A Note from the Fiele Files | Volume 3
In this week’s Fiele Files, we introduce you to husband and wife duo, Blair and Eli Hansen, the creatives behind Asp & Hand, the whimsical glass design and production house based in the Pacific Northwest. In a month that celebrates the gift of love and all that it encompasses, we found their story uplifting and were inspired by their approach to collaborating as a couple while sharing a mutual respect for their craft. Both bringing their own accomplishments to the table (his working with esteemed glass blower Dale Chihuly and hers spent mainly in galleries including Hauser & Wirth and Gagosian), the two founded Asp & Hand in 2017 with the idea of putting art into our simplest everyday rituals.
Here, we spoke with them about how fragrance is incorporated into their everyday life and practice while learning their advice on striking a healthy work-life balance while working alongside your partner.
Read more here and then enter to win our new giveaway in which 2 lucky winners will receive a set of two handblown Asp & Hand glasses and straws along with a full bottle of Blair’s favorite Fiele Fragrance, Cedrus (a $270 value).
To enter the giveaway:
Follow @fielefragrances @capsuleparfumerie and @aspandhand on Instagram
Look for Fiele Fragrance’s Instagram giveaway post, then tag a friend who would love to win.
* (2) winners will be announced on 2/25.
We’ll also be sending a complimentary sample of Cedrus with any online order on Fiele Fragrances through 2/24.
On their strongest memories associated with scent:
Western red cedar, douglas fir, blue spruce, sequoia, eucalyptus, creosote, gasoline, smoke, propane, the smells of old books and old photographs and low tides. These scents land us directly in the center of our body’s memory.
Blair, on the first perfume she recalls:
I wasn't wearing it myself, but my mother's mother wore heaps of Chanel No. 5. She died shortly after my birth, so I have no memories of her directly. Nonetheless, I was obsessively fascinated with her because her bedroom was so glamorous to me as a little kid, and the scent of her perfume made it feel like she might appear any second.
On the ways in which scent sparks creativity:
Eli: Via memory. Scent conjures the most vivid memories, and these memories connect him to the energy they contain. I’m drawing from this energy of past experience always when I make – glassblowing is very much about locking energy into your muscle memory.
Blair: I find scent to be the most visceral of all my senses, meaning that I am less arduously processing that intake with my brains, and more so with my guts. I love to connect to my guts! The brains are always confusing themselves here. What is more invigorating than stepping into the outdoors and finding the smell of wood smoke in the air? Nothing, to me. To me that is the most perfect and complete experience it is possible to have.
Blair, on why she’s drawn to Cedrus by Fiele Fragrances:
I am so taken with Cedrus. I think we all absolutely have core scents that are living deep within, and I think deep within my body is wood (often burning). My beloved lifelong friend, Georgie Greville, sent me to a healer before my 40th birthday who connected my spirit to that of ancient wood elves! It was the coolest. And I feel it. I am a Taurus sun sign and a Pisces Moon, so my connections to the earth and sea run deep.
I grew up spending tons of time in Maine, where the pines and the ocean spray are best friends. But in my early teen fragrance experiments, I didn't find these tones (more like Elizabeth Arden Sunflowers). It took me basically until my late twenties, when my friend Jade Berreau hipped me to her collection of musk scents and oils, that I realized the power of the deep, warm, earthy fragrance. Sandalwoods and cedars quickly followed as well as Tabac and Ylang Ylang. Meeting Eli and finally making my way to the Pacific Northwest felt very much like a homecoming because of the trees and the Salish Sea.
Cedrus marries allllll of these in one bottle and also has orange blossom notes, which I absolutely love. Another of my very dearest friends, Lisa Farjam, gave me the gift of orange blossom oil from Buly Paris when I was recovering from a cancer surgery, and WOW was that an enormous revelation (the same friend turned me on to ranunculus! Aren't friends the best? I really miss them!!). I think this Buly oil will layer PERFECTLY beneath cedrus for an extremely sensual feeling. I put Cedrus on last night as I was drifting off and awoke to it. I think I will do this every night for the foreseeable future.
On successfully working together and maintaining a healthy work-life balance:
We highly recommend almost dying very early on in your relationship - preferably before you collaborate in any artistic or business ways. Then you will be just two dogs in a cage together, and that's the best collaboration because those dogs are both humble underdogs. If you can’t swing deep-frying your mortal coils, we recommend Eli’s father’s number one rule: HAVE FUN. If you aren’t having real, good fun some of the time, you are not doing it right, and it’s time to call a summit.
On how they continually nurture their relationship as a couple:
Humor and crying. Comedy and tragedy. Tragicomedy. Play as much as possible, outdoors and in. Try not to worry too much about cleaning or appearances. Make sure you build as strong and intimate a web as possible with friends who live close by. No individual or couple is alone in this world. We are all in webs! So, know and love and upkeep that web.