Ånd

Four Perfumes

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Simon Constantine was the main perfumer behind Lush’s Gorilla fragrances, which include such marvels as Breath of God, Kerbside Violet and Sikkim Girls. The look was hard to pin down but easy to recognize: cheap and euphorically cheerful packaging, sassy names and, most importantly, brilliant perfumery accords done with unreasonably good materials. You got a strong feeling these fragrances had been composed by someone who either did not know the rules or knew them but did not care. If this were music, it would be Thelonious Monk, deceptively wrong stuff that, once you get used to it, makes the right stuff feel old.

The hippie aesthetic was probably the only means of conveying this novel take on perfumery, but the quality of the fragrance was unexpected, as if you’d opened up your battered VW camper van to peek at the flat-four engine and discovered it was gold-plated. There is still not the smallest trace of luxury-goods vibe to Ånd, Simon Constantine’s new venture since 2020. The packaging is psychedelic, the bottles are stock, and the price, while still not exactly within adolescent range, is about half what the other big players charge. We got samples after the last Guide was written, and so did not get to review any of these, though Tania has been wearing Påtch frequently and to great effect the last few years.

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