Abstract fragrances

I love many recent niche fragrances, but I often find myself thinking with nostalgia about vintage perfumes. The main reason is I believe that I miss the abstraction quality which caraterize most of the great fragrances released let say before 2000.

I find that too often, niche perfumery favors clarity and legibility over complexity, depth, and fantasy. How many niche brands nowadays claim to link their creations to specific memories, be it a visit at an exotic fragrant spice market, a stay in a remote temple perched on a mountain, or a lush landscape by the sea? I have nothing against figurative fragrances when well done and novel enough, but I just feel that we have too much of that style and too little of the former one. Is it because it takes more time, effort, and/or creativity to come up with a new abstract creation rather than a figurative one? Or is it that the market prefers simple ideas, easy to grasp, over complex ones? I would guess a combination of both.

However, there are of course creators and brands still aiming at abstraction. I'll avoid dropping too many names here, but just two that struck me recently like the kind of thing I'm looking for: Naomi Goodsir and Marc-Antoine Barrois. I am convinced that their fragrances must have taken years to create. Interestingly, in both cases they are relatively small designers seemingly as passionate about perfume as they are about their own art. They also seem to favor quality over quantity, proposing only a handful of fragrances, each deserving attention and patience to be fully appreciated.

If any of this makes sense to you, I would be happy to read your comments and possible suggestions of artists, houses, or even sngle fragrances aiming at abstraction rather than figuration.

Hi Melipone,

this is such a difficult topic, I have tried twice to formulate my ideas and I just end up erasing everything. I do agree there is a trend of perfumes that are almost 1:1 to the inspiration they emerged from, what you describe as easy to understand fragrances. There are other type that aim to reproduce scents in a "fotorealistic" manner. Both types pose no challenge to us, we don't need to interpret them or give them meaning because they are so close to real objects that they don't need any. They give us immediate gratification to our cravings and desires because they smell like things that we have already experienced, sometimes in our domestic, everyday life (perfumes the smell like cherries, cognac, cinnamon, apple pie) or in our travels (sea salt, algae, coconut, pine trees, snow, the smell of Dubai shopping malls). Do I make any sense? My hypothesis is that the perfume industry caters to consumer´s demands, it is us perfume "users" who demand this type of perfumes. Why this is so would require a cultural analysis and that is out of my reach. Of course this is just speculation on my part. As to abstract perfumes I am afraid I cannot really recommend any. 

Thanks so much for taking the time to write your thoughts on this!

Indeed I guess it is a difficult topic and I tend to agree with your analysis, the market is probably somehow demanding this kind of easy-to-grasp fragrances. One could probably find similarities with other modern trends in other areas like cinema, music, food, etc.

It's great if others would like to write their thoughts about this, but I wasn't aiming so much at analysing the trend as much as discussing interesting houses (or single fragrances) that precisely manage to go beyond figuration and take us to uncharted territories. On one side we have houses that seem to make a living of simple -- but of course not necessarily bad -- kind of fragrances (Jo Malone or Maison Martin Margiela for instance seem obvious examples). On the other end of the spectrum we have abstract, inventive creations like Nuit de Bakélite (a masterpiece IMHO). Of course there's a vast grey zone in between...

Anyone to propose other exemples of what they consider abstract fragrances?

Hi,

thanks for clarifying!

Unfortunately I only know Or du Serail.  Lovely mix or raspy honey + tobacco. 

Regards,

I need to revisit that one! 🙂