Spiteful August

30/08/2026

NOT INSPIRED BY. NOT SIMILAR TO. NOT A COPY.

I hope we never become popular enough to be copied.
Which is probably a ridiculous thing for an independent perfume house trying to grow to say. But there it is.

Every Spiteful August fragrance starts with an idea, not another perfume.

We don't begin with something successful and work backwards. We're not interested in making our version of something you already know. And we definitely don't want to tell you what one of our fragrances “smells similar to.”

We create from scratch. We experiment. We get things wrong. We change them. We obsess over them. And eventually, when they smell like something that feels entirely ours, we release them.
Maybe one day someone will decide one of our fragrances is worth copying.

I genuinely hope not.

But if they do, I suppose we'll know we created something worth stealing..

Until then, we'll keep making original fragrances for people who don't particularly want to smell like everyone else.

SPITEFUL AUGUST

30/08/2026

THE I'ZIZOU DIARY

I'ZIZOU will be the next fragrance to join the SPITEFUL AUGUST collection, launching next year.

So we thought we'd take you behind the scenes and show you how Scott is actually creating it. Not just the finished fragrance, but the decisions, the changes, the waiting, the tiny adjustments, and the moments when something unexpected happens and completely changes where the fragrance is going. To get to this point it's taken 5 months and 8 different iterations of the fragrance.

Because developing a fragrance isn't simply a case of mixing thirty beautiful smelling materials together, deciding they smell nice and putting them in a bottle. At least, that's not how Scott works.

Every material has a job. Every milligram has a purpose. He's thinking about structure, projection, longevity, transitions, and how the fragrance changes on skin over several hours.

I'ZIZOU has been a journey. And before we explain what Scott has done to it, we should probably explain what it actually smells like.

The starting point is Tamarine.

It's difficult to describe because it doesn't smell like one recognisable fruit. It's tropical, juicy and slightly strange. There's something ripe and exotic about it, somewhere between tropical fruit flesh and the tartness of tamarind, without becoming obviously sweet or edible.

Scott surrounded that with creamy lactonic materials, soft musks and transparent woods. The result has this smooth, almost tactile quality.

Creamy. Tropical. Bright. Smooth. Peppery. Pollen like.

The best way we can describe I'ZIZOU right now is tropical cream being poured over hot skin in the sunlight.

Imagine the smell of hot skin in tropical heat, with its sensual dark saltiness, then cover that beautiful skin with vibrant tropical fruits and soft sweet cream.

That's the vibe. And that's pretty much how Scott's mind works.

But underneath all that softness is something much darker. And that's where I'ZIZOU becomes really interesting.

There isn't actually black pepper in the formula. That peppery sensation emerges from the darker structure underneath everything else. Nagarmotha brings something dry, earthy and slightly smoky. Kephalis adds warm, dark woody depth. Cashmeran brings texture and warmth. Mosses add something earthy and shadowy.

Together, they create this strange peppery darkness underneath all that tropical cream. You smell the softness first, then gradually you realise there's something underneath it.

That contradiction became the identity of the fragrance. And the transformation is the part Scott fell in love with.

THE PERFORMANCE PROBLEM

Once he'd reached that point, the job changed. Scott wasn't really trying to create I'ZIZOU anymore. He was trying not to ruin it.

There was, however, one thing bothering him. It projected beautifully at the beginning, but after around three hours, the middle section didn't feel as though it was carrying enough weight.

And for Scott, performance isn't simply about longevity. A fragrance can technically last twelve hours, but if nobody can smell it unless their nose is against your neck, that isn't the kind of performance he's interested in.

He wants projection. He wants movement. He wants somebody to catch your fragrance as you walk past them.

But he didn't want to achieve that by simply throwing increasingly powerful materials into the formula. Yes, that might make it stronger, but it could also flatten the evolution he'd fallen in love with.

So he started thinking about the fragrance as a series of engines.

The opening engine creates the initial impact. A second engine has to begin working while that opening is still alive. Then another structure carries the fragrance into its drydown. Those engines overlap. One doesn't simply stop and another begin.

That's how Scott creates movement. The difficult part is making those transitions happen without the wearer ever noticing the machinery underneath them.

BUILDING THE SECOND ACT

That led to three important additions.

