I was fortunate enough to be able to travel to London, purely for pleasure, in 2023 and 2024. My love for that city predates my perfume-blogging existence — I’d visited twice before, in earlier and very different phases of my life — but I’ve closed that gap during those more recent trips. I armed myself both times with a must-smell perfume-shopping list, and three entries on that list were female-founded brands with free-standing boutiques in London: Angela Flanders, Perfumer H, and Ormonde Jayne.

Of these three, Ormonde Jayne was the only fragrance house I’d been able to try at home. (Angela Flanders and Perfumer H don’t have their own retail spots in the United States, although a small selection of Perfumer H fragrances can be found at a few multi-brand retailers in NYC and beyond.) And even Ormonde Jayne had been on my wishlist for a while, since this brand wasn’t available in the US until the later 2010s. (A friend who worked at an upscale fragrance boutique in NYC might have played a part in bringing it here, if I recall correctly.)

So, how did I find out about Ormonde Jayne, and how did I initially try some of the brand’s signature scents? The fragrance message board at MakeupAlley.com, of course. Around 2005, some overseas members started posting about Ormonde Jayne and writing reviews of this new-ish brand’s fragrances. Somehow or other, samples of Ormonde Woman, Osmanthus, Champaca, Tolu, and others from the “OJ” (as we abbreviated it) core collection began circulating in the mail through scent swaps and “RAOK” (“random act of kindness”) care packages. MUA frag board members were generous — and had excellent taste.

Time has passed, and MakeupAlley.com is slated to close down at the end of this month, so memories like this one are even more special to me than ever.

Back to the present, or close enough! On my visits to the Ormonde Jayne boutique in London’s Royal Arcade, I was able to tell a welcoming sales associate about my longtime appreciation for the brand, my favorites (Ta’if, Frangipani, and the recently discontinued Vanille d’Iris). Founder Linda Pilkington wasn’t there at the moment, but she does occasionally stop by, I was told.

Pilkington founded Ormonde Jayne at the turn of the millennium, giving it her own middle name (Jayne) and the name of the street where lived (Ormonde Terrace in London). She continues to steer Ormonde Jayne’s creative direction, working closely with perfumer Geza Schoen. (You can view a short video of Linda and Geza discussing their partnership here). The orange boxes, the luxuriously weighty bottles, the concepts behind the fragrances — all come from Linda Pilkington’s own vision for her brand.

Looking back now, with a longer perspective, I have even more respect for Linda’s creation and nurturing of this business; few higher-end niche perfume lines founded by women have endured the way Ormonde Jayne has. Some of the early female-founded brands in upscale niche perfumery, like Jo Malone and Annick Goutal, suffered some loss of quality and brand identity when they were acquired by much larger corporate entities. Others, like Antonia’s Flowers (a smaller, pioneering brand independent perfumery), quietly retired when the scent-scape shifted so intensely in the 2010s. There are newer woman-founded niche brands, of course, and I enjoy keeping an eye out for those as well. (I’m also fanatically devoted to a number of female-founded independent/artisanal brands, but that’s a topic for another post!)

Whenever I get back to London, I’ll pay yet another call to the flagship boutique to smell whatever’s new and revisit some longtime favorites. Meanwhile, I’ve just reviewed three Ormonde Jayne fragrances for Now Smell This: Vanille des Afriques Intensivo, Babylonia, and Xi’an. You can read the post here.

Have you ever tried anything from Ormonde Jayne? Tell us!