FRAGRANCE
Fragrance has the power to change your mood, your confidence levels and the way you want to be perceived by the world. You can wear a scent to reflect who you are or to empower you to become the person you want to be.
Of all the beauty offerings, fragrance is the one that inspires and tantalises Nicola the most.
Each month Nicola and fragrance expert Suzy Nightingale host On The Scent, a series that explores some of the most incredible scents on the market from mass to niche, budget to luxury.
Here are some of the perfumes that they talk about and love.
This is Nicola’s favourite fragrance of all time and the one that she wears whenever she has a challenge ahead. It gives her confidence and makes her feel ready for anything whilst smelling so captivating that she often has to stop and sniff herself.
Portrait of A Lady is sexy and rich and draws you in. At its heart is a deep red velvety Turkish rose.
You could be wearing jogging bottoms and an old t shirt, but with a spritz of this perfume you’ll still be classy and utterly irresistible.
Nicola first fell in love with this fragrance when she was recording with makeup artist Cher Webb who often wore it. Every time Nicola smelt it she wanted to nuzzle up to Cher and sniff her.
This is a warming, comforting nuzzly scent that has at its heart the same rose as Portrait of A Lady, but is just a bit more toned down.
It is the scent of someone comfortable in their own skin who invites others in.
Nicola was at a party and a woman came up to her and started chatting but the only thing that Nicola could concentrate on was the way that she smelt.
Her fragrance was sublime, bordering on heavenly and it turned out that it was Berber Blonde from what was at the time a brand new fragrance brand called Sana Jardin.
Berber Blonde is the sexiest and most mouthwatering neroli with a musk base. It’s a shimmering, warm, uplifting scent that takes Nicola to a Greek Island called Spetses where wild jasmine grows and the sea glitters.
The brand itself is sustainable and empowers communities of women who harvest the ingredients through fair commerce.
If you’re after an energising, sparkling fragrance that makes you want to leap about and sing then this is the one for you.
Racquet’s is a modern interpretation of one of Penhaligon’s classic colognes and is a total pleasure to wear.
When Nicola wears this she is reminded of the very freshest scent of lemon…that smell you get when you grate the rind. That tingly freshness is then balanced out with a deeper base that gives it a moreish, slightly more nuzzly feel. Nicola’s daughter loves it because it reminds her of sherbet lemons and her son was so enamoured with it that he sprayed it all over himself when Nicola wasn’t looking!