Magnolan was introduced to strengthen the bridge between the tropical creaminess and the woods. Scott didn't want I'ZIZOU to suddenly become a floral perfume. Magnolan gave the fragrance something softer and more luminous, a creamy floral quality that could live inside the fragrance rather than sitting on top of it.

Ambrolotide went into the musk structure to help the fragrance remain diffusive later into the wear. Again, the objective wasn't simply to make it last longer. The aim was to make sure I'ZIZOU continued to exist in the air around the person wearing it.

Then came Rhubofix. Not because Scott wanted I'ZIZOU to smell of rhubarb. He wanted the juicy, woody energy it could bring to that middle section, something to keep the fragrance moving as the tropical opening began changing and the darker materials started taking control.

And then he stopped.

Because sometimes the most important thing you can do to a fragrance is leave the bloody thing alone.

It macerated. Scott wore it. And he loved it.

BUT SOMETHING STILL FELT OFF

To Scott's nose, I'ZIZOU was leaning more masculine than he wanted.

He could have softened the woods. He could have reduced some of the darker materials. But that would have meant removing part of the thing he'd fallen in love with.

So instead of taking something away, he decided to introduce an opposing force.

He started thinking about fruit and flowers. Peach was considered. Different floral directions were considered.

Eventually he thought:

Apple.

THE APPLE EXPERIMENT

Scott took an already macerated 50 ml bottle of I'ZIZOU and added:

100 mg Apple Oliffac
100 mg Mimosa
50 mg Aldehyde C10 at 10%

And then he waited.

What happened was fascinating. It didn't become an apple fragrance. The DNA of I'ZIZOU was still completely intact.

Still dark. Still tropical. Still creamy. Still peppery.

But suddenly there was light.

The apple brought this beautiful juicy brightness through the tropical fruit. The C10 lifted the opening and gave it more energy. And the Mimosa brought something completely different, a soft, hazy, almost pollen like warmth sitting inside all that creaminess.

It didn't announce itself as "Mimosa". It simply changed the atmosphere.

And that's probably the best way we can describe I'ZIZOU now:

Tropical cream being poured over hot skin in the sunlight. Juicy fruit. Soft sweetness. Pollen floating through warm air. Then, somewhere underneath it all, dry peppery darkness slowly beginning to appear.

That's I'ZIZOU.

WHERE I'ZIZOU IS NOW

Scott has been wearing this version for a few weeks, and he loves what those additions have done.

In fact, there's probably room for more. The apple can come further forward. The Mimosa can become more present. And there's still room for a little more brightness from the C10.

So that's the next experiment.

Then he'll wait again.

Because this is the part of perfumery Scott loves. It isn't just about deciding what something smells like.

It's about deciding what happens next.

He wants the opening to grab you. He doesn't particularly mind if it's excessive, overripe or a little too much. Then he wants something else to happen. And something else.

The fruit changes.

The cream changes.

The woods begin appearing.

The peppery darkness moves forward.

Hours later, he wants you to smell your wrist and realise that the fragrance you put on that morning isn't quite the fragrance you're wearing now.

And underneath all of this, he's constantly balancing projection, longevity, structure, transitions and character without sacrificing one to achieve another.

That's the complexity behind creating I'ZIZOU.

It isn't thirty ingredients mixed together because they smell nice. Every material has a job. Every engine has a purpose. Every transition has to lead somewhere.

And ultimately, all that technical work has to disappear.

You shouldn't smell the engineering. You should feel the experience.

Scott isn't trying to make a nice tropical fragrance. He isn't trying to make an apple fragrance. He isn't trying to make another creamy woody fragrance.

He's trying to create something that makes you stop for a second and think:

I've never smelled anything quite like this before.

Because in a world where it sometimes feels like we've already smelled, tasted, heard and seen everything, experiencing something genuinely new is pretty special.

I'ZIZOU
Coming next year from SPITEFUL AUGUST.

29/08/2026

26/08/2026

Choose something with a point of view. Something with personality. Something that doesn’t disappear into everything else you’ve already smelled.

Something that says something without having to explain itself.

Because what you wear is part of how you show up.

Make it interesting.

25/08/2026

Smell like you’ve got stories you’re not telling.

You walk past.

They turn their head.

Not quickly enough to catch your face. Just long enough to watch you disappear into the crowd.

