Knowing that our sense of smell is linked to our memories and the ability to alter the way we feel, it’s no wonder that fragrance and travel are so perfectly aligned. The global luxury hotel group The Peninsula Hotels launches new amenities, enlisting ten local ‘noses’ to create a tailor-made line of beautiful, new scented bathroom products, designed to titillate your senses and keep your mind travelling.
Our minds travel to far-flung lands today – China, in fact – thanks to The Peninsula Hotels. The group, with much loved OutThere properties like The Peninsula Bangkok and The Peninsula Chicago, has developed a divine line of sustainably packaged, environmentally friendly bathroom amenities in ten of their hotels worldwide, each with a distinctive scent. These were created bespoke to the hotels’ individual locations, by talented fragrance curators in each destination.
We received samples for their hotels in China today, from The Peninsula Shanghai and The Peninsula Beijing, both conjouring dreams of floral teas and eastern adventures. From Shanghai – a heady mix of geranium, patchouli and grapefruit, as if straight out of the botanical gardens in Xuhui; and from Beijing, a more masculine bergamot, black pepper and amber, representing the exoticism of the imperial city.
The artisanal perfumers behind these fragrances are none other than Dino Kong and Meng Gu. Dino, hailing from Shanghai and created scents for some of the world’s biggest perfume houses and Meng, also from China but working in Paris, consider fragrance creation to be a form of exploration and discovery. Also, the Peninsula Hotels launches new amenities in Hong Kong (with Angel Cheung), Tokyo (with Satori Osawa), New York (with Mackenzie Reilly), Chicago (with Russel Weiss), Beverly Hills (with Alia Raza) and Manila (with Wiji Lacsamana). We’re particularly excited about the mango, lotus and orchid scents from Bangkok, by Prin Lomros – the Thai capital being a destination we adore; and also the rose and incense based scent from Paris, created by Celine Barel – as Paris is known to be the fragrance capital of the world.
More than just sensorial, we’re pleased to hear that the project is also sustainable. All the amenities are produced with natural ingredients and are gluten, soy and paraben-free. The packaging is also 99.9% free of single-use petroleum products, made from recycled sources. To keep in the spirit of things, they have also replaced the hard amenities – like shower caps and toothbrushes – with more ecologically minded alternatives, and have completely eliminated any plastic wrappings.
It’s great to see a stalwart brand like The Peninsula Hotels take the lead in merging innovation in luxury hospitality with greater caretaking for the planet. We’re all for it. Now, all we need to do is to be able to get out into the world again and revisit (between us here at OutThere, we’ve stayed at nearly all The Peninsula Hotels), to smell them for ourselves. We can’t wait.
In the meantime, we propose that you take a leaf out of The Peninsula Hotel’s book – fill your home with scents that remind you of wonderful times and places you love. It’ll go far to feed your wanderlust.
Photography courtesy of The Peninsula Hotels
