Bird is the word: A week of giveaways

It’s day three of A Week of Giveaways at Wee Birdy, and Penhaligon’s has joined the blogiversary celebrations with a complete set of four fragrances from their limited edition Anthology Collection, at a total retail value of £380.

These new fragrances have been brought back from the Penhaligon’s archive, which has a long heritage of perfumery in Britain, dating back to the 1870s when William Penhaligon first moved to London from Cornwall and started creating fine fragrances for discerning gentlemen.

Since then, the brand has collected Royal Warrants from The Prince of Wales and the Duke of Edinburgh, and has produced some of Britain’s most iconic and historic fragrances. The boutiques, meanwhile, still capture some of the old-world charm and sense of history of the brand, complete with dark wood panelling, glass cabinets, and collectable silver trinkets.

The four new fragrances from the Anthology Collection are the sharply sherbet Extract of Limes (1963), the subtly aromatic Eau de Verveine (1949), the playful Gardenia (1976) and the dark and heady Night Scented Stock (1976). 

For your chance to win the complete set of four fragrances from the Penhaligon’s Anthology Collection, valued at £380, simply leave a comment telling me about your favourite nostalgic scent. Don’t forget to include your email address so I can contact you if you win!

Entries close for all giveaways on Friday 24 July at 6pm (British Summer Time). Winners will be announced on Monday 27 July, 2009.

Thank you Penhaligon’s! If you love the look of these fragrances, you might like to:
- check out the Penhaligon’s website;
- read about their iconic Bluebell bath oil here;
- or visit one of their beautiful boutiques here.

Comments

[Siany]

Oooh anything with honeysuckle in for me! It reminds me of being a kid and playing in the garden aaaaaaaall summer. Summer went on forever when you were a kid.

[K-Line]

OMG: I LOVE Penhaligons and have gone to such length to get the Bluebell perfume to Canada (years after the Toronto store closed and I could no longer buy it here.) It so reminds me of summertime in my childhood. I would be thrilled to win this. Thrilled. [email protected]

[Fionnuala]

My scent seamlessly ties in with the prize on offer - Penhaligon's Bluebells (I blame a girlhood spent imbibing I Capture the Castle).

[Elinesca]

The Farrah Fawcett perfume. It was my very first one. She was just so beautiful, and being as young as I was, the idea that someone could have a perfume named after her was just... mind blowing:)

[Jade]

There's nothing quite like the smell of old books. Ever since I was little, it's been one of my favorite scents. :)

[Emma]

Estee Lauder Youth Dew. My granny gave it to me when I was 12, used to drench myself in it for a while - didn't really understand subtlety at that point...

[Char]

Oh! My favourite smell is a green garden after the rain. I think a shop in Melbourne used to stock a range of perfumes that were part of a scent library and included vials like 'Dirt', 'Wet Garden' and 'Thunderstorm'. If you mixed these three together, they would just about be the right fragrance! Genius.

Penhaligan's Bluebell perfume is quite fascinating because last spring I found out how elusive the real bluebell smell is... it wafts over the woods when the sun shines on the flowers. Very subtle.

[Make Do Style]

I'm a sucker for the smell of parma violets but nothing beat the smell of new shoes!

[Flora]

Wow, what an incredible giveaway...purleeeeeease let it be me!

Favourite nostalgic scent? a mixture of the buddleia, rosebay willowherb and meadowsweet that grew along the canal bank where I spent many happy summers fishing for minnows as a kid. Sickly sweet and intoxicatingly heady at the same time...

[Louise Naomi Best]

The smell of the back of a chubby baby's neck...the scent of a glossy magazine, my nan's Chanel lipstick that I used to peek at as though it was holy, cucumbers in summer, satsumas in December, my dad's shirt, the smell of a bonfire and the divine one time only inhalation of a brand new jar of Blend 37, pop that paper and sniffffff.

