Hear YE, Hear YE, as town criers would say in Medieval times, there is a new indispensable appointment to put in your calendar if you are a perfume lover, the Grasse Perfume Week. Organised in early July by the perfume magazine “New”, in collaboration with the city of Grasse and with the sponsorship of Robertet, famous raw material manufacturer, the event offers over the course of a week, the opportunity to sample and meet niche perfume brand creators but also attend talks on a variety of issues affecting the industry, as well as several olfactive installations and off-site visits linked to the capital of perfumery. Compared to other perfume-related event that are meant for industry professionals, I feel its main focus is on the community of perfume lovers, which is a refreshing change.
The first thing to say, having not been to the sister event in Paris in March, but having read several reviews of this, is that it is an accessible and relatively inexpensive event to attend (19 eur for a 3-day pass, if you don’t count transportation costs to get there and accommodation, which is a bit tricky in Grasse). Being smaller than the Paris event it provides better access to brand owners and perfumers, as well as other industry insiders, which is a plus. It can be tricky to get into bigger fairs and there are less opportunities for genuine discussions.
From an organisational stand point, I have no complaints: Grasse is small enough to make it relatively easy to move from one venue to the next on foot. For instance the exhibit organised by Robertet in Villa Fragonard, named after 18th century Romantic painter of the same name, was only 2 minutes walk from the main exhibition hall, which in turn was close to the small amphitheater where the seminaries and talks (The “Smell Talks”) were being held.
So accessibility once in Grasse and accessibility from an economic stand point were probably a plus compared to the Paris event. I would be remiss however if I did not mention that getting to Grasse can be a bit tricky. The closest airport is Nice, a good 5o min by car from Grasse and taxis to/from the airport to the capital of perfume are expensive. There is a bus connecting the two. Though inexpensive (2,5 eur if memory serves) but it is infrequent, slow and a rather painful affair. I took it numerous times while studying in Grasse (more about this later) but truth be told, it’s not ideal.
Accommodation in Grasse, if one is without a car, can also be tricky, as the prettiest places to rent are outside Grasse, in the surrounding bucolic hills (I highly recommend Cabris, absolutely stunning), which is where I stayed this time around. So if you plan to visit, make sure to nail your accommodation first. If I hade one negative comment regarding the organisation, it would be around language accessibility. Everything was in French with no translation option being made available. As we are in the age of AI, it is true that most phones probably do a reasonable job at providing some form of instant language translation, and personally, being a French-speaker, I was not inconvenienced, but I heard several non-French speakers complain. Maybe a little effort on that front would make more people feel welcomed.
Let’s focus on the few trends and highlights I spotted:
Big in China
This is edition of GPW was dedicated to China, (as was the recent issue of Nez magazine). Having lived in China for 5 years, I was obviously especially intrigued by the topic, and excited to see what Chinese perfume brands were up to. When I lived in Beijing, 20 years ago, there were no Chinese perfume brands, and even now, nearly none have made it to Europe. To my knowledge, this was also the first time a selection of Chinese fragrance brands decided to band together to make a collective appearance on the global stage, choosing the Grasse Perfume Week to do so.
I spoke to Anne Sophie Gauvin, managing partner at KeYi, the consulting company specialising in helping companies (I gather mostly European) penetrate the Chinese market and vice versa. We chatted about olfactive preferences in China, the differences in packaging between Chinese and European brands (for instance it would be a mistake to assume an “Asian sensibility” means packaging with clean lines and a minimalistic aesthetic, which might be true of Japan but not China). To me, the bottles on display seemed to suggest a “more is more” kind of approach: bling ornate bottles, lots of gold, etc.. Understated it was not, and generally speaking, a far cry from the codes used by luxury brands in the west.
Sophie invited me to try ZHUFU, a brand bucking the trend and offering bottles shaped as bamboos, an auspicious symbol in China (and also apparently the winner of the 2025 German design prize), as she mentions they might be an easier brand to approach for a European consumer. One of their fragrances is dedicated to the Donglin temple and was awarded the Centdegrés (a French founded communication/PR operating in China) 2024 Grasse Perfume Art Gold Award!
What does it smell like? Very pleasant, a musky woody scent with, what to my nose smells like a clean patchouli vibe (for those unfamiliar with patchouli, it smells of old cellar/wet earth and decaying leaves in the forest). I mean, I can’t say I have never smelled this type of scent before, but I see how it would appeal to a lot of people who like musky clean scents. To be honest, as a scent claiming to be inspired by a temple, I was expecting more of a cold incense perfume like Orika L. Legrand “Reliques d’Amour” or one of the Comme des Garçons incense offerings such as “Kyoto”, but we are far from any of that. The scent was composed by Gu Meng, a Chinese perfumer from Robertet and I guess she was going for wearability and likeability. Also, a small note on packaging, although pretty (see picture above) the box started falling apart as soon as I opened it, with one piece of cardboard from the box falling off. Nothing major, but again, if you re going for luxury, these things matter
Another brand getting a lot of hype was Tombstone (yes, you read correctly), whose founder and main perfumer, Lan Xiao was present at the round table dedicated to the perfume industry in China. Just the fact that a market which until 10-15 years ago was mostly non existent (I mean you could find foreign brands but there were no real locally-grown Chinese perfume industry) is now producing brands that are as edgy as this, is astounding. From the presentation on China I attended, which included the previously mentioned perfumer, Gu Meng from Robertet, as well as Robertet’s head for the North Asia Market, Fabien Giausseran, it would seem that the Chinese market is growing at an exponential rate. Bear in mind that even if only 5% (at least) of its 1,415 million strong population can allocate resources to expensive perfumes, this still represents a market of over 70 million people. Chinese customers have become more nationalistic and proud of their own brands and generally prefer to shop perfumes that are created in China, so overseas brands and perfume manufacturers are tripping over each other to make sure they are present locally and can produce perfumes that appeal to the local market. The pace at which both local brands and foreign ones are asked to produce their perfumes is also pretty eye opening, with perfumers mentioning that modifications to perfume submissions are sometime required by clients for the same day. All this seemed quite foreign to the Grasse audience I think… I could not help but wonder what was the value of having to create at such breakneck speed. Most creations worth their salt have required significant time and effort, so the blitz pace at which things are moving in China doesn’t really reassure me I have to say but I am nonetheless intrigued by what is unfolding… My money is a company like Zhufu making it to Europe in the next 2-3 years.
Moving on to another defining aspect of the event was the focus on raw materials, another cruel piece of the puzzle when thinking of the industry of the future, as the competition for natural raw materials is getting more critical than ever…
Raw materials emphasis
Two perfume houses that have impeccable pedigree and a cult following were present at GPW each one with an exhibits linked to their brand and the raw materials emblematic of their creations. Amouage, the Omani brand, with Renaud Salmon as creative director, is known for its use of incense and has recently taken on Wadi Dawakah, a Unesco World heritage site dedicated to frankincense trees in the Dhofar region of Oman. The agreement between the perfume brand and the Omani Minister of heritage and culture is to insure the responsible cultivation and extraction of incense and well to promote the rich diverse heritage of Oman. It is always fascinating learning more about a rare raw material, especially one as complex as incense and seeing how it is then used in the various creations.. I have not been to Oman in a long time ago but I would love to go back just to visit Wadi Dawakah….
Anyway, Amouage’s move, in line with its heritage, is also an example of premium luxury brands trying to distinguish themselves from the competition through the use of exclusive raw materials and unique heritage claims. I guess the objective is to be able to claim that the best frankincense is reserved for Amouage…
Another brand I am particularly fond of, Parfum d’Empire, founded by Corsican genius Marc Antoine Corticchiao. also organised an exhibit about some of the natural raw materials it uses in its creation, offering the possibility for visitors to smell side-by-side the raw materials used and the creation it inspired. So, for instance, you could smell the ambrette seeds used in the perfume “Le Cri”, the iris featured in “Equistrius”, the incense employed in the creation of “Wazamba” etc.. The only criticism would be that I was not a fan of the fact that it was organised in a completely dark and windowless room, which felt unnecessary and claustrophobic.
