns and the glamorous yet laid-back escapism of the Californian desert while sniffing this so-happy scent.
£16.50 for 100ml eau de parfum
very.co.uk 

 

NARCISO RODRIGUEZ
Narciso Eau Neroli Ambrée
Neroli is one of the most instantly sunshine-y, happy-making notes on the scentscape (we took an office poll last year, and it came out on top for evoking bright light and happy, holiday memories). The brilliant Aurélien Guichard packs pleasure into every spritz, here – a veritable whoosh of optimism, tempered with comfort, in this slinky, silky dream. Orange blossom and soft woods sigh contentedly to the so-iconic white musk trail.
£65 for 50ml eau de parfum
johnlewis.com

 

CALVIN KLEIN
Eternity Men Summer
If you couldn’t get away this year, this really feels like a holiday in a bottle. Evoking the unique air temperature of a summer’s dawn, the airy exhilaration of bergamot oil sparkles like the first fingers of sunlight illuminating the sea, the glittering waves bringing coconut water and a smooth, creamy breeze of Australian sandalwood – and you’ll be glad to know this precious ingredient was sustainably sourced. Eternity always feels like a perfect summer’s day, bottled forever.
£60 for 100ml eau de toilette
superdrug.com

 

PARFUMS DE MARLY
Greenley
A distinctly greener vibe for this much-loved niche house, bringing the feeling of a Cologne but with the benefit of far greater staying power in a concentrated eau de parfum. Bursting with citrus up top, the petitgrain grants an immediate freshness, a fruity interpretation of cashmere wood fused with crisp apple and the shady cool of violet. Amberwood ripple throughout, making this feel like a much-needed stroll through the woodlands when you need to escape.
£160 for 75ml eau de parfum
harrods.com

 

Bertrand Duchaufour – A Working Nose

As part of our ongoing Working Nose series, we were thrilled to meet up with one the busiest and most talented of perfumers – the incredible Bertrand Duchaufour.

We met with Bertrand at the launch of a new trio of fragrances for Miller Harris, for whom he created Hidden (On the Rooftops) as part of the Forage collection. Inspired by urban foraging and the joy of happenstance, these scents focus on seldom used ingredents which we may overlook or even tread on as we traverse our cities.

Miller Harris chose Bertrand along with fellow perfumer Mathieu Nardin (who made Lost (In the City) and Wander (Through the Parks), and you can read Part One of our perfumer interviews with Mathieu, here.

I began by asking Bertrand how he went about translating an original brief into a final perfume. How does that alchemical process actually begin…?

Bertrand Duchaufour: ‘Well this is my interpretation of foraging, and I think the original concept was to take the idea of humans foraging – you know, wandering through parks and gardens in cities and coming across this incredible array of plants, herbs and flowers we don’t normally stop to look at. In fact we came to London with the Miller Harris team and went foraging with a professional forager. It was really very eye-opening to take this practical trip as a creative exercise.’

So, did you end up using ingredients in Hidden that you’d never used before?

‘No not really, but here’s the interesting thing – although I’ve used all these ingredients previously, it depends on the way you work with them, how you make your accords, what else you put them with, and then you can make new smells that replicate the ones you were inspired by. As a perfumer it’s not always a matter of just writing a list of ingredients you come across and then using them to re-create a scene, because often that doesn’t work.

I try to translate certain plants and herbs I found, the smell that came from scrunching up their leaves, and it was really quite amazing to try and accomplish this. Foraging for me was something completely different, and for this fragrance I tried to look at it from the perspective of a bee. I imagine the route the bee takes, all the flowers they visit in that area. It’s a bee’s eye view of a city!’

‘I only recognised one plant I could eat while foraging, the Wild Garlic, which we also have in France – and I used that to make a homemade pesto!’

Why do you think we so often overlook the plants growing around us and think of exotic ingredients for fragrances?

‘Well I guess we are just not that curious! We tread on them almost every day, but we worship the expensive materials we don’t have access to.’

Do you have a set routine for working on a fragrance, or does this change depending on the project?

‘Too much focusing on just one project is never good as a perfumer, you get lost in it and can’t see clearly anymore. Spending all day long on one fragrance is not healthy. I’m always working on many things at the same time. Sometimes you just happen on an idea, it comes to you just like that [snaps his fingers] and those ideas are usually the best!’

Are there visual stimuli used to help with the creation of each perfume?

‘Sometimes yes, sometimes no. For Miller Harris they gave me a moodboard made up of photographs, and this is a starting point, I found it very inspiring because ideas start to form in your head right away. It gave me the idea of having the bee’s eye view, foraging from the bees, just from the photographs. I thought that because honey can taste very different depending on where the bee forages, the same should be true of this fragrance.’

Do you prefer to get up early in the morning to begin?

[Bertrand looks utterly aghast at the word “prefer” in regards to getting up early, so I modify the question as ‘Is there a time of day you work best?’]

‘Again, it depends with each project. I have so little time to just sit and think, so there is no going for a long walk to find my muse or anything like that! I work on perhaps twenty or thirty different fragrances at once, so sometimes you just have to get your head down and get on with it.’

People have the idea that any creative person must use the luxury of time to be inspired…

‘Maybe Jean-Claude Ellena can use the luxury of time – you know, wandering around his garden – especially now he is retired, but the majority of perfumers cannot!’

Miller Harris seem very good at allowing perfumers to interpret the brief in their own way. How do you find working like that?

‘It’s a different way of beginning, certainly, and really interesting, but in the end you still have to go through the same process, and so I always work the same way. You have a concept, and there are many ways to interpret even one word of a brief, or the way you are inspired by a picture. I like to talk about synaesthesia, the way these things cross over in our senses, the millions of ways we can each translate something. Synaesthesia is the art of making correspondence between one expression of a sense to another one, and it’s not that easy. For me a patchouli, for example, might be likened to violet or something purple. I might be convinced of that, but Mathieu might have a completely different idea. It always has to be personal.’

Miller Harris say: ‘High above the city, London is home to countless hives of diligent honeybees. A whoosh of fresh honeyed floralcy leads you to the crisp green privet of a HIDDEN rooftop garden. The hazy yellow sun warms new flowers, motes of pollen and seed buds dance lazily.’

Top notes: Bergamot, lime, angelica seeds, violet leaf absolute, clary sage, red berries, black pepper
Heart notes: syringa, privet flower, pollen, honey, honeysuckle, Turkish rose oil, tea
Base notes: vetiver, ambergris, sandalwood, driftwood, musk

Miller Harris Hidden (On the Rooftops) £95 for 50ml eau de parfum
millerharris.com

Written by Suzy Nightingale