[holly]

Lily of the Valley. When I was about 4 my mum gave me the tiniest most beautiful little glass bottle with lily of the valley perfume inside... it was about 1" high and had a tiny little kelly green bow around the neck. I thought is was the height of sophistication. Now I have Diorissimo as the closest approximation. Also Chanel No 19 (which my mum wore) and Rive Gauche and Calandre which I have started wearing again as they were all smells from my early childhood and seemed so glamorous and exotic to a little girl growing up in small town Canada.

[j.cro]

There is this scent certain pieces of my clothing will pick up when I've been outside or at the beach all day, especially during the summer - I like to think it smells like the sun. It's one of the greatest smells in the whole world.

[Mette]

An aftershave my grandad used - my siblings and I used to put on our teddybears ´cos we liked the smell so much !

Unfortunatly I don´t know the name of that aftershave.. both he and my grandmother sadly passed away before we were old enough to think about that.

[Lindsay]

My favourite nostalgic scent is Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche. My mum has been wearing it ever since it was launched and it's so evocative for me.

[Fran]

The bluebell eau de toilette by penhaligon's was actually my first ever perfume. I thought it was too precious to use so most it just evaporated over the last 20 years. I've still got the bottle though.

[Kristin]

Almond! I've always wanted to find a scent that features it, but I've never been able to find anything. It makes me so sad, because almond is one of the most delicious scents.

[Rebekah]

What a lovely idea!

My favorite childhood scent is the smell of my mother's bathroom growing up. A fresh, pretty mix of baby powder and Crabtree & Evelyn's Lily of the Valley perfume. It reminds me of hours spent having my hair curled and watching my mother put on her makeup.

Thank you for the giveaway opportunity!

[London plinth]

Wow, what an amazing prize!I love any scent with vanilla tones, reminds me of childhood and icecream and summer....

[Sam]

My favourite nostalgic scent would have to be "Joy" by Dior. My Mum was big on that when I was little and it's been imprinted on my brain I think! What beautiful signage that is!

[spudballoo]

Gosh what a WONDERFUL giveaway. Oddly I dreamt last night about my 'nostalgic' scent, a gentleman's 'Extract of Limes Cologne'. I couldn't remember who made it but guessed Penhaligons. I'm wrong, I just googled and it's the Geo F Trumper one. As worn by the Starter Husband but I'm nostalgic for the scent not him!

I also love Rive Gauche, Anais Anais and LouLou as the scents of my teens. None of which I would wear now! But the smell is so evocative.

Thanks for commenting on my blog, greatly appreciated. I posted about crafting today, mostly inspired by your post on The Make Room!

[Christine]

Rive Gauche for me too- my Mum still wears it; we used to buy it for her every Christmas when we were growing up.

[claire]

ah....it has to be the smell of imperial leather soap mixed with the delicate scent of a light spritz of rose perfume....these are the smells of my grannies hands. mix this with a waft of apple crumble bubbling away in the aga and the smell of charred wood on the fire and i am whisked back to my childhood....

[Patchwork Harmony]

fantastic giveaway!
I think mine is Rose... it is such a classic scent, and reminds me of my grandmother. I love to burn rose essential oil now. x

[Fae]

Leather and roses.

[susan]

When I was 14 or 15 I used to wear "Aspen" perfume - it was a totally cheap and tacky supermarket brand, but I didn't know that at age 15 and it made me feel terribly sophisticated.

I wore it the summer that I went off to camp and fell desperately, hopelessly, obsessively in love with a boy named Kevin in that way that only teenagers can fall in love. We probably had five conversations, all of which were BURNED into my memory, but at the end-of-camp dance he asked me for the last dance of the night. It was to that Boyz II Men song "End of the Road" - remember that? He whispered something into my ear that I didn't hear and I was too shy to ask. I was so deliriously happy I thought I'd never recover. Then camp ended and we never saw one another again.

Many years later, visiting my parents, I found a near-empty bottle of Aspen in my bedroom door. With one sniff, it all came back -- the summer, the silly but devastating crush, the whole feeling of becoming a young woman.

So that's my nostalgic scent!

