Roses at the Cape of Good Hope

Inspired by Gwen Fagan’s book Roses at the Cape of Good Hope, the Rosaria perfume tells the story of a rose at the end of a summer day. Our perfumer tried to capture that exact moment when the flower exudes its last breath, after which it loses all its petals.

When the business acquired a corner block on Pepper /New Church Street in Cape Town, plans were made to restore and enlarge the space. Fagan Architects next door, were tasked with the project.

Their obvious questions was “What exactly is going to happen inside this building?”
Gwen Fagan, who used to accompany her husband in the office, heard our story and she presented to our perfumer her book “Roses at the Cape of Good Hope”.
The book is a meticulous catalogue of each rose species that ever arrived in the Cape of Africa, told through beautiful stories.
It inspired the creation of Rosaria, the perfume that addresses the subtle point of the book: the ephemeral quality of beauty and its importance in our lives.

The perfume is an art deco representation of a rose, constructed on a 1920’s perfume structure, just before the industrial revolution started to introduce more synthetics in the perfumer’s palette.