Girls, call off your search for your next summer perfume. We’ve found it: Stella McCartney POP, a vibrant combo of tuberose and sandalwood that’s now our personal fave – hands down. We’ve been busy spritzing it all over us, so we spoke exclusively to Stella McCartney, to ask our burning questions…
What inspired you to make POP?
POP is about freedom, living in the moment, and having a voice. It’s about celebrating life and everything that comes with the moment as a young girl when you become a woman.
What’s the inspiration behind the key notes?
I’m a big fan of creating quite simple fragrances, without too many notes, which may overpower each other. POP brings together two elements I really love: tuberose, which has a beautiful depth, balanced by sandalwood. It’s an undeniably feminine scent, which makes a statement without being overwhelming.
Does POP reflect your Summer 2016 catwalk designs?
I like to keep the brand consistent in everything I do. It’s all naturally confident, naturally feminine and modern.
What are your favourite perfume notes?
I love quite earthy, traditionally English notes and like to keep the scents pure and uncomplicated.
What clothes perfectly match POP?
For the launch of POP, we’ve created a fun, feminine capsule collection, which is made up of some amazing new pieces. We recreated some of our iconic accessories, like the Falabella bag and Elyse shoe in shades of explosive metallic pink, inspired by the medallion on the POP bottle.
Where did you get your inspiration for the bottle?
When I was working on the design for the POP bottle, I wanted it to have a relationship with STELLA, my first fragrance. The two are very complementary pieces of work, and the bottles hint at each other through the glass and cut-work elements. I also wanted POP to make a bold statement, so I took inspiration from the medallion on our iconic Falabella bag to create the bottle lid. The bottle is timeless but also has a kind of youth and edge to it, which is very much like the fragrance.
What made you choose Grimes, Amandla, Kenya and Lola as the faces of POP?
They are four amazing girls. Amandla is an extraordinary actress with a strong and empowering voice. She’s a great young girl who has a lot to say, and I love that about her. Grimes is a wonderful musician, director, writer and all-round talent – she does a bit of everything and is so authentic. Then we have Kenya, who is my animal activist sister; she’s a great girl, and I love her. I’ve known Lola her entire life! She’s just at the beginning of her career and has such a bright future. All of these girls are so creative and have so much to say. The campaign is a celebration of that.
Who inspires you the most?
I’m inspired by women in everything I do. For this fragrance I was inspired by my new tribe of Stella girls. The four beautiful young women in the POP campaign are all so passionate, creative and headstrong, and I found that very inspiring. As a woman with young daughters, I look at these girls and think, this is a really important moment to have your fellow sisters supporting you. I think that’s what’s really critical about what we’re saying: you’re allowed to be yourself.
When you close your eyes and smell POP, where does it take you?
POP takes me back to that first moment of freedom as a young woman, to my first holiday away with my girlfriends. We all slept in the same room, we all had a budget, and it wasn’t a glamorous holiday – but we just had the best time and it meant everything to me. It was my time to have the freedom to be who I am and have a voice without being judged.
How is POP environmentally friendly?
We used something called bio-mimicry, a new technology that allows you to capture the fragrance and then mimic it. It’s really exciting because it means you’re not using a million tuberoses, and all that water, land and fertiliser, which is environmentally unfriendly. The same goes for the sandalwood: for every 2,500 bottles, it saves a whole sandalwood tree. It’s a really new way to produce fragrance, and you don’t compromise on the scent in any way.
What will the smell remind people of?
I hope it will remind people of a sense of freedom and adventure, whether they’re experiencing that moment in their lives now or have already taken that leap. It’s bold, it’s irreverent, and it has a real spirit.
We love the campaign imagery of the POP girls. What’s the story behind it?
There are a lot of different elements to the ad campaign, and I guess the main part is the girls themselves. I think what’s extraordinary here is that we’ve created a beauty campaign that is about real girls – that’s very rare and something quite new. I feel we’re allowing the next generation of young women to be represented in beauty in quite an authentic way.
What’s your favourite smell in the world?
I love roses. I’m a bit obsessed! I grew up with roses around me. I’m not as obsessed with the way they look – I think they’re the most beautiful flowers, but for me, they have to smell. I also love the smell of my children’s breath – I know it’s weird, but it’s very comforting.
