Portraits of Perfumeurs

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...

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...

A sophisticated Parisian and lawyer by training, Philippine Courtière made a radical career change when she decided to become a perfume creator. During this transition, she benefited from the guidance of renowned masters such as Francis Kurkdjian, Michel Almairac, and Jacques Cavallier. Her career took her from Paris to Geneva, then to New York, a city whose energy and bold fragrances have left their mark on her creative signature. Now dividing her time between Paris and Dubai, she draws on...

Alberto Morillas is a major figure in perfumery, being the first perfumer ever to receive the prestigious Fragrance Foundation Award of Excellence. With his encyclopedic knowledge of the history of perfumes, he stands out for his ability to blend innovative natural techniques with revolutionary synthetic molecules, which he sometimes helps to create himself. His inspiration comes from direct contact with his ingredients. His creative mind is perpetually alert and focused on the future, to the...

Marie Salamagne composes from precise memories, often predating words. The smells of raw materials, enclosed spaces and everyday gestures shaped her imagination from an early age. This sensory memory still guides her work. She creates as she would paint, in successive strokes, seeking color balance and the right tension between clarity and depth. Her style favors emotional legibility, with clean structures and sensuality. She favors controlled contrasts, expressive materials and...

Trained in chemistry before turning to perfumery in Paris, Daniel Josier built up his expertise with major international houses before opting for independence. His career path has given him a rigorous mastery of structures and materials, which he puts to good use in his personal, masterful writing. His work focuses on balance, legibility and coherent formulas. He composes from lived experience and precise sensations, translated with discipline. His style is distinguished by elegance without...

Béatrice Aguilar, a Franco-Spanish perfumer based in Barcelona, studied in Montpellier before training with Marcel Carles and other great names in perfumery. Her style is distinguished by a quest for transparency: she creates fragrances of crystalline purity, airy and luminous, while giving them a tenacious presence thanks to her masterful mastery of white musk. Her compositions evoke discreet elegance and quiet confidence, blending scientific rigor and creative intuition to sculpt olfactory...

Luca Maffei grew up between Italy and the raw materials that surrounded his family's workshop. Trained in Grasse and then back in Milan, he refined a style based on balance, controlled contrasts and the precision of noble materials. Co-founder of Atelier Fragranze Milano, he creates fragrances inspired by memories, Italian light and artisanal gestures. His work explores olfactory trajectories where each note finds its rightful place.

As a self-taught perfumer, Maya’s practice was developed through experimentation; the blending of raw materials with a variety of essential oils, aroma compounds and resins; nature and science combining in autobiographical fragrances. Maya’s olfactory identity draws inspiration from her upbringing, as well as an archive of intimate family photographs from the 1960s; the small Swedish summer house surrounded by mercurial forests, the visits to her grandparents’ sparsely furnished flat on...

Dr Frida Michailidou is an award-winning scientist specialising in fragrances and a creative perfumer. Born and raised in Greece, she was fascinated from an early age by the scents of Greece's rich botanical heritage, which inspired her to embark on a career in sustainable chemistry and perfumery. She led a pioneering scientific expedition to Mount Olympus and was the first to decode the scents of its rare flora using advanced, non-destructive technology. Recognised as an ‘MIT Innovator Under...

Some destinies are not discovered, but revealed. Riccardo Halac-Ruggeroni belongs to this rare category. Founder of RHR Luxury, this self-taught perfumer has transformed a collection of olfactory souvenirs into a house of fragrances that defies the conventions of contemporary luxury.

Born between grandparents who were master coffee roasters and a father who was a distiller, Jean-Charles Sommerard grew up among flowers, alembics, essential oils and perfume. For this perfumer, bestselling author and teacher at the École Supérieure du Parfum, a fragrance is far more than a delicate olfactory caress. It is almost an act of sorcery—capable of lifting souls and transforming lives! And he delights in this magic every day. Today, drawing on his rich experience with companies and...