Bathing in the new

I've moved house again recently. Sometimes I feel like the littlest hobo- and that until tomorrow I'll just keep moving on.

I enjoy new neighbourhoods so much though; finding the idiosyncrasies of a new place and finding the local beat, learning to step with it properly. In a new area a trip to the shop for milk becomes a little adventure. Roman Road market was as exciting to me on Saturday as a souk in Morocco, watching the traders, the customers, finding muffin trays in the least likely shop, realising toffee apple cider existed- all of this being within 200 yards of my new home- how nice! I have become like a much nicer vampire, sucking up novelty to feed my curiosity. There is something to not being a tourist in a place but not quite being local yet- I find that limbo time thrilling. I haven't found out where the recycling goes yet though; this seems to be a total mystery.

Moving itself is quite another matter. I lived in the same place all my life until I was eighteen and went to University. My University halls were Brideshead shabby chic- utterly lovely and quite grand but extremely frayed around the edges. The setting meant out of term that the conference roadshow came to town and we had to move in and out of our rooms every three months- and so an intense dislike of moving, or more accurately moving day, was born.

I don't like materialism but at the end of the day when you acquire books, music and films and even clothes they are precious to you in as much as they are the ones you chose over other options. I fret that books especially will be ruffled and scarred by being packed up and into little cases or boxes and try to be as careful with them as I can without becoming completely absurd about it. There is also the problem of things, especially clothes, seeming to expand as soon as you need to contain them and always having one box too many for the car. The moments between homes are strange too- when you have left one place but are not quite at the other- for a moment you are homeless and only then can you realise just how terribly lost those without their only little corner of the world might feel.

I had been living, excitingly but unusually, in central London for several months. I loved everything about it- I wasn't sure if I would. I have always and continue to love the city most of all early in the morning when it hasn't woken yet. On Sunday mornings especially when the heart of London wasn't booming and a strange quiet used to fall I would sometimes wake- I'd open the big sash window and just gaze out and listen for the quiet- then I'd go back to my slumber and that sleep would be intensely peaceful.

So I will always have very happy memories of those months in London proper- the only thing I missed when I lived there was not having a bath in my flat. I really didn't realise quite how much I love the bath. It is just such a simple pleasure and so relaxing. People write endlessly about baths, liking them or not, busy people like to say they don't have time for baths and others will tell you all about their bath routine.

No one ever really talks about how wonderful it is to be able to just lie in hot water for a little time, breath in the steam and just be. I always love the bath scenes in period dramas for this reason- in old films or books from another time the bath is a luxury for most and treated with respect.

My new home has a very nice bath in it. On the dreaded moving day after lifting many many boxes in and out of buildings quite literally the first thing I did after throwing everything at my new room was to have a bath.




Now that I am settled in I have taken the time to enjoy some beautiful rose bath truffles I was given by Simply Roses.



It is quite clear that I love roses but really the scent of these truffles was sublime as it wafted around my flat. Lavender is always thought of as the archetypal relaxing scent but rose oil is extremely nurturing and re balancing and in many ways is as good for stress as its lilac cousin, especially for women.I loved watching the petals unfold and dash around as the water ran so I took some photos to share with you below.








The rose truffles, which do look and smell good enough to eat but should probably be kept just for the bath are available online here.

Man's candle

I don't know if the world necessarily needs candles just for men but they are good scents and the names are quite funny.



Lady Luck candle



Motor oil candle

Full 'Mans Candle' range available here.

True Grace

For a long time I didn't 'get' scented candles. I don't know why but I just didn't covet them or feel I needed them in my life. Now that's all changed and I want candles all over the house, in various scents for various moods.

The candles I want them to be are from True Grace. I have been spending far too long sniffing their wares in shops lately and so I finally looked up their website- which is delightful. You can select scents from either the Manor, the village or the walled garden; the ones I desire the most are comforting, seashore and meadow- but really I would be happy with any of them- or indeed all of them.

I love to find British companies that are stylish and that take the best things about our traditions but don't live in the past. True Grace seems to be a company like that and I feel I've taken them a little bit into my heart- and want to take them into my house.

The Ice Maiden

Last Christmas I visited one of my favourite exhibition spaces, Dulwich Picture Gallery, for their The Age of Enchantment exhibition about Beardsley, Dulac and other illustrators, including some Arthur Rackham, from 1890 to 1930. I had been so looking forward to the exhibition and it was a feast for the eyes and mind.

I particularly fell in love with the Ice Maiden picture above and have a poster I bought at the exhibition as a kind of Christmas decoration. It's a strange picture I suppose in that she looks so calm and serene but she is clearly cupping a heart in her hands so I wonder if she is as angelic as she looks. She seems able to tame Polar bears so she must be very powerful or knowledgeable, or perhaps they have a great respect for her. I think the mystery makes the picture more interesting.

Whenever I look at this illustration I think of the scent of Crabtree and Evelyn's Winter Birch. This sadly seems to be discontinued from their main sites but I did find some independent American sites which are still selling some of the line, including this one.

From memory it is a startling well put together home fragrance; it smells of walking through snow in darkness or fading light as the ice maiden is doing, there are fir trees nearby and in the far distance a house with a gentle glow of warmth and the scent of mulling and logs from the chimney floats on the breeze. It is both a scent that smells of the cold but is also incredibly warming and comforting. I really regret not stocking up on more of the candles last year and am going to have to track some down so I can be my own kind of ice maiden.



Winter Birch picture courtesy of: https://www.paradiseemporium.com.au/companyProducts.asp?id=465

The Ice Maiden by Aubrey Beardlsey picture courtesy of: www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk