Heritage
A house, in its own words
The name Amygdala carries a dual heritage within independent perfumery. In its Mendittorosa incarnation, the fragrance was born from the academic background of founder Stefania Squeglia, who holds a Master's Degree in Psychology. Squeglia's studies into the relationship between scent, emotion, and memory directly informed the creative brief that led to Amygdala, conceived as an exploration of fear, instinct, and olfaction. The composition was brought to life by Luca Maffei, an Italian perfumer recognized for his work across the niche landscape, and was released in 2022 as an addition to Mendittorosa's Talismans Extreme Collection, an extension of the brand's existing Talismans line. In parallel, Amygdala exists as its own independent UK-based fragrance house. Founded by perfumer Kimberley McGovern in 2016, the brand launched simultaneously with its debut collection of ten fragrances, each centered on a single botanical note: Bergamot, Oakmoss, Sea Salt, Pear, Tonka Bean, Honey, Iris, Patchouli, Jasmine, and Neroli. This same-year founding-and-release approach reflected a focused, thesis-driven entry into perfumery, positioning the house around clarity of materials rather than traditional pyramidal construction. For Mendittorosa, Amygdala represents the meeting point of neuroscience and artistic perfumery. The fragrance takes its name and conceptual framework from the amygdala, the brain region responsible for processing emotion and memory, and the one most directly activated by scent. Squeglia's psychological background gave the project its intellectual scaffolding, while Maffei translated that framework into a composition blending white florals and woods. The result is positioned not merely as a fragrance to wear, but as an instrument to provoke emotional and associative responses, an olfactory exploration of instinct and feeling. McGovern's Amygdala operates on a different but parallel wavelength. By building a debut collection of single-note fragrances, the brand strips perfumery back to its most fundamental question: what does one material smell like, isolated and fully expressed? The ten debut compositions, ranging from Honey to Sea Salt to Oakmoss, suggest a philosophy rooted in material literacy, inviting wearers to develop their olfactory palate through direct, unblended encounters with individual naturals and molecules.