THE PERFUME TRAIL TODAY
In 1970, 200 years after it opened as an apothecary, long-lost aromatic trade secrets were found at Woods Pharmacy in Windsor. After moving into the building, Roger and Kathleen Knowles found piles of rubbish which turned out to be books of ingredients. The British Library confirmed the collection dated to the 1770s.
By 1971, Woods of Windsor was selling potpourri and pomanders inspired by the rediscovered formulations, and by 1974 the brand was selling in Harrods and Liberty. The family sold the business in 2000 to Yardley’s.
Happily, in the 21st century, London’s perfume credentials show no sign of abating. A perfume trail today must also include modern houses like Dom De Vetta and Julie Massé’s Shay & Blue (80 York Street), Jo Malone (23 Brook Street), Selfridges (which has had a perfume hall since 1810), Harrods (home of Roja Dove Parfums), Liberty’s, Bloom (4 Langley
Court), Miller Harris (16 The Market) and Les Senteurs (the oldest independent perfumery) on Elizabeth Street, Belgravia. Newcomers are also opening shops, and Sloane Street is now home to Dar Alteeb, purveyors of luxury fragrances inspired by the Orient.
Perfume houses are still being founded, too. The late Angela Flanders established her perfumery in East London in 1985. After a successful career in costume design, she first made elegant potpourri before moving into perfumes. It all started with the chance discovery in an antiques shop of a book by a 19th-century perfumer, Septimus Piesse, which inspired her to make her own home fragrance.
Finally, Penhaligon’s is another must-see. Founded in 1870 by William Henry Penhaligon (who became barber and perfumer to Queen Victoria), the original Penhaligon’s was part of a hammam (Turkish bath) and unsurprisingly the first fragrance was “Hamman Bouquet” (1872), followed by “Blenheim Bouquet” (1902) – a citrus cologne enriched with eucalyptus, pine, musk and a massive dose of black pepper!
Penhaligon’s is the aristocrat of British perfumers, but has reimagined itself over its long history to survive volatile markets. In 2015 it launched fragrances inspired by the British countryside, and now makes the gin-inspired “Juniper Sling” and a scent influenced by the Savile Row tailors’ workshops. “Savoy Steam” was launched in 2017. The latest is “The Favourite” by Elena Knezhevich, inspired by the recent Oscar-winning film of that name.
The company’s luxury fragrances now come with courting tips and guides to flirting: A light splash of scent will ensure you create a fine impression on any social situation, and if elegance is your aim, you are advised to be always clean-shaven. Stubble rash doesn’t become a lady or a gentleman!
You learn such things following London’s perfume trail and sniffing out the sources of England’s aromas. Long may their scent linger!
AFOREMOST social critic and reformer who entertained live audiences with readings or recitals, a letter writer par excellence, a celebrity before the word had been invented, and someone who had a literary term named after him: he was all of these things. Oh, and he was a pretty talented novelist, too. His name was Charles John Huffam Dickens (1812-70), and as this year marks the 150th anniversary of his death, it’s time to consider the life of this remarkable individual.
Dickens was born at Landport, a small suburb of Portsmouth, in the spring of 1812 and the small terraced house in Old Commerical Street has been restored and is now a museum. He was the second child of John and Elizabeth, who went on to have a further five children. Charles’s father was a clerk in the Navy pay office, attached to Portsmouth dockyard. John, and therefore the family, was transferred to London in 1814, then Chatham in 1816, where Charles, already an avid reader, began his schooling.
By 1822, the family was in financial trouble as John had lost his position at Chatham and consequently most of his income. A small house in Camden Town, London, awaited but John was soon arrested for debt and carted off to the Marshalsea prison.
To help the family survive, the young Charles went out to work in 1824 at a shoe polish factory. It was near today’s Charing Cross railway station. While the young boy was busily pasting labels on jars of shoe polish and making the four-mile journey from and to his bedroom in
Camden Town, he dreamed of being a writer. The fact he was not privileged makes his achievements all the greater.
His father’s incarceration at Marshalsea scarred the consciousness of the impressionable youngster. But Dickens taught himself shorthand and caught up on lost time by reading at the British Library. Aged 16, he became a reporter at a society of lawyers, but it wasn’t until he was 22 that he finally got permanent
MAJOR WORKS
1836 – The Pickwick Papers
1838 – Oliver Twist
1838 – Nicholas Nickleby
1843 – A Christmas Carol
1849 – David Copperfield
1852 – Bleak House
1855 – Little Dorrit
1859 – A Tale of Two Cities
1860 – Great Expectations employment as a reporter and began travelling round the country with the
Morning Chronicle.
Dickens’s first major work of fiction was The Pickwick Papers,
published in 1836, which catapulted him to fame at the age of 24. This was followed by the legendary Oliver Twist, depicting the travails of a young orphan sold from the workhouse and ending up as a pickpocket.
The author was one of the first to successfully reveal the underbelly of Victorian society and the plight of the poor. He shone a light on mean, miserable tenements, courts and alleys of London which were peppered with colourful, often dishonourable characters.
Numerous other classics followed, including A Christmas Carol, which has left us with a blueprint for festive celebrations to this day, and David Copperfield, inspired by his own life experiences.
It could be said that Dickens’s own domestic life was eventful enough to have been taken out of a book. In 1836, the year of the Pickwick Papers, he married 20-year-old Catherine Hogarth, a daughter of his mate, George Hogarth, editor of the
Evening Chronicle. They would have ten children between 1837 and 1852, but separated in 1858 after Dickens had begun seeing the young actress Ellen Ternan, who was 18 to Dickens’s 45 years when they met.
Ternan had been recruited for a play co-written by Dickens and Wilkie Collins (famous for The Woman in White and The
Moonstone). Separation contravened Victorian morals, but was preferable to divorce. So, after 22 years the once