Highland Retreat, Scotland

Step into the Scottish Highlands, past the castles and the moors and the historic royal villages, to the welcome that waits within. Highland Retreat is a rich woody gourmand amber fragrance: dramatic, generous, deeply comforting.

Bergamot, cognac and a trace of smoke open it, saffron lending a glow that borders on ceremonial; smoked cinnamon, clove and leather deepen the heart; a base of patchouli, sandalwood, vetiver, moss, vanilla and amber settles into a slow, enveloping embrace. It is the feeling of arriving somewhere that holds you, the kind of warmth that fires the soul.

Top notes: Cognac, Smoke, Saffron, Bergamot, Lemon

Heart notes: Smoked Cinnamon, Clove, Leather

Base notes: Patchouli, Sandalwood, Vetiver, Moss, Musk, Vanilla, Amber

A ruined Scottish castle above heather moorland, with a single-track road winding into the hills under a stormy sky.

The place

I found out about Aberdeen when my mum and I met a university recruiter in India. He had a way with words and described Aberdeen as the Silver City, where beautiful, shimmering granite caught the light. I was enchanted before I had even packed.

Then I stepped off the plane.

Grey clouds. Grey buildings. Grey streets. Grey everything. I actually cried. I had come from a world of colour, from the vivid, sun-soaked intensity of the Seychelles, and Aberdeen in the depths of a Scottish winter was a considerable adjustment.

The Scots are not grey at all. They are warm and funny and genuinely welcoming in a way I had not expected and have never forgotten. I kept my light on late. My yellow toaster was always on. People wandered in. I made friends quickly. The city that had seemed so austere from the outside turned out to be full of exactly the warmth I had been quietly missing: dry, unhurried, utterly genuine. Aberdeen was the Silver City after all. It simply kept its warmth on the inside, where it counted.

Then I started my master's. First day. A boy sat nearby. We would not stop talking. He walked me home afterwards, though it was considerably out of his way. I went in and told my mother I had met this boy. That evening, he called his parents back in Northern Ireland and said something very similar.

His name is Chris. In hindsight, the fact that he walked considerably out of his way should have been a clue.

A girl from the Seychelles and a boy from Northern Ireland, who met in Aberdeen and never quite left it behind. Scotland gave us warmth when we arrived with none of our own, and it has stayed with us ever since. Highland Retreat is that warmth, kept.

A Highland Retreat, Scotland diffuser with black reeds on dark tartan, with dried thistles, driftwood and a leather notebook.

The fragrance

Composed by Julie Dunkley at Sozio.

Highland Retreat was created by Julie Dunkley, Senior Perfumer at Sozio UK and a Past President of the British Society of Perfumers. Julie has spent her career building fragrances that are deeply atmospheric and unafraid of intensity, and that is precisely what this one asked for.

Most fragrance briefs begin with notes. We began with a feeling. My parents lived near Royal Deeside, and what we wanted to capture was the majesty of the Highlands set against the welcome you find indoors: the warmth of a little drink by the fire, vanilla shortbread, the particular comfort of being somewhere that holds you. The brief was for something that would wrap around a room and stay.

The result answers with intensity and restraint in equal measure. The fragrance opens with bergamot, cognac and a trace of smoke, saffron lending a glow that borders on ceremonial. Through the heart, smoked cinnamon, clove and leather deepen into something dramatic and enveloping. The base is where it settles and stays: patchouli, sandalwood, vetiver, moss, vanilla and amber, woods and resins that resolve into something close to being held.

A wonderful warm hug is still the only description that entirely fits.

Kerry Lemon's hand-drawn Highland Retreat illustration on the porcelain candle: a castle on its crag, poppies, thistle, a stag and bagpipes.

The illustration

Hand-drawn illustration on porcelain by Kerry Lemon.

We needed an illustrator who could draw memory. Kerry Lemon is one of the most respected illustrators in the UK. She very rarely takes on commissions now. This one, she said, was too good to turn down.

The brief for Highland Retreat was specific. Every motif had to mean something. Each element had to belong to this place, this memory.

Arriving from the Seychelles, the thistle was the first thing Scotland showed me. It appeared on every emblem, and it felt like a threshold, a quiet welcome from warmth into granite skies. Kerry drew it unsoftened, spines and all, which is exactly right: it is a plant that gives nothing away easily and rewards you anyway.

Seeing a deer or a stag in the wild always thrilled me, and one presides over the vessel now, that stately, regal bearing, the true heir of this resplendent, rugged land. Behind it rise the castle ruins Chris and I would drive to on long roads north, romantic dates among old stone as the landscape opened out and the Highlands began. Tartan runs through the whole scene, the texture of the place drawn in ink.

The seal means the most to me. When Chris and I were first getting to know each other, he told me about diving in the cold water off Aberdeen, near Boddam Lighthouse, and the friendly seal that had followed him through it. I was fascinated and impressed in equal measure. I secretly felt it was a sign, that animals can sense purity and specialness, and that Chris had a gentle way with the natural world. It drew me in even closer. The whole illustration, in that sense, is a portrait of how we began.

A Highland Retreat, Scotland candle, refill and cotton pouch on a marble board with heather, thistles and a snuffer.

Made to be refilled

A Told London candle is made to be kept. The porcelain is yours for life: when the wax is spent you refill it rather than replace it, so the vessel stays in your home instead of being remade and shipped again. Each candle is hand-poured in England in natural soy wax, and the packaging is plastic-free and FSC-certified. Refill, don’t replace.

Recognition

Silver at the Pure Beauty Awards 2025 for Best New Wellness Product, awarded to Highland Retreat, Scotland.

Have You Been Told About Scotland?