Given this emphasis on raw materials at the event, it seems hardly a coincidence that Robertet, a company particularly well known for the excellence of its natural raw materials, was chosen as this year’s sponsor. Staged in the beautiful Villa Fragonard, the Grasse-base company organised an exhibit aimed at showcasing some of the rare raw materials they produce, along with the innovative extraction methods they use. Some of the extraction techniques were also on display, such as the revival of the ancient “enfleurage” method, i.e. a press with vegetable fat layers where flowers are placed in order to extract their olfactive molecules. Visitors could then compare the various results that are produced by the different extraction methods (enfleurage jasmine versus jasmine extracted by Co2 distillation, etc…). Quite nerdy but fascinating if you are a student of perfumery.
The final trend I wanted to highlight was that of the changing perception of perfume itself, evolving from a beauty product to an olfactive experience
Moving away from perfume as a self care product, GPW also confirmed my impression that an increasing number of brands are creating scents to accompany different experiences: so scents to illustrate an art installation or a novel. Perfume is now being marketed as a way to translate in olfactive terms what is being expressed in a different art form.
A case in point is the Swiss brand Luzi. They had a big splashy room/stand at the GPW with a line of perfumes inspired by the 1960s French musical film (a rather usual genre) by Jacques Demy “les parapluies de Cherbourg”, featuring Catherine Deneuve. Apparently organised in collaboration with the Lugano Film Festival, the idea behind the concept is to smell each of the 6 perfumes Luzi developed to illustrate precise scenes of the film, and in doing so, creating a sort of olfactive soundtrack..The film session organised during the GPW was sadly fully booked so I could to attend and can’t report back on what is was like, but it is an intriguing concept that has, to some extent, been explored before with other art forms but not, as far as I am aware, cinema. Let’s see if this catches on…
Finally, Grasse being also the home of many perfumery schools, there were several events dedicated to studying perfumery in Grasse. It was also one of the reasons I attended the GPW, as my own school, Passion Nez (5eme Sens) celebrated its 10 year anniversary.
Studying perfumes in Grasse/Passion Nez anniversary
Created by Claire Lonvaud, a chemical engineer by training, with a masters in marketing and another in perfume formulation from Isipca (one of the top 3 perfume schools), she is a unique position to understand the needs and challenges of would-be perfume brand creators. What makes Passion Nez/5eme Sens a bit of an outlier in the perfumery school landscape is that they mainly aim to train people who have had a different work experience before turning to perfumery.
Claire offers many different types of courses, most are short-term (ranging from 1 day to 2 weeks) and focus on an introduction to perfumery, exploring specific aspects of the market and offering immersive experiences with programmes such as the summer schools, that looks into the most iconic raw materials that are cultivated in Grasse (rose, jasmine etc..) and the basic accords used in perfumery to recreate them. But only one course is the sum of all these various ones, the 9- month long “Designer Olfactif” (DO) programme that comes very close to the teaching you would get from other industry-led perfumery schools such as Isipca, GIP, etc.. It is aimed at people who dream of creating their own perfume brand or want to integrate perfume in their own field of expertise. The idea of the DO is to make you able to understand all aspects of perfume creation, give you the foundational skills to create your own fragrances or, at any rate, as composition skills will vary from person to person , to act as a knowledgeable creative director for your perfume brand.
It was fascinating talking to some of the other of Passion Nez alumni from the Olfactive Designer course, which included people from around the world and all walks of life such as a photographer based in the UK using perfume to illustrate her exhibits, an aromatherapist based in Mauritius creating scents based on local raw materials with therapeutic benefits, a business man with a career in the building sector who recently created his own perfume brand, etc.
Seeing so many roads leading to perfume was inspiring, and, as Claire so often says herself (paraphrasing a bit from French) ” it is by keeping one’s head in the clouds that one catches a star”.
So I would define her as a dream catcher, calling to all aspiring perfumers who want to make their dreams a reality.
I will leave you with some pictures of the celebrations including the perfumes that were created by DO alumni to celebrate Passion Nez. Each graduate created a scent around a letter of the name of the school. I chose the letter A, representing “Joy” in French: “Allégresse….” and dedicated to all those who have found their passion in life!
