Gardenia and frangipani: two of the most intoxicating flowers in existence. In Forbidden Bloom, London-based Mabelle O’Rama brings them together, and the result is every bit as seductive as you’d hope. A two-time finalist at The Fragrance Foundation UK Awards 2024, which comes as no surprise to anyone who has smelled it.
The fragrance tells a story of forbidden love. In the secret garden of Astarte, goddess of love, gardenia and frangipani grew side by side, even though they were never meant to. Together, their scents were feared to be far too intoxicating. Yet they bloomed next to each other all the same, slowly intertwining like two lovers who refuse to play by the rules.
And that’s exactly how Forbidden Bloom smells: creamy, lush and unmistakably sensual. As an extrait de parfum, it’s rich and intense, a floral with real daring, made for the moments you want to be noticed.
Pear, Peach, Frangipani, Gardenia, Coffee, Cedarwood, Ambergris, Musk
Mabelle O'Rama
Mabelle is a Lebanese-British perfumer and artist. During the pandemic she turned to scent as a way to escape for a moment, which led to her own brand and grew into a fascination of what scent does to us: how it brings back memories and shapes how we feel. From her studio in London she creates perfumes that move somewhere between nostalgia and fantasy. She draws inspiration from her Phoenician heritage and from the cosmos, which she sees as both our past and our future home.
Every perfume is hand-bottled in London. Her work hasn’t gone unnoticed: in 2023 she received an honourable mention from the Institute of Art and Olfaction, in 2024 she was a finalist at the UK Fragrance Foundation Awards, and this year Lunar Dust won Best Skin Scent at the Marie Claire UK Fragrance Awards. We’re delighted to share her world with you in Amsterdam.