Ingrid Starnes
Ingrid Starnes built her reputation in Auckland as a fashion designer first, establishing her label in 2009 with a devotion to natural fabrics, considered tailoring, and the kind of printed silks that earned her a fiercely loyal New Zealand following. Fragrance arrived later, almost by accident. What started as a personal curiosity became a three-year immersion into a completely new discipline. Starnes and her team had to learn an unfamiliar vocabulary and retrain their senses from scratch, approaching perfumery with the same patience and craft ethic that defined their clothing. The result was Vetiver Bergamot, her debut scent, which launched after roughly two years of development and signalled a clear shift for the brand. Today the label operates as an online-first operation out of its Auckland studio, encompassing lingerie, ceremony bridal, made-to-measure, skincare, and a growing fragrance line built on natural and considered ingredients. Starnes is a designer who crossed into scent not through industry convention but through sheer determination to understand it on her own terms.
The hits
Notable creations
The signature
How Ingrid composes
Starnes works in a restrained, nature-led register, favouring compositions built around recognisable botanical anchors such as vetiver and bergamot. Her process leans toward natural ingredient palettes, and her formulations tend to read as clean, grounded, and wearable rather than decorative. The Hellebore perfume and surrounding collection suggest a comfort with green, slightly bitter floral characters and with the kind of structured, somewhat mineral dryness that recalls her clothing aesthetic, refined, unfussy, and quietly architectural. Starnes composes with longevity and skin intimacy in mind, creating scents that sit close to the wearer rather than broadcast.
Philosophy
What drives Ingrid
Starnes approaches fragrance the way she approaches cloth: with deep material respect and an unwillingness to cut corners. Her entry into perfumery was less a commercial decision and more a stubborn act of curiosity, the kind that demands years of study before a single bottle ships. She gravitates toward all-natural compositions, drawn to botanicals that behave like the natural fibres she has always favoured, materials with character and provenance rather than synthetic shortcuts. There is a quiet, almost editorial sensibility to her work, scents conceived to sit alongside garments rather than shout past them. For Starnes, fragrance is an extension of the wardrobe, another layer of dressing and another way to express a personal point of view, quietly and on one's own terms.
The houses