Simon Shaer

United Kingdom Neshama Perfume

Natural-material perfumery in the vintage tradition: rare florals, balsams and woods, with oud, sandalwood and real animalic notes, built at 20 per cent extrait strength and made by hand in small batches. Fruity osmanthus, white florals and dry tobacco set against civet and resin recur across the range.

About

Simon Shaer is a London perfumer and the founder of Neshama Perfume, a small house that compounds and bottles its extraits by hand in London. Neshama is the Hebrew word for soul, and the house began under the name Rebel Perfume.

No perfumery school or mentor is named for him. The house says only that he studied with perfumers great and small, so this profile makes no training claim.

His work starts from vintage perfumes and natural aromatics, which the house sets against the linear style of modern commercial scent. He prefers naturals to synthetics and builds with rare florals, balsams and woods, among them Thai osmanthus absolute, Egyptian jasmine, oud and sandalwood, with real civet and castoreum in some of the formulas. The perfumes are made in small batches at 20 per cent extrait strength.

Souls on Fire, released in 2022 under the name Osmanthus Floral, was named a finalist in the Artisan category of the Art and Olfaction Awards in 2023. It reads as a chypre without a classic chypre structure, with osmanthus, basil, tobacco, balsams and civet doing the work of the usual bergamot and oakmoss. Jasmine & Tobacco and Ninth Wave followed in 2023. Wandering Stars, a Lebanese gardenia and Indonesian oud perfume, was co-created with Michael Ælfric Nordstrand of Mythologist Studio.

Reviewers describe a classical sensibility: deep natural materials kept legible rather than smoothed out, in compositions that feel vintage but stay fresh.