Stories by Eliza Grace is the first fragrance house to come out of Northern Ireland, founded by a mother-of-four, Tonya Kidd-Beggs, who’s a self-confessed smell obsessive who’s translated her understanding of perfume’s power to move us into a beautiful fragrance line. (It’s named after her twin daughters, Eliza and Grace.)

In the recent Fragrance Foundation Awards, Stories by Eliza Grace was shortlisted for Best New Independent Brand (and also for best ad campaign) in the recent Fragrance Foundation Awards 2019 - a huge achievement.

The two debut fragrances – which are now available as beautiful Hand & Body Washes and Hand & Body Lotions – are quite lovely and quite different, inspired by stories in her own life. (Tonya grew up during Northern Ireland’s ‘Troubles’, which made her think deeply about the future of her country and her children.) Stories No.1, 

‘tells the uplifting story of sorrow transformed into beauty, of the dark yielding to the light’, which the fragrance carries off via luminescent notes of citrus – bergamot, grapefruit and orange blossom leading to the deep, warm embrace of cedarwood, with delicate touches of jasmine, heliotrope and a fig-tea accord, finishing with an embrace of amber, sandalwood and vetiver.

For her second fragrance, Stories No.2, Tonya reached further back in her fragrant memories to recollections of her own childhood, evoking days spent in her grandfather’s garden. ‘In the greenhouse, rose bushes stood among orange trees, on which blossom and fruit grew in tandem.’ (You can read in much more depth about Stories by Eliza Grace on The Perfume Society website, here.)

We love that they’re now available as bodycare – to be enjoyed in its own right or as a ‘foundation’ over which to layer the fragrances. (That always makes a scent last longer, as it’ll cling to the oils on the skin.) They’re packed with all sorts of skin-friendly botanicals, too: aloe vera, sweet almond oil, shea and cocoa butters, argan and glycerine... 

Lovely to smell, lovely on skin. And lovely for making us think a bit more deeply, perhaps, about the amazing power of smell to tell stories and Tardis us through time.

Stories No.01 and No.02 Hand & Body Wash/£38 for 250ml – buy here

Stories No.01 and No.02 Hand & Body Lotion/£26 for 100ml – buy here

PS As it happens, Jo just wrote a post for Stories by Eliza Grace about training her sense of smell – you can read it here

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