Regency Ragtime

Report by Luke Singleton

Image by David Newton

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Jermyn Street: the romantic Elizabethan cobbled-way entrusted to Elizabeth II, flanked either end by Pall Mall and Piccadilly and home to Sir Christopher Wren’s Portland stone 17th century church and some of London’s lavish 50-metre-high plane trees. Today, it is a narrow, elegant store-fronted spectacle, which became the epitome of chic shopping back in the late 19th century, when royal shirt-maker Turnbull & Asser opened its mahogany-panelled, cavernous cloth-house to genteel society. Floris, the only English perfumer bestowed with the Royal Warrant, now occupies the adjacent No. 89 Jermyn Street as its flagship store, another 17th century splendour, with rows of deep-set antique display cabinets and a rosewood parquet floor, spotlit by Art Deco plafonniers. Floris has released 71/72 Eau de Parfum, a new fragrance for Autumn 2017, in collaboration with Turnbull & Asser, named in commemoration of the renowned address of this historic tailor, evoking the refined atmosphere of Jermyn Street’s inimitable history and royal connections. The elegance of rich wood and hallowed earth is captured in a perfumed heart of orris and oud, with heady floral top notes of juniper, lavender and jasmine, reminding us of the verdant wonder of London’s city streets in the midst of a seasonal change. This is a warm and understated fragrance, with a trace of citric melodrama: that splash of eccentricity, which lies just beneath every English fable.

 Floris 71/72 Eau de Parfum 100ml, £140