Santa Maria Novella believes in discretion. Tucked away in a (plush) back street that’s off-off the Fulham Road, the sight of me and my notepad has the sales assistants squirming.
“We don’t advertise,” says the chief assistant, slightly scandalised.
A steady stream of customers suggested that they probably don’t have to. The wealthy residents of Kensington know all about Santa Maria Novella. It’s essentially their local Bath & Body Works.
Santa Maria Novella — the mother shop — is the famous Officina Profumo-Farmaceutica in Florence, Italy, one of the world’s oldest pharmacies and the creator of colognes and unguents whose recipes have been handed down for hundreds of years…