The Studio, Moss Vale
Inside the Stuga studio, Moss Vale.
Walk in and the smell gets you before anything else. Not one smell, dozens of them stacked on top of each other. Resins, woods, citrus oils, something sharp and green that got decanted this morning, and a warm sweet base underneath that never really leaves the building. I stopped noticing it years ago. Everyone who visits tells me about it.
This is the actual room.
Not a shopfront. It is a working studio in Moss Vale, in the New South Wales Southern Highlands, and the shaving, beard, body and perfume ranges are blended, poured, cured, labelled and boxed here by hand.
Most brands you buy from have an address on a contact page and a factory somewhere else. This is where the boxes get taped shut.
The studio is only a few years old. Before it went up, the site was an empty field. We are the first owners of it and with any luck the last.
Perfumery and soapmaking are fussy about their surroundings. Temperature, light and airflow all end up in the bottle whether you planned for them or not, so getting to build the space around the work instead of squeezing the work into a space built for something else changes what you can do in it.
One half is the making side. Benches, the blending and filling gear, and shelf after shelf of aromatics, which are the raw materials that give the room its character. Absolutes and essential oils, resins, woods, spices, and the strange and wonderful synthetics that modern perfumery cannot do without. Rows of small brown bottles that look unremarkable and cost a fortune.
The other half is everything a product has to pass through before it reaches you. Labelling, packing, printing, and a great deal of cardboard.
Made here, sold in five places. Every Stuga product starts in this room and leaves it by one of five routes. Direct to your door, or onto a table or a shelf somewhere you can smell it first.
Half of it is making. The rest is cardboard.
Making things is the fun part and it is the part people picture. It is maybe half of what happens in here.
A normal day is orders. Picking, packing, getting them out. Then making stock, which is the unglamorous engine room of a small business: batch after batch, so the shelf at a market on Saturday is not a shelf of gaps. Then planning. Then the admin nobody sees and nobody thanks you for, which is most of what keeps a business standing up.
The front of house is a table with beautiful things on it. The back of house is a spreadsheet and a lot of cardboard. Both are the job.
Making the products is the creative bit. But watching somebody enjoy one, or better, come back a year later to tell you about it, is the part I would actually miss. None of that happens in here. This room is just where it starts.
You are welcome to come and smell the lot.
The studio is the only place you can go through the entire range in one sitting, which is not something you can do anywhere else, online or off.
By appointment only. I am here most days, but most is not all, and it is a long drive to find a locked door. Send a message first and we will sort out a time.
The Stuga Studio
15/2 Red Fields Road, Moss Vale NSW 2577
Open by appointment
Where Stuga is made, and whether you can come and see it.
Where is Stuga made?
Here, in a working studio in Moss Vale, in the New South Wales Southern Highlands. The shaving, beard, body and perfume ranges are blended, poured, cured, labelled and packed by hand in this one room.
Is Stuga made in Australia?
Yes. A few components, like blades and brush knots, come from specialist makers who have done that one thing for generations and do it better than anyone. Everything else begins and ends in the studio.
Can I visit the studio?
Yes, by appointment. It is a working studio rather than a shopfront, so get in touch first and we will sort out a time. It is the only place you can smell the whole range in one go.
Is the studio a shop?
No. If you would rather browse without making an appointment, the stall at The Rocks Markets runs every weekend, and there are shelves at Dirty Jane's in Bowral and Canberra and inside the Old Cheese Factory at Robertson.
If you would rather not make the trip.
The Rocks Markets, Sydney
My stall on George Street, every Saturday and Sunday, and it has been since 2016. The full range, and someone to talk you through it.
A stallholder's guideDirty Jane's, Bowral
A Stuga shelf in the Southern Highlands' best known antiques and design emporium, twenty minutes up the road from the studio.
What's actually insideDirty Jane's, Canberra
The Fyshwick sibling. Same collective idea, funkier mood, more mid-century than Georgian.
Inside the Fyshwick storeThe Old Cheese Factory, Robertson
A Stuga shelf inside the Cool Room Emporium, in the main hall on the way through to the café. Twenty minutes away.
What's in the buildingEverything in the range comes out of this room.
Shaving, beard, body and perfume, made by one person in Moss Vale. If you want the back story rather than the address, that is on the maker page.
Run a shop and want to stock Stuga? Wholesale and trade enquiries.