Description
India
Winner of the Fragrance Foundation UK Award for Best New Independent Fragrance, India by Marina Barcenilla is stunningly beautiful, warm and spicy, with a depth and complexity that can only be achieved with natural floral essences of outstanding quality. Cardamom, coriander and rose effortlessly lace with an exuberant floral heart, before being enveloped in an amber and sandalwood warmth. The story behind the fragrance… ‘Hand in hand with a thousand children smiling their best smile, breathing in the sweet incense and the heady fragrance of Indian flowers, is where you will find me. In milky white marble temples with towering gods, amongst crowds of sari-clad women, in my India. That is where you will find me.’ A percentage of every sale is given to charity and this year it is The Tulsi Trust, which funds health and education projects in Chhattisgarh, a remote area of central India.
Perfumer
Marina Barcenilla was Born in Spain and has been based in London for over twenty years. While growing up Marina remembered being extremely intrigued by the aromatic notes in the Herbissimo fragrances and in her grandmother’s lavender water and her love of natural ingredients comes from this period of her life. Marina became deeply involved in aromatherapy and natural scents which eventually lead her to branch out from her aromatherapy roots into the world of perfume. It was a new challenge for her but it lead her to creating well known natural perfumes. Using ingredients as building blocks for fragrance instead of for their therapeutic qualities came easy to her, and it didn’t take long before she began to create bespoke fragrances for customers who had heard of her through word of mouth.
On 6th June 2011 Marina Barcenilla launched The Perfume Garden, a small artisan perfumery located in the West Country, as a way to return to more traditional ways of creating perfume. As Founder and Perfumer, Marina‘s vision was to be involved in every aspect of the process, from sourcing rare and precious aromatic essences from around the world to blending fragrances by hand in her own perfume studio. With a range of six perfumes and a selection of body oils, bath salts and sugar scrubs, which were originally blended to order, she saw her passion turn into an industry recognised “fragrance house”.
In 2016 Marina won the coveted Fragrance Foundation (FiFi) Award for Best New Independent Fragrance with India, which prompted her to take the next step on her journey. More awards have followed in 2017. Patchouli Clouds fragrance won the Editor’s Choice Beauty Shortlist Award, The Perfume Garden fragrance and Patchouli Clouds Bath & Body Oil each won an NHM International Natural Beauty Award, and Marina Barcenilla Parfums won the Eluxe Award for Best Natural Perfume Brand. The Perfume Garden was finalist for the prestigious FiFi Award of Perfume Extraordinaire at the 2017 UK Awards, and both Black Osmanthus and The Perfume Garden were chosen finalists for Best New Independent Fragrance, which Marina won for the second consecutive year with Black Osmanthus.
