A Floral Arrangement

No chintz here!

If there is one thing I’ve learned as a beauty journalist, the surest way to connect with our mood, especially after a long day, is through fragrance. When you bring aroma into your home it has a huge impact on the senses.

Let’s start with a bunch of flowers. Visually you have colour and architecture in the petals; but even more powerful, you have the aroma: be it fresh roses, or crisp lavender intertwined with sprigs of rosemary. It’s that ‘ahh’ aroma effect. It just has to make you feel good right?

Home is not about the colour on your walls, the size of your kitchen or the number of bathrooms you have: that’s a house. Your home has soul. It’s all about emotion. Scent has emotion. That's why it really matters to connect with an aroma in your home that smells more divine that trainers and puppy dogs: yes I have both though huge dog!

As a perfume writer, I once had a fragrance consultation with the fabulous Richard Hawkins at Guerlain. It was an eye-opening experience where my profound dislike for heady, pungent floral fragrances was totally revealed (I seem to remember squealing), and it highlighted how it affected my choice of aroma in the home. Big heavy, primarily white flowers are out: they just give me a headache! Freshness with hints of different woods and incense... sign me up.

In fact, I pretty much only bear roses on display (who doesn't love a rose - male or female) - or unscented sculptural flowers such as anemones and peonies - yes, these have NO smell regardless of how perfume companies seem to be inspired by them! That's because we 'deem them pretty'. Marketing guys - all marketing. So I fill, style and arrange my vases more for the way they look sculpturally than for the way they smell. I truly hadn't considered flowers in my home in this way before this moment. 

So here are a few tips

MY LIVING THING? Organise your floral arrangement more like a visual work of art - even if they smell good to you: then you get the best of both worlds.

1. Buy three identical vases.

2. Fill each with a 'big sculptural head' such as hydrangea, peony or dahlia - or a posy of a daintier rose, rosemary sprig, and ranunculi (love these).

3. Line them up along a windowsill, mantelpiece, console or dining table.

4. Make the space between each vase equidistant from each other and central to the space you are decorating.

5. Opt for colour over aroma, making the flower the most vibrant part of the room - unless of course it's a plant you adore, then just go for it!

So for the record - feel free to send me bouquets of roses (delicate and beautiful - and found to some degree in every JOGB candle) mixed with herbs (rosemary and lavender, thyme and sage), but keep all essence of gardenia, jasmine, lilac, hyacinth, or lilies far, far away! 

So what's your flower? What's your passion? Share it with me - it may inspire the very next JOGB aroma to come!

TRY SCENT LAYERING

Love perfume layering? Try layering at home. Be experimental and burn candles like a signature cocktail, choosing scents that complement each other with shared styles or some similar notes. I love to burn a different JOGB fragranced candle in every room, and they’ve been designed to complement each other too, so that they can burn together as a collective fragrance force for a whole new mood! Ah… our JOGB In Harmony Collection in the hallway becomes your own signature scent where all the aromas meet. Your guests can then ask ‘what is this smell’ and you can say it’s ‘home’.