Flip through the 5 pages of notes below to see how things got started for the rich concept, moving from initial ideas to final framework, I'll meet you down below to explain a bit more.
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There were so many strong fragrance and ingredient ideas for this category, I think this was the one I was most excited to brainstorm. I love strong smells, and spices, so this concept let my brain go crazy. For this collection, I settled on Indian inspiration, I love cooking and eating Indian food and have learned a lot about the core spices typically used in India, the real challenge here was limited myself and my ideas. Once I had come up with way too many contrasting scents, I had to group them based on what made the most sense, and then select a group from there. I settled on using cinnamon, a type of tree bark used to treat infections, it’s also anti fungal, and its powerful scent is effective for clearing head colds and sinuses. The Ritual of Ayurveda uses cinnamon in its tea, which is why it’s such a popular product. The other ingredient I settled on is star anise, which is a lesser known spice but easily one of my favourites. Anise take the shape of a star, and has a distinct black liquorice scent with ginseng notes, and helps with digestion, nausea, and cramping, its also commonly used in stews and broths for its sweet aftertaste.
For this collection, I took inspiration from the Ritual of Tsuru for its distinct woody fragrance and iconic branding. I also took inspiration from Yalda for the same reasons, which still has a cult following even after its been discontinued. I came across the Ritual of Light, and added it to my inspiration board for its packaging design, which is distinct and dark, and the speckled texture caught my eye (I haven’t had the chance to smell this collection, but the packaging was merit enough). Last Christmas Rituals released the Roi D’Orient EDP + shower gel gift set, and it was the first time we had seen that fragrance in the form of body/shower care. I was smitten with the fragrance before it was a shower gel, and even moreso now that it is, and I derived a lot of inspiration from this scent for my own rich collection. The packaging of the Roi D’Orient shower gel was almost exactly what I had pictured in my head for my design, the swirly, wooden texture mottled with different shades of brown.
This collection was for going crazy, in my head I was picturing the mounts of dried spices lined up in Indian markets I had only seen on YouTube or instagram, and the powdered pigments used for holidays like Holi or Diwali. I wanted to stick to burnt/warm colours like oranges and reds, using browns as contrast. For texture I was inspired by rough clay and brick, even tree bark, but with another contrast. The star anise ingredient would hypothetically offer a ginseng-sweet undertone to the fragrance, and I paired that with a satin or velour texture in my mind. I knew that this design was going to have to have two distinct layers on order to effectively express its ingredients.
