Scent Bar opens on Driggs Ave this weekend
Welcome to Williamsburg, LuckyScent
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Hi friends, it’s Nadia! 💌
I know, I know. It's been a minute. A long, quiet, somewhat chaotic minute… and I owe you more than one line to explain it. But today I come bearing news so good I couldn't stay silent any longer, so consider this my dramatic return to your inbox. More on where I've been very soon. (There's a newsletter coming that I think you're going to love. Hint: it involves my nose changing in very unexpected ways.)
THE SCOOP~
Scent Bar is opening on 663 Driggs Ave in Williamsburg — this weekend. I was there yesterday for a private preview with the LuckyScent team, including co-founder Franco Wright and I can confirm: the doors are open to the public this Saturday at 11:00AM. This is the second New York location for the LA-based niche fragrance institution, and from what I’ve seen, it’s going to be larger, more event-forward, and differently designed than the Nolita outpost on Elizabeth Street.
The new space is bigger, brighter, and designed for the way we actually want to shop fragrance. Unlike the beloved Elizabeth Street location— where most bottles live behind the counter/bar— Williamsburg opens things up considerably. You can actually grab bottles yourself, move through categories freely, and take your time. The flow is better, the natural light is generous, and there is even a small outdoor patio which, if you know anything about fragrance shopping, is genuinely life-changing. Step outside, clear your nose in the open air, and dive back in for more. As one should.
I was guided through the space by the wonderful Steven Gontarski, and like the Nolita location, the store is organized by category but with meaningful additions. Given the explosion of releases in the industry, they’ve expanded the gourmand section and added dedicated space for popular favorites like tea, cult femme, chocolate, coffee, and more. The categories feel more considered, and less crammed.
And the part I’m most excited about: events. This space can hold them properly. The niche fragrance community is always hungry for more gatherings, more access, more shared olfactory experiences and Scent Bar Williamsburg is designed to deliver exactly that.
For the uninitiated: LuckyScent and its brick-and-mortar Scent Bar have been the gold standard of niche fragrance retail in the US for years. If you’ve ever fallen into a 1am rabbit hole of obscure, independent, beautiful fragrances… you’ve probably ended up on their site. They recently secured investor backing, and this Williamsburg opening feels like the first move in something bigger.
What this means for ~fragheads~: Williamsburg is now home to two of the most exciting niche fragrance destinations in New York City, within blocks of each other. You can quite literally bop from one to the next until you are utterly, blissfully nose blind (!!!) LuckyScent could not have picked a better area.
The community welcomes all new spaces, places where we can expand our senses and our perspectives. Stéle, which opened in Williamsburg first before expanding to Mott Street in Nolita, is right there in the neighborhood. The NYC fragrance community has built a deep devotion with both boutiques and they are not so much competitors as two different love languages for the same obsession. Both have their place. Both deserve your nose.
(BONUS: Japanese-house LINC Original Makers boutique is also around the corner from Scent Bar’s Williamsburg’s location!)
If you’re there tomorrow, let me know because I will be there around ~5pm.
***Don’t forget to keep scrolling for all the events happening in the coming weeks!
A NOTE TO MY PAID SUBSCRIBERS~
You have been genuinely patient and kind, and I don’t take that lightly. As a thank you for sticking around, I’m pausing paid subscriptions for the next 30-60 days while I return to a proper rhythm. Thank you for still being here. xx Nadia
UPCOMING EVENTS—
McCormick Black Currant Experience, 4/24 6-11pm
Glass Candies Pop-up this weekend 4/25-4/26, 12-6pm
Bath & Body x Vera Bradley Pop-up, 4/24-4/26
Scent & Style with Jessica Murphy, 4/28
UPCOMING MAY EVENTS—
Perfume Discovery Party with EAU Snap! and Powder Room Beauty, 5/3
Devil Wears Prada-Inspired Candle Making Class, 5/7 and 5/17
Twilight-Inspired Candle Making Class at The Twisted Spine, 5/11
Create Your Own Body Oil, 5/16
Nonfiction, a Korean fragrance house with nearly a dozen stores in Asia, opened their very first US store on the LES — minutes from Aedes de Venustas.
Vacation is releasing 5 versions of Orange Gelée in EDT form —we smelled these late last year and my favorites were GELÉE MINÉRALE, GELÉE VANILLE, and GELÉE TROPIQUES.
Guerlain's $660 Vanille Planifolia has been their best-selling product online for five months straight — and the dupe conversation it sparked on TikTok is what finally pushed the 198-year-old house into its very first paid influencer campaign. The verdict from everyone who tried to find a dupe? There isn't one.
Ten years after launching Dark Ride, Xyrena is back with an officially licensed Jurassic Park extrait — opening with stormy petrichor, rainforest greenery, neroli, and blackcurrant, finishing on fossilized amber and brominated water. Comes in a VHS box. $120. Chaos theory, bottled….
Flower Shop Perfumes Co. just launched its first in-house brand, El Morocco Perfumery, inspired by the legendary NYC nightclub that ran from 1931 to 1970 — a glamorous haunt of Humphrey Bogart, Lucille Ball, and Eva Gabor. Five fragrances with names like Two Cigarettes in the Dark and Lulu's Back In Town, packaged in an embossed silver compact (quite heavy!) modeled after vintage cigarette cases. Available in a $135 discovery set, and yes, carried by Scent Bar/LuckyScent. I’ve heard full-size bottles are gorgeous and coming this summer.
For nine years, Bulgari Hotels' signature scent, Eau Parfumée Thé Impérial, a bergamot, black tea, and musk blend by master perfumer Jacques Cavallier, lived exclusively in their lobbies. $165 for 75ml.
That’s all for today, friends!
Thank you for reading, sharing, sniffing, and staying nosey. :) If you enjoyed this, please share it with someone who doesn’t have a perfume budget. <3
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