How To Choose Winter Scents For Your Home

If anyone knows scent, it’s Saskia Havekes. Much more than a green thumb with a discerning eye and knack for arrangement, Saskia is an artist. As she notes, she doesn’t arrange flowers, she curates them.

Reposed between the ferns and the fig trees at Sydney’s famed florist Grandiflora, Saskia has transcended floristry. She has influenced interior, hospitality, fashion, beauty and editorial, with her whimsical work featured in every top glossy, event and fashion show you can think of. A published author of four books, she has used her expert nose to add a luxurious candle and Eau de Parfum range to her fragrant repertoire, which, as you would imagine, smell like a thousand freshly cut flowers.

We spoke to Flower’s First Lady about winter scents for the home, the best flowers for winter and her unique candle tips.

• What are the best scents to warm your home for winter?

Clove, Pittosporum, Red Berry, Spruce/ Connifer and Fig.

• Can a scent actually have a warming effect?

Yes, scent can take you to a place that has been set in your memory. Atmospheres or experiences that induce warmth can be recounted through scent.

• What flowers are in season this winter that we should be filling our homes with?

Orchids are a terrific winter flower as they last as a cut stem of blooms. Rich warm tones or clear / clean whites, creams and greens. A selection of varieties of Orchids in a single vase covered in moss can have a sense of bringing the garden inside from outside effect. Potted orchids also last without much care for a long time. Cylcamen in hot and deep magentas can have the same effect. Japonica blossom is effective in large bundles and is also very lasting.

• Are there any scents that work perfectly together? And any that don’t?

A beautiful combination is found when fragrances are kept in their families according to the famous fragrance wheel created by Michael Edwards. These include some of my favourites of pairing citrus and aromatic cut flowers, floral and woody vetivier notes. I find it obscure when these groups are mixed in an opposite way so that it would be strong sweet spiced oriental mixed with fresh green notes or citrus notes.

• Do you have any candle tips?

Often I will burn Beeswax candles between changing to a new scented candle as it is such a wonderful purifier. Don’t have a mixture of scented candles burning at the same time. Each time you burn your special candle no longer than 3-4 hours, cut its wick down before relighting again. Sometimes the wick may need re-centring – do this gently when the wax is liquid.