Celebrating World Smell Day at Angela Flanders

To celebrate World Smell Day yesterday I made myself an appointment to explore Angela Flanders’ range of perfumes at her boutique on Artillery Passage in Spitalfields. Although I had read much about Angela’s fragrances I had never ever actually been to her shop in Spitalfields so today being World Smell Day seemed like the perfect excuse for a trip to East London. I met with Rachel, who works at the boutique, and she was a fantastic guide in helping me to get acquainted with the line. She was super knowledgeable and really down to earth and lead me through sampling the fragrances. There is something about taking in scent with another person that I always find to be a bit of a bonding experience.

Coming to My Senses with Alyssa Harad

I had my first brush with London’s Perfuminati on Tuesday evening at the Coming to My Senses: Reading, Conversation and Sniffing event featuring the book’s author, Alyssa Harad, and hosted by Persolaise. I arrived about half an hour prior to when the event was scheduled to begin because I wanted to grab a seat close to where Alyssa would be speaking as I was planning to record the Q&A portion of the event on my iPhone and as it was my first time doing this (and as someone who is perpetually disappointed by the seeming limitations of modern technology) I wanted to be certain the app I had downloaded would be close enough to record clearly.

The full transcript of the Q&A with Persolaise and audience is available below my babbling 🙂

Alyssa greeted me as I entered the upstairs portion of the pub, and I immediately felt completely put at ease by her warm, welcoming aura. I had inadvertently emailed her a week prior to the event asking if it would be all right for me to cover on the blog to which she answered very encouragingly on the same day. She invited me to sit down with her and we spoke briefly about my budding interest in exploring perfume and writing about my experience, which I am documenting on this blog. She asked me about the types of perfumes I enjoyed the most and then she introduced me to the scent she wore on her wedding day, Annick Goutal’s Songes, which I found absolutely dreamy.

Alyssa greets a guest at the event