Buckle up, it’s weird girl winter. Unlike the weather months which call for something light and easy on the nose, winter begs for something with a little heft. Rather than counteracting the cold with warm, spicy fragrances (although we’re not opposed to those too), winter is the perfect time to take a more experimental approach to your scent. Not just from an olfactory perspective, but from an intellectual one. Cold weather is the ideal time for something dark and contemplative — ideally, a church fragrance.
Yes. It’s time to assuage your Catholic guilt by smelling like the memories you tried to repress. Or, perhaps you’re the type to seek out old churches wherever you go. In which case, pay homage to them by smelling like a dank, dimly lit gothic church with gentle wafts of incense, or indulge your forbidden fantasies with a scent that smells like altar wine sipped from the priest’s chalice.
Herewith, the best church fragrances to try this winter.
1. Comme des Garçons Incense Avignon
It’s impossible to talk about church fragrances without mentioning Comme des Garçons Incense Avignon. With raw resinous notes of incense, frankincense, and myrrh mingled with cedarwood it’s equal parts mysterious and contemplative — like sitting on a sun dappled pew in a church in rural France, listening to a sermon you don’t quite understand as your mind begins to wander.
Price: $182AUD
Brand: Comme des Garçons
Scent notes: incense, myrrh, olibanum, cedar, labdanum, chamomile, elemi, rosewood, spices, patchouli, oakmoss, ambrette, vanilla, musk
2. Serge Lutens L’Orpheline
Serge Lutens is the king of weird fragrances and L’Orpheline is something of a masterpiece. Spices, frankincense, and aldehydes combine to create a scent that’s cold, mysterious, and lonely yet alluring. For the young bride whose groom tragically died the night before the wedding, or the nun who recently left the city to join a convent.
Price: $234AUD
Brand: Serge Lutens
Scent notes: spices, incense, musk, frankincense, aldehydes, cedarwood, ambergris, cashmeran
3. Comme des Garçons Zagorsk
Another Comme des Garçons, you ask? Why yes. Where Incense Avignon is dark, mysterious, and dry like a Catholic church, Zagorsk draws from eastern Orthodox churches and is named after the Russian city that was once one of the most influential Orthodox-Christian places in the country. Wet, sad, and sombre, the notes of burning incense are stronger here, with spicy and slightly bitter notes of pine trees and hinoki wood rounding it out. It’s strong, austere, masculine, a little lonely, and above all, cold.
Price: €100
Brand: Comme des Garçons
Scent notes: white incense, pine, pimento berries, violet, cedar, iris, hinoki wood, birch wood
4. Heeley Cardinal
A relatively underrated niche fragrance, Heeley Cardinal paints a strong olfactory picture of the church through the addition of a white linen accord, evoking the scent of freshly washed vestments. It’s also got frankincense, but it’s intermingled with rose, black pepper, vetiver, and amber. It’s still gothic, but much more inviting than both Comme des Garçons Incense Avignon and Zagorsk. Like the comfort of taking refuge in a church just before it starts to pour outside.
Price: €145
Brand: Heeley
Scent notes: white linen, rose, black pepper, labdanum, frankincense, myrrh, vetiver, grey amber, patchouli
5. Aesop Hwyl
A blend of frankincense, cypress, Hinoki wood, and vetiver, Aesop Hwyl is akin to a little stone church ensconced in a verdant Japanese forest.
Price: $210AUD
Brand: Aesop
Scent notes: spices, thyme, frankincense, cypress, hinoki woods, vetiver, olibanum, oakmoss
6. Anatole Lebreton Grimoire
A positively biblical scent, Anatole Lebreton Grimoire perfectly captures the high altitude of a monastery in the mountains. Notes of oakmoss and lavender lend freshness to a scent that’s otherwise defined by incense, warm woods, and distinct notes of candles and old books.
Price: €120
Brand: Anatole Lebreton
Scent notes: bergamot, basil, lavander, elemi, incense, sevillan lavander, atlas cedarwood, cumin, patchouli, moss, musk
7. Amouage Lineage
Amouage is known for its impeccable blending, but there’s no denying the myrrh and frankincense are the stars of the show here, intermingling with balsam and woods to evoke the feeling of being in an old, dry church with bakhoor or incense burning. However, the tinge of minerality present lightens things up…as if said church was perched on a clifftop by the ocean.
Price: $395USD
Brand: Amouage
Scent notes: ginger, sichuan pepper, schinus molle, saffron, frankincense, fenugreek, myrrh essence, frankincense resinoid, myrrh resinoid, vetiver, patchouli, benzoin, labdanum
8. Jovoy Paris La Liturgie Des Heures
For the most pious among us, Jovoy Paris La Liturgie Des Heures is for those who take solace in a higher power. Eschewing human comforts in favour of a cool, smoky austerity, Jovoy Paris La Liturgie Des Heures is devoid of any warmth, with the pine tree, green notes and incense decidedly cold and aloof. For introspective days, this is a decidedly intimate scent that one wears for oneself alone.
Price: €133
Brand: Jovoy Paris
Scent notes: cypress, green notes, incense, myrrh, olibanum, cistus, musk, patchouli
9. Oriza Legrand Relique d’Amour
A call for salvation, but it’s too late — the chapel has been abandoned. There’s a slight sweetness here which mingles with the coolness from the green and oakmoss notes, evoking cold stone overgrown with foliage. Oriza Legrand Relique d’Amour has managed to capture the church in its entirety, with the scent of waxed wooden pews and the cool marble of the altar tinged with watery white lilies and powdery incense which recall the feeling of walking into church after the sermon has ended and the incense blown out, faint wafts lingering in the air.
Price: €150
Brand: Oriza Legrand
Scent notes: foliage, terebinth, pepper, white lily, linseed oil, frankincense, myrrh, elemi
Words by Theo Rosen and T. Angel
