I’m very lucky to be currently working my way through a couple of fragrances that I’m absolutely loving, and the first one I’d like to share with you is Penhaligon’s Artemisia*.  When I was given the opportunity to try a scent from Penhaligon, I decided it would be best if I headed down to one of their London stores to select a fragrance rather than blind-choosing as I’m very fussy about what I like!

Apologies for the make-up smear on the box; I kept it in pristine condition until I swatched make-up for pictures and ended up smearing the box

I ended up going to their Mayfair branch on Brook Street.  I really recommend visiting a Penhaligon store if you’re looking for a new fragrance as it’s a very positive experience for fragrance selection.  All the fragrances are set-up in a circle and you sit next it to it with one of the store experts to discuss what sort of scents you like.  Then, through a process of elimination, you eventually settle on a few you like, which you can take away on scent sticks to explore further.

I narrowed it down to a fragrance from their Anthology collection and Artemisia, before deciding to go ahead with Artemisia.  What’s most interesting about this is that I was pretty confident I knew which scents I would like (by reading up on the notes of their various fragrances online) but my choices turned out to be completely different, thus proving how important it is to familiarise yourself with a scent beforehand.

Artemisia is one of Penhaligon’s most popular fragrances and the notes are as follows:

Considering that both the heart and base notes contain vanilla, it was inevitable that I would like this fragrance.  However, the vanilla really doesn’t dominate the fragrance as you might expect, but instead merges well with the other fragrance notes.

Artemisia is a scent that I would refer to as “grown-up girly” as it’s incredibly feminine, but it manages to avoid the typical traits of overtly girly scents and isn’t too sickly or too floral.  It dries down to a very gentle, powdery finish that’s a little musky with a hint of vanilla.  Interestingly, even though there’s a few fruity elements, I wouldn’t say there’s a particularly fruity finish at any point and instead the fruit blends with the other scents and keeps them all fresh.

For me, this was a bit of a grower fragrance and I didn’t fall in love with it immediately as it’s quite different to my usual scents, even though it contains a lot of the same notes that I usually enjoy.  However, I wore it every day for about a week before it started to really appeal, and now it’s something I really love wearing as it’s such a pretty, gentle and unique scent; one thing I love is that it isn’t something I’ve smelt on others so it isn’t generic and instead I get to feel as if it’s my scent rather than something that everyone smells of. This is now a firm favourite in my scent wardrobe that I happily wear regularly and have received many compliments on, including from a random stranger in a lift who got out their phone to make a note of it.  If you like your scents to be gentle yet present, feminine without being too girly and pretty without a hint of sickliness then I recommend checking out Penhaligon’s Artemisia.

Available now from Penhaligon’s starting at £68 for 50ml.  It also features in Penhaligon’s Scent Library which is a great way of trying out Penhaligon’s 10 most popular fragrances for £16, which would make such an amazing gift!