Best tomato leaf scented products
My gran would call me as soon as the first tomato of the season arrived in the garden. If I missed the call, I'd soon be inundated with photos of the small, orange pearl. Then followed a flurry of Instagram messages: ‘First toms here!’ and so on. Show any enthusiasm for something, and my granny would invariably associate it with you forever. I was lucky that tomatoes were mine. She was unrelentingly thoughtful and generous; my heart hurt a lot when the tomatoes came through the year she passed away, and she wasn't here to let me know. I really should have gone to her house to pick the first one off, but it felt too sad to do it without her.
What I'm left with is the transportive power of the tomato plant scent. At my gran's house, it would drift through the windows and into the kitchen; the thick, hairy vines emit such a wonderfully strong smell they can perfume a whole room. Indeed, it is the green vines and leaves that carry the bulk of the heady scent, rather than the scarlet fruit itself. Chefs including Heston Blumenthal advocate for throwing in the stems while cooking with tomatoes to infuse them with this grassy scent - though make sure to remove the stalks before tucking in.
My personal olfactory attachment aside, the tomato leaf scent is hugely loved, and increasingly so. It is earthy yet light, floral without sweetness. The massive influx of tomato-scented products to the homeware and beauty market in recent years and months is indicative of its popularity. This is especially true during the summer months, when tomatoes are in season in the UK. The scent is distinctly verdant and fresh – similar to that of a fig – and immediately recognisable. It's sharp, but without any heavy citrus twist. It's herbal, without any medicinal edge.
Tomato leaf is a scent that I'd be happy to meet in any iteration around my house, from candles to skincare, in the kitchen to the bathroom. It's also one of those rare smells that can be very successfully captured and realised in a product without a synthetic quality. Daylesford’s ‘Botanical Vine Tomato’ candle really does, in its strong, garden-y tones, smell just like the real thing.
Luxury fashion brand Loewe is another notable purveyor of tomato vine smells. Its undulating, crimson candles are densely perfumed and have, as they say in the candle business, a real ‘throw.’ The ‘Tomato Leaves’ scent also comes in an elegant body lotion, room spray, incense, and blushing bars of soap. ‘Jonathan Anderson’s inspiration behind the creation of the home scents collection was, since the very beginning, to transmit the idea of a vegetable garden… the plants that are present in his ideal garden’, explains Nuria Cruelles, an in-house perfumier at Loewe Perfumes. ‘We always envisioned the tomato as one of the icons.’
Capturing, or recapturing, the kind of rural, bucolic bliss associated with a vegetable garden seems to be a strong pull for many brands, then. The ‘noses’ of companies are using nostalgia and the power of storytelling to elevate an already delightful, fresh fragrance. Discover our favourite products below to bring this summery, outdoorsy scent inside.
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