[Ali]

How evocative scent is. I was reading your post and the mention of Gardenia took me right back. When I was small my family lived in Fiji - gardenias grew like weeds and my mother would snip off a bloom every morning and put it in the bathroom. The scent has always been firmly fixed to her in my mind.

Years later, as an adult I was living in Japan and I walked past a gardenia bush just as it had finished raining. I was rather homesick and the scent actually made me cry.

Not exactly what Penhalligons have in mind as a reaction to their fragrance I'm sure. But it's good to know we can be moved by them.

[Sarah-Rose]

Oo.I love Penhaligon's!

My memorable smell is the smell of rain on wet concrete. Takes me right back to summers of my youth where for a little while it was cool enough to stand on rain soaked pavements in the sun.

[Juanita Bongoqueen]

Oooh! The smell of lemon myrtle on a crisp Melbourne morning! Reminds me of arriving in Australia aged 12, and my first ever day at an Australian school in Grade 6. Lovely!

[gondalgirl]

It was with great sadness that Penhaligons is no longer available in Australia from David Jones, which they stocked briefly. I have their old scent library which is great for sniffing and imagining the characters that would wear such fabulous perfumes. The Night scented stock is very Titania esque, seductive and full of the warmth of summer nights, the Orange blossom, like a VIctorian bride, the white lace covering her eyes.

My personal nostalgic favourite, Violetta - dark and sweet and powdery, like the real thing and intoxicating.
gondalgirATgmail.com

[Vanesa]

Oooh..I like Susan's story :)
I think my favourite nostalgic sent is that pink Cashmere Bouquet soap...you can still get it here in Oz..whenever I smell it it reminds me of being a kid in the early 70's :)

[Kathryn Robinson]

I love the smell of snow - well, right before it snows and you can smell it in the air. It's like magic. In the UK, it used to snow most years when I was a kid, and we'd take a really long walk trudging through the snow as a family. So now anytime I can smell snow, it reminds me of times we were all together as a family. And I feel like a child again and have to throw snowballs.

[sato]

Oh what a lovely fragrance! My favourite nostalgic scent is the smell of my teddy bear:) When i was little, he always made me so better.

[Emma S]

I love Rochas Madame - it reminds me of my Mum. She lost her sense of smell after giving birth to my brother so still wears it as she remembers loving it. Every six months I have to find it on the internet and buy it for her.

[Rebecca]

Honeysuckle: when I was growing up in rural Queensland, we lived on a block of land with no trees. Although my parents had planted many, they were tiny and needed constant watering to just keep them alive. Just outside my parents' bedroom was a water overflow pipe, which used to drip - and under this they had planted a honeysuckle. Given the heat and the constant watering, it thrived and would be a sweet-smelling green haven in the barren yard. Every time I smell honeysuckle, I'm instantly taken back to that place, being young and in an oasis.

[Lee]

Coco de Chanel - how sophisticated was I as a kid ;) but even now its a scent that brings back fond memories.

[Georgie]

I find smells just so evocative....tranpsorting me back to when I was a little girl, or to a holiday or a time of my life - even a relationship. Two of my absolute favourites smells though - freshly cut limes.....just so clean and fresh. And jasmine. Truly intoxicating. Oh goodness, I think that this is my favourite giveaway EVER. I have my fingers & toes crossed that I am lucky!

[Spannerchilde]

For me it's got to be lavender, it's the most gorgeous smell. We used to have huge bushes of it in our garden when I was little and we'd dry it and make bunches of it and tie them with little blue ribbons... so cute.

X

[Delicious Industries]

Lavender! I can't explain it but for over a year now I can't get enough of it. It is the best fragrance for a bath, for sleep and just general relaxation. I do have trouble keeping lavender plants alive though!

[Marie]

Log fires is my nostalgic scent. Reminds me of a childhood at Christmas time and the smell a log fire brings to a room, mmmmm. And I found something I think you may like:
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=26993618&ref=cat1_gallery_15

[Maria]

Suntan lotion! Being allergic to the sun, its a comforting smell, I feel strange without it!

And my quest to find the right perfume to compliment the suntan lotion is a tricky one!

