Parterre Fragrances

Parterre is unusual twice over: it is one of very few perfume houses anywhere that cultivates its own botanicals, and it runs the widest ladder of workshops in Britain. Founded in 2015 and working with the Grasse-based master perfumer Jacques Chabert, it holds sessions in Bath near Pulteney Bridge, with regular dates in Oxford too.

The range is the reason to book. £38 buys a 75-minute mini workshop with a 10ml take-home; £65 a themed evening; £125 the standard afternoon with a 50ml bottle; £175 a full day; and £350 a private masterclass with one of the founders for one or two people. Almost every other venue offers a single format at a single price - here you can match the spend to how seriously you want to take it, and a 50ml bottle at £125 is competitive with London sessions that hand you 10ml.

The own-farm angle is not marketing dressing. A house that grows its own crops can walk you from the plant to the extraction to the formula, which is a materially different lesson from being handed thirty numbered bottles. Parterre launched at Fortnum and Mason and has been covered by the Telegraph and Harper's Bazaar, so the brand behind the teaching stands up.

Bath also makes it a destination rather than an errand, which suits the full-day format. Book the £38 taster if you are curious, the £125 afternoon if you want the bottle, and the full day if you want to understand what you did.