But something stayed behind.

Your fragrance.

And for a moment, a complete stranger is curious about someone they’ll probably never meet.

Not what you were wearing.

You.

For a few seconds, you were the most interesting person on the street.

Wear something worth talking about.

25/08/2026

Scott wanted to share his latest draft of his lab diary to let you know about the 5th fragrance he's been working on. It's been a challenge and has been in progress since march 2026. We hope you enjoy reading about the trials and tribulations of this Gin inspired fragrance. 😍

THE GIN ONE | LAB DIARY

This fragrance started with a very specific image in my head. A bottle of premium botanical gin taken straight from the freezer. The glass covered in frost. The bottle opened and that first rush of cold, aromatic vapour escaping into the air.

That was the fragrance I wanted to make.

Not a citrus fragrance. Not a conventional fresh fragrance. Not a blue aquatic. Frozen gin.

I wanted juniper to be immediately recognisable, surrounded by crushed ice, cold steel, botanical bitterness, dry tonic water, juniper needles and frosted glass. It needed to remain transparent throughout, without becoming sweet or collapsing into a heavy amber base.

The first version was built around a substantial Juniper Berry accord with ginger, cardamom, black pepper, fenchol, armoise and Rhubofix. Green mandarin was there for sparkle rather than to become part of the identity. Aldehydes, Rose Oxide and Dihydromyrcenol were used to create frost, air and volatility.

Underneath that I built a huge diffusion structure with Hedione HC, Hedione, Timbersilk and Ambroxan, eventually moving into transparent woods and a substantial musk base.

Then I made it.

And I bloody loved it.

That's quite an important point in development because there's a huge difference between a perfume that fundamentally doesn't work and one that works but hasn't completely reached the idea in your head yet. This one worked.

But it wasn't cold enough. The gin wasn't quite dominant enough and the fragrance wasn't carrying that identity for as long as I wanted.

There was also one material screaming over everything else.

Dihydromyrcenol.

I'd used 580 mg and it was far too much. Instead of giving me cold air and diffusion, I was getting cheap men's aftershave and shower gel. Once my brain made that association, it coloured the perception of everything around it.

The green mandarin was also contributing more citrus than I wanted.

There was another problem. The opening was gin and the drydown was beautiful transparent woods and musks, but the journey between them wasn't developed enough. The gin seemed to disappear and the woods appeared.

I didn't want that.

I wanted the opening to hand its DNA to the heart and the heart to carry that DNA into the drydown.

That's when the idea developed slightly.

I stopped thinking only about the smell of frozen gin and became much more interested in the exact moment the bottle is opened.

The perfume wasn't simply the liquid in the bottle.

It was the cloud of frozen botanical vapour escaping from it.

That gave me a much clearer direction for the next version.

I increased the juniper because the hero needed to behave like the hero. I increased the fenchol to strengthen the frozen botanical character and pushed the Rhubofix harder to create more dry, tonic like bitterness and help carry that botanical signature further into the fragrance.

I pulled the green mandarin right back.

And I more than halved the Dihydromyrcenol.

By this point my materials library had expanded, which gave me some new possibilities. But I've become increasingly strict with myself about not adding something simply because I own it. Every material has to have a reason for being there.

Kaffir lime leaf came in for crushed green botanical character rather than citrus. Tarragon added this strange dry, herbal, slightly anisic quality that made the botanical mixture feel more like something distilled rather than a conventional perfume accord.

Acetaldehyde Diethyl Acetal was introduced for alcoholic sparkle. I wasn't looking for citrus fizz. I wanted that fleeting sensation of volatile alcohol escaping from an ice cold bottle.

Helional came in to create cold space around the botanicals. Olibanum Coeur replaced the more resinous frankincense I'd previously used because I wanted something drier, cleaner and more mineral.

I also increased regular Hedione, not because the fragrance needed more projection, but because I wanted more air and a better transition between the botanical opening and the woods.

Then I made it again and left it alone.

After many weeks of maceration, I've finally been properly evaluating it.

The good news is that the performance is exactly where I want it.

It lasts.

It projects.

It has presence.

So I'm not touching the power architecture. It doesn't need more powerful woody ambers or more musk. That part of the fragrance works.

And most importantly, I love the smell.