[Nicola Cooke]

ahhh my favourite scent is from my childhood teddy bear.

It smells just like my Grandma's house - a mix of fresh flowers, Chanel no.5 and shortbread.

Anytime I'm feeling nostalgic, I bury my head into the bear and take a deep breath. It takes me right back!

[Lucy]

My favourite nostalgic scent is the temple incense sticks that burn at Buddhist temples. If I smell it now I immediately am taken back to visiting my mum's family in Malaysia.

[margarita]

I was born in a Spanish sunny island in the middle of the Ocean Atlantic, opposite Africa, so the smell of the sand, the sea and the sun cream conform me when I am in London, specially when it is grey and raining. I gather this memory of the smell and I picture myself on the beach feeling warm, relax and above all at home!!!
it is incredible what a smell can do, and where it can transport you and makes you feel.

[Style Scanner]

One week in 1986, my Stepmum's 'Woman's Own' came with a tiny phial of 'Gucci no 3' sellotaped to the front cover, she offered it to me. Oh My God, I'd never smelt anything so exciting, I felt it represented everything I wanted to express about who I was. I was often asked what perfume I was wearing and was almost always met with a look of suspicion or worse revulsion. You see back then Gucci was the scent of middle aged Chinese ladies and Grannies, anyone who remembers Gucci before Tom Ford knows what I mean. Gucci No 3 was tragically discontinued in the nineties, I even asked the Roja Dove people what would be a good equivalent, the answer from the man himself?.... "There is nothing".... boo hoo.

[KatieBee]

I think it would have to be marzipan, and christmas tree smell...reminds me of christmas and excitement...x loving the nostalgic stories.....x

[Gemma G]

'Old Spice' always reminds me of my grandfather. There is still a half empty bottle of it in my parents' bathroom cabinet. When ever I go home I take a sniff and I'm instantly reminded of sitting on his knee when I was little, as he regailed me with tales of his adventures as a merchant navy seaman!

[kelly]

Great giveaway and so generous too!
My fave scent is wet soil after a rain and vanilla!

[email protected]

[Sally]

Ooh, wonderful! My favourite nostalgic scent is sweet peas - they remind me of being a little girl in my grandmother's garden.
Although the more evocative scents are cKOne and Tommy Girl... brings back very strong memories of being young!

[Stephanie]

My favourite nostaligic scent would be Guerlain's Shalimar. My mum wore it, and I remember her dressed to the nines and going out for the evening, the sound of swishing taffeta and the smell of Shalimar as she kissed me good night. I wore it myself for years ... once ran into an old boyfriend, who hugged me and said "Ah, Shalimar". I might need to re-visit it!

[natalie]

I love the old German cologne, No. 4711 Reminds me of summer!

[Feefee]

Definitely my Mom's tea rose perfume and being enveloped in a warm tea-rose scented hug! Even my Dad said he once followed a woman wearing tea rose before realising it wasn't actually his wife. Or at least that was his excuse....

[Jessie]

Brilliant giveaways!
I love the smell of gardenia - my sister had a gardenia perfume when I was little and I would sneak a smell every now and then.
So many vintage smells!! Chanel no.5 (my grandmother), Calvin Klein Obsession (my aunt), Farenheit 451 (dad), etc etc etc!

[Natalie Brem]

My favourite Nostalgic Anthology scent would have to be the subtly aromatic Eau de Verveine (1949). Why? Because when I smell it, I close my eyes and imagine a handsome gentleman, from a bygone era, gently taking me by the hand and assisting me up into his carriage, and taking me for a ride.

[dee]

Body Shop Melon Aftersun Lotion.

[Michelle Solange]

The smell of Chanel, takes me back a long way, to when I was young and had so much to say! I would dab a drop or two, (stolen from my mother - just between me and you) and would feel that I had crossed the line to become a woman so refined. And now when someone passes me wearing that perfume, it takes me back to a time when young, all was possible and nothing should be assumed....

