Certain scents have an incredible way of whisking you straight back to your favourite summer holiday. A splash of coconut might remind you of sun cream on a golden beach, while salty sea notes bring back breezy walks along the coast. Juicy citrus can transport you to lazy afternoons in Italy, sipping fresh lemonade beneath orange trees, and tropical fruits instantly evoke poolside cocktails and warm evenings. Fragrance has a unique connection to memory, making it one of the easiest ways to relive those carefree moments. That’s why one spritz of Eau des Vacances from Fragonard can capture the feeling of sunshine and adventure.
The first perfume a company releases is often the fragrance that the creator has wanted to realise their whole life - whether that's the embodiment of a person, a place, or an emotive experience. It’s the releases that follow however that can cause the issues. Will the second, third or fourth be met with the same response, and is the inspiration strong enough? When Charles Wong launched Aurora back in 2019 he started gently but, over the following two fragrances, has grown in both scented drama and luxurious subjects. The fourth perfume in the collection takes us to the South East of France, and is as beautiful as its inspiration.
One of the roles that fragrance often plays is that of transporting the wearer to a different place or time. These real-life experiences may be out of our everyday reach, unless we have a time machine or a wealthy benefactor, and so indulging in some “armchair travel” really is the next best thing. Now, taking inspiration from a location or a particular period in history is nothing new, but achieving both the style as well as the substance is not always as easy as it may first appear. Thankfully it’s exactly what is on offer from Place des Lices, and their Poivre de Sichuan is ideal as we ease ourselves into autumn.
I think we can all agree that February is usually a month filled with thoughts of where we’ll be going on holiday during the summer or, if we’re lucky, locations for that quick escape over the Easter break. There are obviously still some pretty big hurdles to get over before there’s any chance of retreating to a sandy oasis of calm this year, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t close our eyes and indulge in a little bit of well deserved armchair travel. As we come out of the winter fragrance season there are plenty of sunny scents that can be reached for to simulate sunshine, and one of the finest is surely Acqua di Genova.
