Beckielou Brown

United Kingdom Altra

Abstract, conceptual compositions built only from natural materials, drawing on architecture, art and urban spaces rather than a literal portrait of nature. Notes such as concrete and sunscreen sit beside florals, orris and frankincense, giving the work a cool, modern edge.

About

Beckielou Brown is the perfumer and co-founder of Altra, a UK perfume house that works only with natural materials. She started the house with Bridget Plant, from a shared wish to make a natural scent experience that celebrates beauty in all its forms and respects the planet.

She works from an exclusively natural palette and sets out to challenge what people expect natural perfumery to smell like. Rather than a true to life rose or woodland, she builds abstract, conceptual scents that bring in notes such as concrete and sunscreen and a sense of structures and spaces. Her references come from architecture, art and urban environments, and the natural world is placed in unexpected contexts.

Her process is visual. She usually starts from a feeling she wants to capture, sometimes with one ingredient in mind, and builds moodboards that develop alongside the scent. She says she can look at an image and know which scent it belongs to. She is drawn to the vibrancy and complexity of natural materials, and names orris as an all time favourite for its range, from suede and violet to chocolate and skin.

The Altra range includes Jasmin XXX, Stone Cold Heart, Ghost Flower, Altra Skin and Dualist. She calls Jasmin XXX the most evocative of them, a full-on white floral built to capture the optimism of a night out in youth, and says Altra Skin is the one she cannot live without. In Stone Cold Heart she pairs French orris with frankincense for a cool, airy heart.