Guerlain
From Freepedia
Guerlain is a among the oldest of the perfume houses in the world with a large and loyal customer following and held in high esteem in the perfume industry. Their creations have long influenced the trends of perfumery with fragrances such as Jicky, Shalimar, and Vetiver. Guerlain is also among the few houses (including Caron or Estee Lauder) that exists solely to produce and market perfumes. Many perfume makers including Chanel, Jean Patou and Gucci are fashion house that produce perfumes as a portion of their product line.
Perfumes by Guerlain are often regarded as strongly inspired by the scent of confections due to a common vanilla and amber accord in many of their fragrances. This unique attribute present in many is often refered to by many perfumers as the "Guerlinard". A perfume of the same name was release by the house in 1921.
The House of Guerlain was owned and managed by the perfumers of the Guerlain family from 1828 to 1994. Guerlain was since acquired in 1994 by the LVMH group, a multinational coorporation that owns many of luxury goods brands across Western Europe.
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History
The Beginning
The House of Guerlain was officially started in 1828 when Pierre-François-Pascal Guerlain open his perfume store at Rue de Rivoli, in Paris. As both the founder and first perfumer of the house, Pierre-François composed and manufactured custom fragrances with the help of his two sons, Aimé and Gabriel. Through continued success and the patronage of members in high society, Guerlian open its flagship store at 15 Rue de la Paix in 1840 and put its mark on the Parisian fashion scene at time.
The success of the house under Pierre-François peaked in 1853 with the creation of Eau de Cologne Impérial. This perfume earned him the prestigious title of being His Majesty's Official Perfumer (France), which lead Pierre-Françoise to create perfumes for Queen Victoria of England and Queen Isabella of Spain among other royalty.
The Second Generation
With the death of Pierre-Françoise in 1864, the house was left to Aimé Guerlain and Gabriel Guerlain. The roles of perfumer and manager to Guerlain was divided between the two brothers, with Gabriel managing and further expanding the house and Aimé becoming of the grand perfumer. As such, the House of Guerlain began a long tradition where the position as the "nose" and grand perfumer was handed down through the Guerlain family.
As Guerlain's second generation in-house perfumer, Aimé was the creator of many classic Guerlain perfume compositions, including Fleur d'Italie (1884), Rococo (1887) and Eau de cologne du coq (1894). However, many would argue that the greatest of all his perfume composition was Jicky (1889). Jicky was said to be named after a girl that broke Aimé's heart as a student in England, and proved to be a great success in its time of creation as well as in mordern times. Widely heralded as the first "modern" perfume, Jicky was among the first perfumes to incorporate synthetic odorants in its composition, and is described by some as being the "ultimate" Fougère.
The Third Generation
The business was handed down to the sons of Gabrielle Guerlain, Jacques Guerlain and Pierre Guerlain, with Jacque becoming Guerlian's third master perfumer. Jacques composed many of Guerlian's classic perfumes, many of which as still held in high esteem in the modern perfume industry. As another sign of their popularity, most of his perfumes are still sold and marketed.
Among Jacques Guerlain's most popular creations are:
- Eau de Coq (1894): Meaning "Rooster Water", Eau de Coq is bright with the freshness of citrus.
- Après L'Ondée (1906): Meaning "After the Heavy (Summer) Shower", Après L'Ondée is reminiscent of bitter almonds and wet stones.
- L'Heure Bleue (1912): Meaning "The Blue Hour", L'Heure Bleue is perfume with the dusky scent of candies and almond cake bought in an old world apothacary. Although much akin to Après L'Ondée in its pastry and almonds core, L'Heure Bleue is much less bright and more melancholic.
- Mitsouko (1919): Meaning "Mystery" in Japanese, Mitsouko is said to herald the ending of World War I. Since it use a similarily styled bottle as L'Heure Bleue, Mitsouko was likely composed as warm counterpart to the cool L'Heure Bleue. Mitsouko has the sweet smell of peach preserves and glazed danishes with a warmth like that of glowing embers.
- Shalimar (1925): Named after the garden in Srinagar built by Shah Jahan in memory of his wife, Shalimar is one of the first perfumes successfully to incorporate large amount of vanillin in its composition. The scent of Shalimar is deep and velvetly black with scent of lemon hinted medicinal vanilla. This is the flaship perfume of the House of Guerlain.
- Vol de Nuit (1933): Meaning "Night Flight", Vol de Nuit was created in homage to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry and Air France.
Ode (1955), a floral perfume similar to the likes of Joy by Jean Patou, was the last perfume composition by Jacques Guerlain. The composition of Ode was helped by his grandson, the then 18 year old, Jean-Paul Guerlain.
The Forth Generation
Jean-Paul Guerlain is currently the grand perfumer of Guerlain. No less accomplished then his predecessors, Jean-Paul created the Guerlain's classic men's frangrance Vétiver (1959) and Habit Rouge (1965), considered by many, to be the first male oriental fragrance. He also created Nahema (1979), Jardins de Bagatelle (1983), Samsara (1989), as well as Heritage and Coriolan in the 1990s. Nearing the retirement of Jean-Paul, there does not appear to be an obvious successor within the Guerlain family for taking on the position as the House of Guerlain's grand perfumer.
Guerlain/LVMH Group
Following the acquisitions of Guerlain by LVMH in 1994, perfumers outside of the family have been hired to composed perfumes for Guerlain:
- Mathilde Laurent worked as a perfumer in Guerlain composed Pamplelune (1999) and Shalimar Light (2003). Authorship of the latter has since been reattributed to Jean-Paul Guerlain and relaunch in 2004 after formula changes in the perfume.
- Maurice Roucel an outside perfumer of Quest International composed L'Instant de Guerlain, which was launched in 2004.
LVMH Reformulates Perfumes
Since its acquisition by LVMH, Guerlain had reformulated some of its classics for health compliance reasons. These could potentially mean the end of the traditional formulations of many classics such as Mitsouko and Shalimar.
