Shopping in Lincolnshire: Freckleface
A mother and son team, Tara and Noah are working hard this month to provide gifts for Mother’s Day from their homegrown ethical home fragrance brand Freckleface, founded in Bourne in 2017
Mother and son team Tara and Noah Carlile-Swift, are enjoying the sweet scent of success, having founded their Lincolnshire home fragrance business in 2017.
This month is set to be one of the busiest in the company’s year, with the launch of a new collaboration with a major heritage brand (we’re sworn to secrecy!) as well as spring fragrances, for Mother’s Day and then Easter.
If there’s a better success story than that of Freckleface, we’ve yet to hear it. At the age
of 14 Noah was in mainstream education, where his dyslexia and dyspraxia were impacting on his ability to really achieve his full potential.
Mum Tara decided to take him out of school and instead home-school him, which was an environment in which he thrived, to say the least. One of the tasks she set him as part of his home schooling was to set up a business with a budget of just £50.
Noah rose to the challenge and created a range of wax melts designed to provide authentic fragrances for the home.
What was supposed to be just a project lasting a few weeks, though, proved rather more enduring. Family and friends proved an initial source of repeat business, but then word spread and soon the family, including dad Simon, were all involved in a cottage industry.
After success at over 50 events across the UK, the family took a leap of faith and Freckleface as a brand was born. Within a year, the family had took on their first workshop and then their first shop in 2020.
Today Freckleface has grown considerably and last year, the company produced a whopping 4.5m wax melts as well as a range of candles, oils, diffusers, room sprays and bath bombs. The company now has retail studios in Lincoln and Stamford plus two shops in York, one on the historic Shambles shopping street.
“We knew we had great products and because we’ve grown organically we’ve been able to manage that success, ensuring that we remain faithful to the values that we’ve held dear to us since founding the company,” says Tara.
“All of our products are still hand-poured not just in Britain, but in right here Lincolnshire. As far as possible too, our products and packaging are plastic-free. And where they’re not plastic free, they’re at least recyclable.”
“Our wax melts are overwhelmingly our most popular products, which have the advantage of minimal packaging and the ability to constantly reuse a ceramic melter.”
“We use soya wax which ensures a cleaner burn than paraffin wax, and our fragrances use recognisable ingredients like lavender, originally sourced from Tara’s garden.”
The company’s range includes over 40 different fragrances throughout the year: Evergreen and Winter Berries in the cooler months, and Jasmine & Lime or Sweet Pea in the warmer months for example. There is also a core range of all year round fragrances, including best selling Pomegranate Black and Bergamot Verbena.
The company also creates bespoke fragrances for its licensed partners such as the RHS and Laura Ashley. These take up to six month to refine but it’s worth the wait for those partners who want to work with a company which values traditional production and the fact that they’re homemade in Britain by a team enfranchised in their products’ authenticity.
Creating and refining a fragrance is the tricky part, but once finessed, it’s relatively easy to adapt a composition from, say, wax melts – these represent over half of the company’s output – to products like reed diffusers, room sprays and fragrance oils.
“We work really well together as a family,” says Tara. “I enjoy the creativity and the invention of products which are faithful to the brand’s ethos.”
“Meanwhile Noah himself has become a commercially-minded co-owner who’s really good at working with our team, opening and looking after our retail stores and managing the company’s growth commensurate with our ethos.”
One of the more unusual elements of the company is the value that Noah and Tara place on Freckleface having a physical presence on the High Street.
“It’s not just a pleasantry,” says Tara. “We’ve always felt that we should offer an in-store experience and have contact with our customers. So many products now can be purchased online, but in doing so there’s no emotional connection to the brand… it’s a bit of a soulless experience which is the opposite of what we want to offer.”
“We’re keen to know and reflect our customers and to offer a really premium product that they want to enjoy time and again. Fragrance is really personal so we’ve always thought it’s an advantage for people to visit us in person, and be guided through our range, experiencing each one for themselves.”
“Having said that, we do also offer a Wax Melt subscription club which provides a different selection of fragrances each month, delivered through the letterbox and cancellable at any time, with the option to ensure your home smells seasonally fresh throughout the year.”
“It’s proven popular once our customers have that connection with the brand, and we’re thrilled with the fact that we have that relationship with our customers, and that they’re invested in us as a family company, based in Lincolnshire, determined to grow our business but without sacrificing our founding principals. It’s one of the many advantages of working together as a family in such a lovely company, with such a great team!”
Freckleface is based in Spalding and has retail studios on Lincoln’s Sincil Street and in Stamford’s Red Lion Square. For more information on the brand call 01778 393699 or see www.frecklefacehomefragrance.com.
See more of the company’s products in the April edition of Lincolnshire Pride, at https://www.pridemagazines.co.uk/lincolnshire/view-magazines?magazine=April-2025