“It’s never about how it defines you. It’s about how it completes you.”
— A dialogue between the designer and the perfumer, Nick Wakeman and Lyn Harris
In collaboration with British perfume house Perfumer H, Studio Nicholson presents SOAP Eau de Parfum and Incense.
Weightless.
Invisible.
Essential.
SOAP Eau de Parfum captures the trace of clean fabric against skin, evoking the warmth of a lived-in garment — As though it’s always been there.
SOAP, the new fragrance by Perfumer H for Studio Nicholson, will launch globally on February 4th 2026.
Nick Wakeman and Lyn Harris have a longstanding friendship; both have founded independent British brands with shared philosophies around craftsmanship, timelessness and attention to detail. The intentions of Studio Nicholson and Perfumer H meet in not wishing to define or overpower their wearers, rather to offer something that might complete them.
“A fragrance should be effortless, it should just exude this beauty on your skin, like Nick’s clothes. It’s a simple as that,” says Harris.
“We started talking about the smell of fabrics and the idea of a fragrance that would be almost like a fabric. Then we moved on to thinking about how fabrics feel against your skin,” adds Wakeman.
An intimate blend of cardamom and white pepper, washed by soft aldehydes and orange flower, with a tender base of white musks, ambrox and tonka, SOAP eau de parfum captures the trace of clean fabric against skin and is also available as an incense, made by one of the few traditional incense makers in Japan, supplying the local Buddhist temples and monasteries.
Cotton, wool, flax, the smell of Italian Barbershops and of Harris’s grandmother, who used the same soap her entire life, were key inspirations. For more than a year, the pair worked in close collaboration on the fragrance. “The way this fragrance lingers around your clothes is unbelievable. It develops as it evolves, both on fabric and on skin. It’s distinct but subtle, which is what I am always aiming for with our clothing,” says Wakeman. “Soap has a certain warmth and familiarity about it that we liked,” says Harris. “And it has a uniform feeling that, of course, both Nick and I appreciate.”
SOAP eau de parfum launches in tandem with a capsule collection of garments by Studio Nicholson, inspired by Perfumer H founder Lyn Harris’s uniform: a lightweight Italian cotton shirt, soft cotton twill pants and a blue SOAP baseball cap - all made in Italy.
Discussion around a collaboration between their two brands has been longstanding - Harris has worn Studio Nicholson as part of her personal uniform since the brand launched in 2010 whilst Perfumer H candles have long fragranced Studio Nicholson’s stores. Both are stirred by the senses; Harris smells everyone and everything - “I imagine Lyn up a mountain in China smelling the ground,” smiles Wakeman. Meanwhile, Wakeman has always favoured haptic fabrications which might sound crunchy in movement or feel like paper or marble to touch.