But there are still two problems.

The first is technical.

It's cloudy as hell.

Both versions have done it. The concentrate itself was clear and the cloudiness appeared when I added the alcohol. I'm using 96% alcohol and this formula contains a substantial amount of botanical material, so I'm increasingly convinced I'm dealing with a solubility problem rather than one particular ingredient misbehaving.

That's something I'll deal with separately. I'm not prepared to butcher a fragrance I love simply because I want the liquid to look prettier.

The second problem is much more interesting.

After living with it for weeks, it still reads too masculine.

In fact, the best way I can describe it at the moment is an absolutely fu***ng amazing men's shower gel.

And that's not what I want.

I don't want to make it feminine either. That's not the answer.

I want it to be genuinely genderless.

So the next experiment is going to be quite different.

I'm seriously considering removing the Dihydromyrcenol completely. I've already reduced it from 580 mg to 250 mg and that masculine shower gel fingerprint is still hanging around. The fragrance now has enough other diffusion architecture that I don't think I need it.

But subtraction alone isn't quite enough.

I think this gin needs a flower.

Not a floral perfume. Not rose dumped into gin. Not sweetness and definitely not something pretty for the sake of being pretty.

I want an unexpected floral presence to emerge through all that frozen botanical vapour and disrupt the gender coding of the fragrance.

I'm currently looking at the florals in my lab and working out what that should be. Orange Flower Ether is interesting. Magnolan is already part of the formula and could potentially be developed into a more deliberate floral heart. There are other possibilities too.

Whatever I choose, the gin remains the hero.

The challenge now isn't making this fragrance stronger. I've done that.

It isn't making it last longer. I've done that too.

It's taking something I already love and changing its DNA just enough that the brain stops trying to put it into the men's fragrance box.

Frozen gin. Botanical vapour. An unexpected flower. Transparent woods. Skin.

That's where the gin one is today.

23/08/2026

Nice???

Nice is polite.
Nice is agreeable.
Nice doesn’t upset anyone.

Nice is also forgettable.

We didn’t create SPITEFUL AUGUST to be nice. We created it to have a point of view. To provoke a reaction. To make someone turn their head and wonder what the hell you’re wearing.

Because perfume can be beautiful without behaving itself.

Wear something worth talking about.

Nice was never the brief.

23/08/2026

Wear something worth talking about.
Wear something for you.
Wear something that makes you feel something.

Choose something different.
Choose expression.
Choose individuality.

And above all... choose yourself.

It’s the Spiteful August way.

We created these fragrances because we wanted to. Not because we listened to focus groups or market research. Not because everyone else was making oud mixed with more oud and topped with oud.

We made these fragrances because we could.

Because it’s what we wanted.

And sometimes, that’s the only reason you need.

22/08/2026

Evolution in perfumery for us.. is everything.

And CÃRDA is a perfume that lives for those moments. It starts off overripe. Unbearably so.

Too much green, too much spice, too sweet. It assaults your senses, but it wakes them up. And just when you don't feel it's for you...

You can't stop smelling your wrists. Because you're hooked on the evolution. You don't know why you love it. You just do.

21/08/2026

We would just like to say a huge thank you to everyone who has left reviews on the Spiteful August website over the past few months. It really means a lot to both of us.

The feedback on our creations has genuinely been overwhelming.

When Scott created our first collection, we knew they were going to be artistic fragrances that would challenge and rebel against the "norm", whatever that is?

We also knew they wouldn't be for everyone. They were never supposed to be.

We never wanted to create fragrances that tried to please everyone. We wanted to create perfumes with personality. Perfumes that make you stop, think and smell again. Perfumes that provoke a reaction, start a conversation and, hopefully, make you feel something.

So to see people not only wearing them, but really understanding what Scott was trying to create has been incredibly special.

We're still a very small independent perfume house. Every bottle is made by us, every order is packed by us and every review is read by us. So when you take the time to tell us what you think, we genuinely see it. And yes, we're probably sitting here with stupid smiles on our faces reading it.

Thank you for taking a chance on something a little different. Thank you for supporting independent perfumery. And most of all, thank you for giving our fragrances a place in your lives.

There's a lot more to come.

And don't worry. Nice still isn't the brief.

Scott & Ryan
SPITEFUL AUGUST