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Jean-Michel Duriez, behind perfume, the memory of the senses

Trained in Versailles and then in Grasse, Jean-Michel Duriez practiced his art at Jean Patou and Rochas before founding his own house.

His olfactory signature is rooted in the art of translating emotions and memories into fragrances, combining technical precision, sensitivity, and a search for balance. Attentive to the nuances of raw materials and their evocative power, he conceives each perfume as a sensory experience capable of bringing back a presence, a place, or a forgotten moment.

A vision he sums up as follows: “I do not create perfumes, I make memories.”

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Arturetto Landi, operas for the nose

Arturetto Landi is Italian, trained as a chemist, and became a perfumer by chance. A temporary job at a fragrance company in England changed his path. After growing up on the Italian Riviera with a father who was a chef, he trained at H&R in Holzminden, then worked in New York, Paris, Tokyo, Hamburg, Vienna, and Dubai.

The Middle East introduced him to agarwood, which became the backbone of his work. His style is expansive, dense, and theatrical. He likes warm, woody, leathery oud, combined with resins, ambers, flowers, and spices. Contrasts prevail over restraint.

In 2014, he launched his own house. His philosophy can be summed up in five words: modesty, patience, imagination, passion, discernment.

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  • Maxence Moutte, the art of extending a legacy
    Maxence Moutte, the art of extending a legacy
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    Maxence Moutte is a French perfumer, a graduate of ISIPCA and Senior Perfumer at Givaudan. Since the revival of Le Jardin Retrouvé, he has continued the work of its founder Yuri Gutsatz by adapting his historic formulas to current requirements while preserving their identity. He has also created new fragrances, including Mousse Arashiyama, Osmanthe Liu Yuan, Violette Kew and Immortelle Babylone. His olfactory style favors balance, emotion, and inspiring landscapes, in keeping with a vision in...

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  • Yuri Gutsatz, the rebel who gave the perfumer a face again
    Yuri Gutsatz, the rebel who gave the perfumer a face again
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    Yuri Gutsatz (1914-2005) left his mark on the history of perfumery by championing a simple idea: the perfumer is an author. Born in Saint Petersburg and later settled in Paris, he worked for Roure before collaborating with several major houses. In 1975, he founded Le Jardin Retrouvé, often regarded as one of the first niche perfume houses created by an independent perfumer. There, he championed free creation, guided by emotion rather than marketing. As co-founder of the Osmothèque in 1990, he...

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  • Perfume as an Inner Landscape: A Portrait of Perfumer Mirella Pomina
    Perfume as an Inner Landscape: A Portrait of Perfumer Mirella Pomina
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    Mirella Pomina is a Swiss perfumer whose career illustrates the power of perseverance and high standards. After joining the fragrance house LUZI in 2001 as an apprentice perfumer, she rose through the ranks until she was named Principal Perfumer in 2026. Inspired by nature, the Swiss mountains, travel, music, and the arts, she has developed an olfactory style characterized by balance, finesse, and sensitivity. Her creations emphasize luminous harmonies and lasting emotions, driven by an...

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  • The Subtle Art of Perfumer Urs Castelletti
    The Subtle Art of Perfumer Urs Castelletti
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    Urs Castelletti creates fragrances that reflect his personality: precise, balanced, and deeply harmonious. A perfumer at LUZI since the late 1980s, he favors an olfactory style in which each ingredient naturally finds its place. His creations eschew spectacular effects in favor of building a lasting emotional impact, carried by woody, amber, oriental, or floral accords of great fluidity. His career path—which began in the laboratory before he became a perfumer—has given him a technical...

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  • When Vines and Roses Share the Same Furrow: A Portrait of Lauriane Guignon
    When Vines and Roses Share the Same Furrow: A Portrait of Lauriane Guignon
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    Lauriane Guignon has a unique background. She is a perfumer, winemaker, and producer of perfume plants. She practices these three professions at Mas Ricardenque, a family estate in Callian, in the Grasse region, where 8,000 Centifolia rose bushes grow alongside 2.5 hectares of organic vineyards. She comes from a century-old lineage of winemakers and perfume flower growers, and her creations are born from the terroir before they reach the bottle. Each fragrance she creates for her own brand...

