One of the changes brought about by the curtailment of travel during the past few years was that people actively started to look for new ways to experience unfamiliar locations and unexpected situations. Whether through literature, perfume or music, it opened the eyes of customers all around the world. Shopping local is still a cause to be championed, but shopping internationally also brings with it an added originality. This was the situation when I first discovered the Los Angeles based Ankermade. Their Machine Shop fragrance had been fantastic, so I had no option but to revisit the company and bask in their Cosmic Burn.
Unless you’ve been living on Mars you can’t have escaped the momentous decision taken by the BBC to cast a lady as the new Doctor Who. Well, the world is still spinning after Jodie Whittaker’s debut on Sunday 7th October but she isn’t really the first woman to try and conquer space and time. Earlier this year Marina Barcenilla released Out Of This World, a fragrance that brought together the scents of the universe along with a healthy dose of Marina’s imagination. A die hard Doctor Who fan, a space scientist, and an award-winning perfumer, I was curious to see whether Out Of This World would send me into orbit.
The idea of “giving back” is one that many companies attempt but, unfortunately, also one that can very easily miss the mark. In an era of “Corporate Social Responsibility” it’s become very fashionable to throw money at a cause and take the glory in a burst of publicity, but it’s much harder to create and manage a project that also has an educational aspect. The latest company to attempt this, undaunted, is Marina Barcenilla Parfums with their AromAtom project. Designed to educate and stimulate both children and adults in the field of astronomy using scent, just what DOES space smell like?
