Should you be heading London-wards for Christmas shopping – and with the break in train strikes, you might just be, today – then there’s a new perfumed pit-stop we’d like to ensure is on your radar.

You probably know Lyn Harris as the original founder and perfumer for Miller Harris,. Truly one of the British perfumery greats, Lyn has for the past few years moved on to create exquisite fragrances under her Perfumer H brand, working out of the studio underneath a beautiful, restful store on Crawford Street, in Marylebone.

But now she’s opened a sliver of an outpost on one of our favourite London shopping streets, Chiltern Street – somewhere that needs to be on the radar of every lover of indie shopping.

With the same understated, mid-Century-inspired look as the original store, it invites a leisurely nose around – literally. Lyn’s fragrances are exquisite (Jo is utterly addicted to the Patchouli, which she’s shortly going to have to replenish, and also wears Magnolia and Heliotrope). The fragrances are offered in apothecary-style glass bottles, or – and these are true investment pieces – the stunning Michael Ruh hand-blown bottles, which you can see above. Pricy, but so special.

We are also super-keen on the home fragrances - notably the wonderful, fireside-y SMOKE candle, above (£140 for 325g). They’re available in black ‘utility’ designs (£55 for 175g) – see below – or the stunning blown glass vessels above (price £140), and we very much like the fact those can be refilled time and again. (The incense sticks are interesting, too – check out Wood Land, if you like cedar-y, outdoorsy, leaves-underfoot smells; they’re priced £30 per pack of 30 sticks).

All in all, an olfactory oasis, away from the madding West End crowds…

Perfumer H, 19 Chiltern Street, London W1U 7PH/

perfumerh.com

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