If you are a resident of the Eternal City you will be well aware that, even before the beginning of a new solar year is celebrated on the 1st of January, the 2025 Jubilee year kicked off on Christmas Eve with the unlocking of the Holy Door at St. Peter’s Basilica by Pope Francis. If you are not a Roman or indeed a Catholic, you may need some explanation as to what a Jubilee is and what it entails… Jubilee years are historic events taking place every 25 years in Rome, a tradition that dates back to the 14th century and which marks an important milestone for the Catholic Church. What in entails on a practical level for many Romans, is months of chaos (hello morning traffic jams!). For whats feels like an eternity now, the city has been in a state of turmoil, with much needed repair works to the city’s infrastructure underway and aimed to be completed by the end of 2024 (um… the jury is still out on that!) to welcome the millions of pilgrims that are expected to visit Rome.
Although most visitors will come to celebrate this important event, many will take the opportunity to explore the city’s historic sites and experience the “dolce vita”. Where to go, what to prioritise and experience will depend on the time at your disposal, your preferences and your budget. My point of view when visiting a place is that scent is always an important part of any experience and a very personal and creative way to remember something meaningful. With this in mind, let me guide you, in this of articles and the following, to be published during 2025, through a few of my favourite strolls in Rome, which will of course include interesting perfume-related stops!
Where to start?
Rome has weathered quite a few storms throughout the ages, but although most monuments are safe when it comes to modernisation due to the city’s very strict laws that preserve historic landmarks, it is getting harder and harder to find some real artisans working in the Eternal City. Old ateliers have given way to more profitable restaurants, ice cream shops or souvenir stores. Bucking the trend, and nestled between the Coliseum and Termini train station, is the neighbourhood of Monti, and in particular the area around via dei Serpenti (i.e. snakes’ road, what a fabulous name!)
For many years a rather downtrodden area it has, over the last twenty odd years, seen a rebirth from its ashes and is now happily populated by small artisanal shops such as an artistic candle maker Candlestore (don’t be put off by the boring name) (#candelstorelab ), a mosaic workshop (#Studio_Cassio), a glass maker (#Studiosilice), a Danish tailor making stunning vintage inspired high-end garments (#Tina.Sondergaard.rome), absolutely beautiful, check out her instagram page for regular updates on her designs), etc.
The neighbourhood is well worth a visit if you are looking for thoughtful gifts or if you fancy a break from all the standardised souvenir shops.
In the same artistic vein, just a few steps from via dei Serpenti, on via Leonina 5, is the lovely niche perfumery Alè Parfum. Set up by Sig.ra Giancarla Perugini in 2008, originally in a different neighbourhood, the boutique was created as a labour of love by someone who clearly appreciates perfumes and has been steeped into the world of scent since childhood. As is often the case, Mrs Perugini’s mother also had a perfume/cosmetics shop in the north of Rome, near Monte Mario, although it featured more commercial and traditional brands.
But as the saying goes: “the shoemaker’s son always goes barefoot” and from those days, Giancarla remembers that, although she has access to many perfumes through her mother, she used to regret never being gifted any perfumes by friends or boyfriends who naturally assumed it was the last thing she wanted! She eventually took over the shop from her mother, along with her sister, and managed it for many years until she decided to open a more exclusive and artistically-minded perfume shop. Originally located in via degli Avignonesi, near via del Tritone in the city centre, Giancarla decided to move to its current location in 2008, having the flair and vision that this area would become one of the artisanal/artistic centres of the city
The decision to open a niche perfumery was made because Giancarla wanted to follow her real passion when it came to perfumery. The choice to eschew commercial brands was both a decision made to differentiate herself from the competition and also one motivated by personal inclination.
So what sorts of brands can one find at Alè Parfum? Giancarla personally chooses each brand she stocks, as this is the only way she will then be able to effectively transmit her love for the scents to her customers. To do that, she mainly relies on trusted distributors she has built a relationship with over the years and whom knows will select brands that are unique and interesting. The choice is really breathtaking for a relatively small boutique..
You will find the following – and these are all my categorisations, not the owner’s:
*Artistic/rebel brands: such as Naomi Goodsir, Etat Libre d’Orange, Meo Fusciuni or DS & Durga; all slightly edgy and provocative.
* Heritage houses: like Lubin that dates back according to the brand to 1789 (I would of thought they had different fish to fry at that particular time, but hey, what do I know?);
*Trendy newish brands: like Atelier Materi or Bohoboco;
*Natural/sustainable luxury offerings: like “Voyages Immaginaires” that create all natural perfumes and provide the option of buying refills;
*Pop” niche: like Montale, Nobile 1942 or Carthusia;
*Indie/independent perfumers: such as Tauer Perfume, Francesca Bianchi and James Heeley, to name but a few.
As official licensed distributors, Alè Parfum carries the entire line for each of these brands, which, in the case of Montale, Nobile or Meo Fuschiuni, can mean close to 50-60 different perfumes.
So who are her customers? it’s a mixed bag but given the location, there are a lot of tourists (making up roughly 70% of customers, as Italian customers tend to prefer shopping online) from the USA, Asia and Eastern Europe, as well as many EU countries. While I was interviewing Giancarla, a group of three Spaniards came along following the recommendation of a friend.
Foreigners are often in search of Italian brands as souvenirs to take home from their travels, which has also influenced Giancarla in her selection of brands.
In terms of the evolving consumer shopping habits, the owner bemoaned the age of Instagram and YouTube influencers who convince large number of their viewers about what to buy, what is in and desirable, in her view robbing people of the freedom to make up their own mind as to what to suits them. She told me of the frequent visit of people who show up with long lists of perfumes to try following influencers’ recommendations and end up disappointed when they finally smell the perfumes..
What of recent perfume trends? Since the pandemic, there has been a noticeable trend for perfumes that are comforting and nostalgic. Vanilla, as well as other food-related indulgences like coffee (like Montale’s Intense Café) and chocolate, are very popular , as well as scents that are perceived as “nostalgic” and linked to childhood memories. For perfumes marketed towards men (if we still care to put a gender on perfumes), recent years have seen a resurgence of spicy perfumes, as well as tobacco, incense, smoky and woody scents. Of course these preferences vary from person to person, but on the whole, in her experience, customers from Asia tend to prefer lighter florals, Northern Europeans incense and woody scents, while many American tourists gravitate towards natural and light fragrances as well as gourmands .
I was interested to get her take on the importance of packaging and story-telling. How big a factor is it in the decision-making of customers? According to Giancarla, and to my surprise, those factors don’t seem to matter much to customers who are generally no longer interested in knowing the back story to brands and scents. (so much for convoluted story telling and expensive packaging..). It could be due to the location of her store, and the fact that busy tourists lack the time to delve more deeply in those issues, but in her experience, influencers’ recommendations and generally the scent in itself are the factors driving the sale. Natural perfumery and/or sustainability concerns don’t seem to rank high in people’s priorities.
Finally, as I visited the store just before Christmas, I asked her what was her recommendation in terms of buying perfumes as a gift for someone else? For practical reasons, they don’t carry sample sets, which is always my first recommendation, so her advice was to stick to fresh cologne like citrus-forward scent that are always pleasant, or clean musky scents that are unlikely to offend anyone. As always, she recommends going in store to try the perfumes personally. Until they invent a new technology for smelling online, there is no substitute for it…
So hopefully this has given you some ideas of where to go for a stroll when you are next in Rome!
Happy New Year to all, and happy sniffing!
