Fragrance house

The Society of Alchemists

The Society of Alchemists opened its first shop at 18 The Shambles in York on 3 November 2022. Conceived by Marcus Doyle and Warren Booth, founders of The Yorkshire Soap Company, the brand was developed alongside their York venture, The Imaginarium; The Yorkshire Soap Company Ltd also owned the registered THE SOCIETY OF ALCHEMISTS YORK trademark filed in September 2022 and registered that December. Its creative world draws on 1980s and 1990s fantasy films such as The NeverEnding Story, Labyrinth, and The Dark Crystal, imagining a clandestine society of nomadic alchemists who travel across worlds and return ideas to York. The brand’s public identity centres on the pursuit of eternal life and the transformation of ordinary materials into magic, with the Ouroboros symbol representing cycles of life, death, rebirth, transformation, and immortality. Alongside bath and body, home-fragrance, beauty, and fantasy-themed curiosity products, it offers eau de parfum organised into Alchemists’ Exclusives, Signature, Elements, and Celestial collections.