Cloon Keen

Brand Overview

Cloon Keen is a perfume house based in Galway, in the West of Ireland. Its name comes from the Irish place name Cluain Caoin, meaning "splendid meadow." Its perfumes and candles are all made by hand in Galway.

History

The brand was founded by Margaret Mangan and Julian Checkley. Margaret was born in Canada to Irish parents and grew up in Newfoundland; Julian is a set designer and model maker. They met while working on a film production in the West of Ireland, where together they built sets that let audiences believe in a story's world. That craft carried over into scent.

Philosophy

The brand draws on Galway, Connemara and the wider West, and on the question of what it means to be Irish: to belong to a country whose people have scattered across the globe and whose poetry, music and song have travelled with them. It also asks whether the place you are born and the place your heart belongs can differ. Folklore, rebellion and romance all feed the compositions. Essential oils come from growers who understand how weather, soil and season shape the scent of a raw material.

Highlights

Castaña grew from a childhood memory of chestnuts roasted on the streets of Andalusia: burnt chestnut and a trace of caramel give way to vetiver, cardamom, cassia flower and jasmine. Róisín Dubh, "little black rose," takes its name from a subversive 16th-century song that became an emblem for Irish writers, and sets Damask rose against a dry paper accord, ink-stained patchouli and smoky incense. The spray bottles can be refilled from the house’s 200 mL bottles.