Storytelling is often spoken of in branding. Every founder has an origin story. Every product launch comes dressed in narrative. Too often, though, the story feels added after the fact — a decorative layer.

At 39BC, the story came first.

Not a retrofit. Not a branding exercise. A real story. A historical one.

We begin in the final eleven years of the Ptolemaic dynasty — a time when Cleopatra VII and Mark Antony forged a political and romantic alliance that altered the fate of Egypt and reshaped the Mediterranean world. Their union was not chosen for shock value or romance, but because it was a turning point: where beauty, power, politics, and pleasure collided.

I spent months immersed in historical research: Plutarch’s accounts, museum catalogues, essays on Roman hygiene, Egyptian perfumery, Greek bathing practices, and Moroccan hammams. I wanted to understand how people tended their bodies — not as routine, but as ritual. From that inquiry came the idea for Vol. I: Alexandria.

This debut collection is anchored in the chronology of Cleopatra and Antony’s alliance. Each of our fine-fragrance shower oils corresponds to a distinct chapter:

• Silk Veil — Cleopatra alone in power, preparing to receive.

• Denarii — Antony’s return after years apart.

• Fig Milk — the gaze of a palace handmaiden, watching desire unfold.

• Sage Water — the quiet withdrawal of the Priests of Isis in empire’s twilight.

Together, they trace a story not of myth, but of power, ritual, and scent as signal. A modern act of slow beauty built from historical emotion.

Because when we say 39BC is about beauty and bathing, we also mean archive, memory, transformation.

Vol. I: Alexandria is now available for pre-order.

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