Author, and creator of the ‘first feminist fragrance’ Sara Sheridan discusses how perfume can be a powerful statement.
I’VE been fascinated for years by the Overton Window, otherwise known as the window of discourse. It encapsulates the spectrum of ideas that public opinion will accept. In my lifetime there must have been thousands of shifts. I was brought up in the 1970s when women still left work when they got married. I find it exciting that ideas change. In Scotland we’ve been seeing that a lot – ideas that would have been on the fringes coming closer to the hearth.
My first love is women’s history – much of it hidden or lost. You can tell a lot about a culture or an era by what it deems acceptable for women. And as a historical writer, I can confirm, you don’t spend long in the past without comparing it to the present. Last year, increasingly frustrated by the lack of recognition for female historical figures and spurred on by the controversial nature of putting a woman on a banknote, I created a perfume to memorialize the past’s amazing women. I felt I had to do something.
I love the idea of perfume as a statement. Historically, memorializing someone means naming a place or raising a statue. There are famously more statues of animals in Edinburgh than there are of female figures – that’s the patriarchy for you. It occurred to me that perfume is an ideal vehicle for remembrance – how many scents take you back instantly to a particular place and time? The best things in life are experiential. A taste. A touch. A whiff of rebellion. You can take it with you wherever you go, order it wherever you are. From the off we wanted to sell in Europe and beyond.
There are famously more statues of animals in Edinburgh than there are of female figures – that’s the patriarchy for you.
The resulting company, REEK, launched this August. Its first scent is called DAMN REBEL BITCHES in memory of the Jacobite women, who were abused in the press of the day and particularly by the Duke of Cumberland who sent troops to subdue them with orders to rape at will. Maggie Craig’s book of the same name put flesh on the bones of these extraordinary women. My favourite, Lady Nithsdale, broke her husband out of the Tower of London in 1716. There is no statue to her.
For me, DAMN REBEL BITCHES is the whiff of reminder that in taking a stand on feminist issues, we are part of a long tradition. We must not forget our heroines. Change is only possible because someone did something that seemed shocking. The Jacobite women did that in spades. The first call for women MPs at Westminster was in 1746. After Culloden, English women realised the Scottish women were paying their own fines. South of the border, they had no property rights and they decided they wanted MPs so they could change the law. It took 173 years before the first female MP took her seat, but the Overton Window did shift. Eventually.
I particularly like the idea of reclaiming the word bitch. I’m a writer, so I’m acutely aware of language. It troubles me that there are so few words in English that venerate women and so many that denigrate. It seems to me we should take some back. So there I was with an idea and I needed help.
I particularly like the idea of reclaiming the word bitch… It troubles me that there are so few words in English that venerate women and so many that denigrate.
The world of perfume is notoriously sexist. The first prominent female perfumer was Germain Cellier who broke into the industry through sheer determination in the mid-20th century. Later, when Patricia de Nicolaï wanted to work in Paris, the fact she was part of the Guerlain family didn’t help her combat the industry’s naiscent gender bias. So there was no question I wanted a female perfumer. When Sarah McCartney, an award-winning, indie star agreed to mix for REEK it was a landmark. Unlike many brands, I wanted to be transparent about who mixed the scent and why. The perfume had to have meaning all the way through – and Sarah chose scents that would have been familiar in the lives of the Jacobites – malt (brewing was women’s work) and clary sage (prominent in women’s medicine at the time) were key notes along with blood orange and hazelnut.
As the project continued I became increasingly aware how little real meaning the beauty industry invests in cosmetics. I became sick of doctored images of women and of chemical ingredients. Of huge budgets spent to sell a fantasy that plays on women’s insecurities.
So for me, ethical practice didn’t stop at the ‘vegan’ and ‘cruelty free’ tags. When it came to shooting campaign images for DAMN REBEL BITCHES, there was no question of doing anything other than taking a stand. We chose models from size 8 to 22. The youngest was in her 20s. The oldest, almost 80. They had underarm hair, wrinkles, curves and creases, they were heterosexual, bisexual, lesbian and trans. We did not retouch the images. To me, it seems obvious that one size does not fit all – why should we pretend that it does?
I became sick of huge budgets spent to sell a fantasy that plays on women’s insecurities. So for me, ethical practice didn’t stop at the ‘vegan’ and ‘cruelty free’ tags.
Last month, unveiling the images publicly, I hadn’t realised how shocking they were in the face of a billion-pound industry that sells a sanitized and unattainable version of female beauty. While some women found the images liberating, others were offended. ‘This looks like a pig,’ one woman said of a size 10 model, aged 24. For hours it felt the REEK office was sieged by a body-shaming army. It was particularly telling that some of those criticizing the pictures seemed to feel guilty. ‘It seems a little real,’ one woman posted with what we took as a twinge of regret.
Feminism is a broad church. There are times it seems that the true cause of equality for both genders is lost in squabbling over whether you can be a feminist if you hold certain views. This amounts to a game of ‘my feminism is more feminist than yours’, illuminating the fine line between zeal and zealotry. Ultimately, though, what my study of history has taught me is that if landmark stands are not made and supported, then there is little chance of new ideas becoming normal. The Overton Window doesn’t shift on its own. So we put, right at the top of the site, in large red letters ‘Bitches Unite’. Oh, and amidst the uproar, the good news is, we sold plenty of perfume as well!
But REEK. was always about more than that. So in the days after the uproar over our images, we started a sticker campaign. We printed a thousand to start with and gave them away free. In only three weeks they’re turning up all over the world. We don’t put our web address on the stickers – we put campaigns for our Damn Rebel Bitches to be proud of. ‘Fuck the pay gap’ or ‘we repeal the 8th’ – women’s issues, because we’re not being memorialized and often, it feels, we’re not being listened to.
So we put, right at the top of the site, in large red letters ‘Bitches Unite’. Oh, and amidst the uproar, the good news is, we sold plenty of perfume as well!
I met my MP recently on a train. She told me she wears Damn Rebel Bitches in the House of Commons. I like that. It turns out that there are a lot of Damn Rebel Bitches out there. So I say it again, Bitches Unite.
This is a guest post by Sara Sheridan. Sara is an historical novelist, but her new venture, REEK. perfume which launched this summer has been touted as ‘the first feminist fragrance’ – Damn Rebel Bitches. It can be can be found at www.commonmarket.scot and www.reekperfume.com
Pitcure courtesy of Sara Sheridan
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