[Fabric Nation]

Leaving a proper comment now! This is a lovely idea and made me think of the reminiscence project in Blackheath where they have scents from the past to use in their sessions. My husband used to drive people there and told me a heart breaking story of an elderly man who rediscovered his late wife's perfume there, a scent he didn't think he would come across again. It's hard to think of one as nostalgic scents can catch you unawares, an unexpected waft of something from the past can suddenly triggers memory of it. My choice would be a Max Factor perfume, Hypnotique Sophisti-cat. It was given to me by my grandmother and came with a little hard plastic velour-coated black cat with green diamond eyes. Needless to say my six year old self was entranced with it and the scent brings back memories of sitting in the back garden liberally sprinkling it on myself.

[Rose]

My top nostalgic scent is actually Bluebell by Penhaligon's- no kidding honest! It's not so much nostalgia for me but that I'm in love with the book and film I capture the castle and the sisters obsess about Bluebell perfume in it.

L'heure Bleu has to be a very close second.

[ellie]

Geranium. My dad grows them every year. They remind me of home - beautiful.

[caroline]

I got a little perfume from france from my parents when i was small- I can't remember what it was called, but i think i'll remember the fruity scent forever :D

[petajane]

I've got two fond scent memories - one is my Nanny who was always giving me lavender perfume, lavender sachets for the drawer, lavender soap and knitted coat hangers with lavender sewn into them! You'd think I'd be sick of the smell of it but I still use lavender soap to this day.
Also when I was wee my aunty bought me this daisy perfume from Avon that I loved and I was so delighted because I already had a bottle that I had nearly used up. I was so delighted I ran upstairs and got the nearly empty bottle to show her. I was trying to show her how much I liked it, but I think it was slightly anti-climatic for her to discover I already had it. Kids!

petajanedewar at yahoo.com.au

[Tamsin North]

I just opened a birthday card from my granny in Cornwall, and was blasted with a whiff of 400 year old Cornish farmhouse. I'm sure it sounds yucky and musty to some, but to a a Cornish maid in the deserts of Utah, it gave me a few seconds of the happiest days of my childhood :)

[M*]

I'm an old fashioned kind of girl and love the smell of rose oils and violets. Praying to the giveaway goddess to pick me....

[Natalie]

My favourite scent is freshly picked wattle, arranged into an old jug - beautiful! A scent like no other and all the more special as wattle blooms for such a short time in winter.

[Chris]

My favourite nostalgic scent is from the beautiful Frangipani blossoms. Growing up in New Guinea, we had masses of them in our huge garden. I have the most amazing memories of playing in the garden at sunset, our dogs running around and my mum pottering around somewhere nearby. The orange/yellowy sky reflected in the Frangipani blossoms and their sweet, almost overpowering scent hanging heavily in the air. I felt so safe and happy!

[Cara @ Turvys]

I adore Penhaligans. My all time favourite fragrance is actually one of theirs too. I love Malabar. I love the slightly oriental tone to it, and it just makes me smile. I hope they never stop creating it!!!

[Susie]

It sounds strange but I think my favourite nostalgic scent is savlon! It reminds me of being a kid intent on growing up to be a doctor - life plans changed and I didn't go down that route but I still like remembering the feeling of being a kid with confidence to follow my dreams, and being sure I could! I still like medical type smells. And perfume too of course!

Thanks x

[fester]

My favourite nostalgic scent is the smell of fairy cakes baking!

[Cath W]

When I was a young girl growing up in Melbourne, my bedroom window opened amongst a glorious jasmine vine and I would lie in bed surrounded by the heady, sweet perfume. It's still my all time favourite.

[Gem]

Most girls wouldn't admit to this, but mine is White Musk. As a young teen, I'd go to the Body Shop with my pals on a Saturday morning and spend my pocket money on bath oils and hand lotion. It seemed the height of sophistication back then...

[Liz]

Germaline, the inky solvent smell in glossy picture books, fried onions and lavender. Slightly less weird, that last one! Thought I'd best redeem myself. Oh, and campsite breakfasts cooking. And my wetsuit. Love to have a little sniff of that whenever I've got the landlocked blues.

