From Cleopatra to Coco Chanel: The 3,000-year history of signature scents
Cleopatra knew how to make an entry. Not with glitter or speeches, but with a perfume. History tells us that she turned off the sails of her ship in rose oil so that the wearing of Tarsus took his presence long before Mark Antony posed her eyes, because Plutarch (Philosopher and Greek historian), writes: “The even winds could endure his perfume” even before his arrival. She seems to have understood that the perfume is not to feel “nice”. This is order. This is the thing about the perfume, it has always been less to feel nice and more about control. Take Napoleon Bonaparte, who was so devoted to Cologne that he allegedly ordered 50 bottles per month, often overlapping citrus with rosemary.
Meanwhile, in England Elisabethaine, gloves were flavored with rose water, orange flowers, cloves, musk, civet and ambergris. And in India Moghole, the emperors wore attacks of rose and sandalwood; These can be so powerful that they would linger on clothes for months. Empires can collapse, but the perfume continues.
Then came Coco Chanel, who approached the perfume as she approached the clothes, with rebellion. In the 1920s, she had enough perfumes with unique flowers that reduced women to roses, violets or lilies. His answer was Chanel No5, a mixture in layers of aldehydes and flowers that seemed as modern as her little black dress. Marilyn Monroe later immortalized it in Life review; When asked what she was wearing in bed, she replied“Chanel no5”.
Modern perfumers like Juliette Karagueuzoglou remind me that the perfume is not only the luxury in the bottle or the reflection after the blow of history, it is generosity. It is the creative spirit behind perfumes like the man of Yves Saint Laurent, the signature of Ferragamo and the ysl velvet tuxedo, perfumes that already live on countless vanities.
When I asked her what scent is, she has not reached molecules or chemistry. Instead, she smiled and said: “For me, the perfume is to give people’s emotion, giving them strength, giving them confidence. This is the tool that allows them to appear in the world as they wish. ”
Signature perfumes and the superposition of perfumes, at the base, are the narration. This is perhaps the reason why he endured for 3,000 years, it reminds us that identity is not fixed. Cleopatra has slept to seduce, Napoleon to conquer, coconut to release. Today, we use it to organize identity, memory and mood. The fascination continues because the superposition, once well done, is narrative. The scent is music in molecules. Each perfume has high, heart and base notes. An opening, a choir and a final. The superposition is to remix this symphony. A smoked oudh under a rose? It’s jazz. A brilliant citrus raised by vanilla? Pop ballad. Each Spritz is a choice of casting: who do I want to be today?
