If you write Regency fiction, you may have stumbled upon Laurie Benson’s excellent post, How To Smell Like a Regency-Era Gentleman. Laurie chronicles a visit to two very old London scent makers, discussing some colognes that date all the way back to the Regency. If you’ve ever wondered what a Regency duke really smelled like, check out her post.

Note that Truefitt & Hill sells a cologne sample pack that includes a few of their oldest scents. This might be the cheapest way to sample Regency-era cologne. If you’re curious, Henry Dawson, the lead in my forthcoming book The Solitary Rose, wears “Freshman,” a Truefitt & Hill cologne popular with Regency-era undergraduates. Lord Colburn, from My Lady Sorceress, wears Spanish Leather, a scent produced (with variations) by multiple fragrance companies.

But what if you want to smell like a Regency-era lady, not a gentleman? I have never had the opportunity to visit London perfumeries in person, but some quick googling turned up a few sources for women’s scents that date back to the Georgian era.

First up, you can try Sweet Water, based on an 18th-century recipe. This is a pretty floral scent that I don’t find too strong. There are other Etsy sellers who make old-fashioned rose water or lavender water, so if you want to buy from a small business, try poking about Etsy for scents. (Emma Ainsworth, the female lead of The Solitary Rose, prefers lavender, while Madelene Shaw of My Lady Sorceress always uses rose water.)

If you want to support some of the old British scent makers, Floris has been around for centuries, and they do sell some of their classic fragrances. Check out their Lily of the Valley eau de toilette, based on one of their earliest fragrences. Limes is also a very old scent. American shoppers note that you can find Floris scents floating around on other places on the web, too, such as Ebay or the Zon.

Unfortunately, Floris is out of my price range, so I was happy when Regency writer Beth Elliott directed me to Woods of Windsor, which dates back to 1770. Their True Rose and Lavender Eau de Toilettes are based on old formulas. (Of the two scents, I prefer Lavender.) If you live in the US, don’t worry about international shipping: several American vendors carry these scents, too.

I am not a perfume expert, and I know that I am undoubtedly missing many other sources for historic fragrances. Drop a comment if you know of some good Regency-era women’s scents that I haven’t listed here!

And if you’re curious about how perfume was stored in the Regency era, Candice Hern’s Regency World blog has several posts about Regency perfume bottles, including one with a built in spy-glass! That would be perfect for a lady pirate, wouldn’t it?