[lishlash]

playdoh! and dettol...

[Mads]

The small of London trees in blossom- lime flowers. Heaven. Reminds me of lazy, late summer evenings.

[Angela]

Lilly of the Valley. It reminds me of being a kid - running barefoot in tall grass and not caring what I looked like in a bikini.

[nath]

wow, you have some amazing prizes, quite spectacular.

one of my favourite scents is lily-of-the-valley. they were my maternal grandmother's favourite flower, and it transports me back to being a small girl again. And sweet peas, as my mother grew them in the tiny yard of the first house i remember living in. and vanilla, because it's delicious.

[Bri]

It's a toss up between the scent of fresh-cut grass and the smell of Spain. I know that sounds weird, but the country has such a smell about it - the people, the food, the plants, the landscapes, the laundry detergent - it all combines to make such a significantly unique scent.

[JuliaJulia]

I loved the smell of my Grandma doing the laundry in a big tub in the garden.

She was very stubborn and refused to embrace the modern washing machine until much later than the rest of the country. When I was young I would sit with her in the garden whilst she scrubbed the clothes on a washing board. The smell of old-fashioned soap flakes mixed with the sweet peas from the garden is what I remember most about her.

[Laura]

Tomato leaves...they remind me of my grandparents greenhouse, there's nothing better than a warm tomato fresh from the plant..I used to eat them like apples as a kid.

[Gemma]

As soon as you mentioned nostalgic scents I thought of four things...

The Gucci perfume my Mum wore in the 1980's. I can't remember the name but it was really strong. She wears much softer scents now so that's definitely a smell from childhood.

The talc we used after having a bath in my Grandparents house. If the floor in the bathroom got too wet the water would leak through to the lounge so I became paranoid about splashing even a drop of water out of the bath.

The rose 'perfume' my sister and I would make by picking rose petals and mashing them up in a bowl.

Imperial Leather - still a smell I love.

[shukumei]

I think it would be the smell of old books. Reminds me of all the time I spent in the library when I was younger.

[Pinkbirdy]

The smell of fresh cut grass, reminds me of my nanny and her lovely garden.

[el]

I love Penhaligons! I get a bottle every Christmas which I try and make last. My favourite smells are vanilla and cakes baking.

[Lynne, Tea for Joy]

Oh, lovely. Nostalgic smells for me - high school girls' first perfumes - Body Shop Dewberry and some Benetton perfume which EVERYBODY wore...

[Alma]

Mexican cigarettes and Spanish facial powder. My grandmother used both on the regular and, while I can't remember the brands, I can conjure up both scents by just thinking about them.

[Flora]

Sweetpeas,without doubt, the sweetest lemonie vanilla-ie scent of proper garden sweetpeas picked fresh that day. My favourite smell in the whole world..Why isn't there a perfume made like them?
It instantly takes me back to my childhood holidays were every tuesday we would trek down to the women's institute market with my grandfather to buy jam and cakes in the old covered market place under stone arches and the heady scent of sweetpeas filled the air..mmmm, I still have it in my nostrils!
Thank you for all these giveaways!

[helen]

freshly cut grass xo

[Jessica]

Homemade Pumpkin Pie baking in the oven. It reminds me of Thanksgiving growing up in the states. So comforting and yummy. :)

Great meeting you and finding out about your blog at the make lounge last Saturday Miss Birdy!

[Feebee]

I have just qualified as a teacher and have been setting up my new classroom this week. The smells are SOOOOOO evocative and have whisked me straight back to my school days in the 80s. I nominate the smell of freshly sharpened pencils and powder paint!

Reading the comments above have brought back happy memories too. Apparently the ofactory centre of the brain (the bit that recognises scent) is closest to that part of the brain which holds memories.....

x

[Top Bird @ Wee Birdy]

Hello all, thanks so much for taking the time to enter the comp.

Your heartfelt entries have completely blown me away - I've really loved reading about your nostalgic fragrances. So interesting that many of them trigger very specific memories from childhood.

Winners will be announced on Monday - good luck! xx