"Our auras are our best accessory."
As a model, Bella Hadid is a walking canvas. She's draped in art to tell stories, though they are not her own. It's a career she's held for a decade, starting at 16—an age when most teenagers lean heavily into style to convey who they are.
"For so many years, I lost a lot of sense of self, of knowing what I liked," Hadid tells me across a computer screen from her new home in Fort Worth, Texas. "People would ask me in interviews, "What's your favorite color? What's your favorite food? What do you like?' And I was like, 'I just work. I don't know. I could try to make something up for you, but I have no idea.'"
On a mission to reconnect with herself, Hadid ramped up her self-care practice. “I just became obsessed with using essential oils for my health and wellness, putting them on my wrist and smelling them 10 times for breathing rituals,” says Hadid. She started playing around with different oils and concocting bespoke blends. Through the alchemy of creation, she reclaimed her agency.
"When it came to essential oils, it was just a science project every day," says Hadid. "During my modeling career, when I wasn't able to use my brain and my voice as much, coming home and making things that were just for myself was so important for me. And it made me passionate about something again."
It started simple—lavender, lemongrass, and patchouli. "And then I would add ginger, and I'd be like, 'That smells weird. Let me just add blood orange to it. Okay, that's really cool; let me go get some cherry,'" she recalls. Her ever-changing parfum du jour caught the attention of those around her. And eventually, they convinced her to turn her passion into a business.
"I haven't been the most confident person my whole life," she says. "Hearing people think that I could do something with what I was making at home, that was the first time that I felt good enough that something that came from me had enough value that other people would want it, too."
And thus, ‘Ôrəbella was born. Pronounced aura Bella, it’s a fragrance line composed of essential oil-based perfumes.
"Our aura is our best accessory," says Hadid. "I just really want people to put this all over their body, to feel, to mix it. I want people to be their own chemist when it comes to 'Ôrəbella. If you feel good when you wake up in the morning, I hope 'Ôrəbella will be a part of your routine that makes you feel that way going through your day."
The Scents
For the inaugural scents, Hadid tapped into childhood memories.
"I grew up at the barn, not wearing a bunch of fragrance, but finding nostalgic smells through my experiences," she says. "And whether it was being able to walk through a garden, or jumping into the ocean, or smelling oils and sunscreen on your skin after you've burned a little bit. There were just things that I wanted to be able to represent in the scents that I was putting out."
‘Ôrəbella debuts with three scents: Blooming Fire, Salted Muse, and Window2Soul. Each is available in three sizes: 10 mL ($35), 50 mL ($72), and 100 mL ($100). For the 100 mL bottle, you can also get a perfume stand ($35) to display it upright.
Blooming Fire
"Blooming Fire is a scent that is an ode to my sister," says Hadid. "She grew up loving Tahiti. We both lovee the beach. Blooming Fire, for me, is this experience of being on the beach with your family and your friends at sunset. It's warm out, but you have to put a little blanket or a sweater over you. Your bathing suit is still wet, you still smell like sunscreen."
Monoï, a perfume oil derived from soaking Tahitian gardenias in coconut oil, is the star of this scent. It's rounded out by grounding patchouli and bright bergamot. "The emotion I want the scent to trigger is safety, happiness, and love," she says.
Salted Muse
"Salted Muse really is the most androgynous scent, our woodier scent," says Hadid. "It has a little bit of lavender, which is funny because, in the beginning, I felt like one of my main scents was going to be full lavender just because of my past with planting lavender on the farm and having access to so much lavender oil. But this is our one scent that has a little bit of lavender. It also has a little bit of olive oil, olive tree in it. That is an ode to my ancestors. Growing up in an Arab family, everything is olive oil. You're sick? Olive oil. You want something to moisturize your skin? Olive oil. You're cooking? Olive oil."
Added amber, pepper, and sea salt add interest to the scent. "It's funny—I literally smell it on myself and it feels feminine but really, really strong," she says.
Window2Soul
"Window2Soul is my baby girl," says Hadid. "This one just feels like you're jumping into a flower petal or you're literally a tiny little person in the middle of a rose garden or at the botanical gardens. And what I really love about this is the rose and the jasmine with the tonka bean. It just makes you feel happy. It's a very sexy fragrance because it is very sweet and youthful but at the same time has a strength to it."
The 'Ôrəbella Experience
While 'Ôrəbella is an expression of Hadid's creativity, she wants everyone to get in on the fun and make the scents their own. The formulation is the first step. "Because they're essential oils, the scents kind of change with the pH of your skin, so it smells a little different on everybody," she says. Plus, they're designed to be mixed so you can fashion your own custom fragrance.
“You can mix them up and make something that’s unique to you,” says Hadid. “People can feel confident in their own skin knowing that they did something cool for themselves that morning to make them feel different than the next person. You get to have that little upper hand being like, ‘Hey, I feel good about myself today. And I did a little art project and it made me feel confident, sexy, different, and excited.’ That’s really what I wanted to be able to do with ‘Ôrəbella.”
As Hadid built her brand, she built up herself. She learned how special life can be when you're living your truth—and she invites you to do the same. "I just thank God for the opportunity to have a dream of mine come true and to have it also be the most fun experience of all," she says.