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I enter a room with horticulture intentionally lined onto a sterile dish: magnolia leaf, Roman chamomile, cedar heart. Warm bodies in lab coats dissect the ingredients, studying and categorizing them in beakers and Petri dishes. Being invited into Aesop’s fragrance lab, or an immersive replica of it, felt as if I was the one bottled up in their cult amber glasses. When, instead, it was the new Aurner Eau De Parfum: a defiant tea-like scent that’s been spilling off of my body ever since.
Since 2005, Aesop has been a household name for fragrance-making. From the unorthodox spice markets recalled in Marrakech Intense to Karst’s seaside vegetal aroma, the Melbourne-born brand has been all the rage in the US. But, their 12th scent—developed by nose Céline Barel—is their most subversive yet.
I’m usually staunchly against floral fragrances, fatigued by their oversaturated, synthetic, and bitter silage they ooze. Most floral scents on the market I find overpowering, masking my body’s natural aroma with a cloud of perfume desperately begging to be smelt (which I often plug my nose to). Except, Aurner is not the type of floral you think.
Barel referenced the work of Chinese poet Li Qingzhao; a palette of greens from Werner’s Nomenclature of Colours, and, of course, the song “Lilac Wine” by Nina Simone to represent the fragrance’s tension between love and fury. The synesthesia, blooming with defiance, is a contradiction to traditional florals. Juxtaposing delicate petals with robust woods, vegetation with metallics, and feminine with masculine, Aurner is all of the above.
Upon first spritz, I was hit with the top notes of Roman chamomile, cardamom, and pink pepper, which I smelt separately, then together. As the fragrance seeps into my pores, heart notes of magnolia leaf and geranium develop. Then, at the foundation, sandalwood, cedar, and cypriol heart are left to linger like a horticultural collage. It’s official: I’ve been converted to the floral fragrance otherworld.