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  • Claudio Zucca, the Architect of Memories
    Claudio Zucca, the Architect of Memories
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    Born in 1985 in the province of Milan, Claudio Zucca grew up in a home where scents held a special place, thanks to his mother’s love for the world of fragrances. This informal education shaped an olfactory sensibility that his career as an architect would only refine, without ever extinguishing it. It was during a personally challenging period that he shifted from architecture to fragrance creation, through a self-taught process marked by late-night experiments, the study of raw materials,...

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  • Miguel Matos: The Man Who Thinks in Scents
    Miguel Matos: The Man Who Thinks in Scents
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    An art journalist turned self-taught perfumer, Miguel Matos is one of the most distinctive figures in European niche perfumery. As editor of Fragrantica since 2013, he brings the analytical rigor of a critic to his compositions: his fragrances do not seek immediate beauty, but rather fertile imperfection, sharp edges, and the imbalance that captures the attention. A two-time winner of the Art and Olfaction Awards—for “Young Hearts” in 2020 and “Tabacco Smeraldo” in 2023—he creates...

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  • In the folds of leather and patchouli: the olfactory itinerary of Eve Miralles
    In the folds of leather and patchouli: the olfactory itinerary of Eve Miralles
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    Eve Miralles came to perfumery through rigor. Through a desire to understand what molecules do to emotion. And with a particular curiosity, typical of scientific minds, which means never being satisfied with a superficial answer. Now Senior Perfumer at Cosmo International Fragrances in Barcelona, Eve Miralles is one of those designers who work in the shadows of the big brands, far from the spotlight of mainstream perfumery, but who imagine fragrances that travel on the skin of thousands of...

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  • Clément Gavarry, the heir who chose his heritage
    Clément Gavarry, the heir who chose his heritage
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    Clément Gavarry was born in Paris in 1977, the heir to a four-generation family line from Grasse. At first, as a teenager, he refused to take up the tradition, as sailing attracted him more than laboratories. An internship in New York in 1998 changed his course. He discovered the profession outside the family sphere and realized that this was what attracted him. Trained at ISIPCA and then IFF, he graduated in 2004 and moved to Manhattan. Senior perfumer at Dsm-Firmenich since 2024, he has...

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  • Sébastien Cresp: the art of not being your father
    Sébastien Cresp: the art of not being your father
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    Sébastien Cresp, son of master perfumer Olivier Cresp, trained at the Grasse Institute of Perfumery after an initial course in cooking. Senior perfumer at Atelier Fragranze Milano, he draws inspiration from his Grasse roots and his gastronomic sensibility. His olfactory style combines modern audacity with technical rigor. An adept of innovative perfumery, he creates striking creations (Margiela, Kayali) that shake up codes. P or him, each fragrance must arouse strong emotion through original,...

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  • Between Constantinople and New York: the sensory paths of Ilias Ermenidis
    Between Constantinople and New York: the sensory paths of Ilias Ermenidis
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    Born in Constantinople, Ilias Ermenidis developed a passion for perfumes at a young age while doing summer internships at his father's flavor factory in Istanbul. This vocation led him to study perfumery in Paris, where he made history at Firmenich by becoming the first apprentice perfumer ever to be recruited there. His professional career reflects his international outlook, having lived in Paris, Geneva, and New York. Deeply influenced by art and opera, his creative process favors abstract...

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  • Pierre Négrin: Earth, Light and Essence
    Pierre Négrin: Earth, Light and Essence
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    Pierre Negrin has deep roots in perfumery: born in Grasse, his two grandfathers were traders in plants and perfume products. Although he initially turned to photography and studied physics and chemistry, an internship with a friend who was a perfumer sparked his creative side. He realized that he could express himself just as intensely through scents as he could through light. For him, creating a fragrance is a form of alchemy where the value of a work does not depend on the rarity of its...

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