"While there are still clothes to wash, we can do without men!" sang the Provençal washerwomen by the riverside. They were called lavandieres – a play on words, because lavender itself got its name from its original use – "lavar" means to wash. Lavender was used for washing clothes and in its distilled form, as an eau de toilette for washing one’s self. Today, large Provençal wardrobes house piles of beautifully pressed and folded linens exuding the perfume of lavender and no one can remember when it wasn’t this way. Centuries ago it was picked on the hillsides, then later the fine Lavandula Angustifolia – the true lavender, which exudes the most subtle essential oil – was cultivated into hybrid varieties. The result – a violet-blue carpet covering the hills and meadows, electric in the summer sun. Lavender only grows well on dry, sunkissed land and thrives in stout rows throughout the Hautes-Alpes, from the medieval villages of Orpierre and Serres, l’Epine, the Tourettes Pass, the Oule valley and through the Fromagere pass to Rosans. Here it climbs the Laragne Monteglin valley until it reaches the Alpes at Aspres-sur-Buech. Fine lavender is prized by perfumères and sought after in August after the harvesting and drying has taken place. After distillation, the plant is transformed into eau de toilette and infused into perfume, bath salts, shampoos and soaps as well as teas, sweets, ice creams and liqueurs. Sachets and small posies are sold along the roadside, along with the most fragrant honey – produced by the region’s lavender-drunk bees. We savour the runny perfume on fresh baguettes, surrounded by the silvery stubble of the harvested fields, green-gold meadows, dizzy butterflies and Provence’s magic light.

Seville