If perfumer Francis Kurkdjian is to be believed, you don’t have to be a chemist to do his job, but you do need to be a scholar.
Odours have the power of persuasion stronger than words, appearances, motions or will. The persuasive power of an odour cannot be fended off, it enters into us like breath into our lungs, it fills us up, imbues us totally. There’s no remedy for it.” Cliché though it may sound, this quote from Patrick Süskind’s 1985 best- seller Perfume: The Story of a Murderer still rings true.
A perfumer is akin to a highly skilled artisan or an alchemist. He hunts and forages for nature’s precious treasures and bottles them up, capturing the essence of emotion, memory or fantasy. And among the proud guild of such honourable artists is French-Armenian perfumer and Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres Francis Kurkdjian, who ceaselessly bewitches those fortunate enough to experience his creations.
Like an ancient high priest, Kurkdjian summons Naiads and Dryads to act as his muses in the formulation of his latest fragrance, Aqua Media Cologne forte. “Water of the middle [as the Latin words translate] is the interaction between light, water and freshness,” the creator explains. A veritable portal into a fairytale, Aqua Media “opens a window on to a luxurious landscape of eternal freshness, like a hidden garden, where living and serene water flows.” It opens with deafeningly alluring accords of Italian bergamot and luminous hedione, which set the stage for a beguiling duet of sweet fennel and verbena, graduating into a rather lengthy fermata of woody musks and patchouli. “To me,” Kurkdjian professes, “Aqua Media is the idea of obvious simplicity. It reflects happiness, being in harmony with oneself, one’s mind, body and nature.”
The ability to choose from a dizzying plethora of fragrant molecules must require years of dedication and fervent scholarship, even though it might seem that talent alone could hold the fort of such a unique occupation. Kurkdjian has been engaging with the art world since he was young – he wanted to be a ballet dancer – but failed to pass the entrance exam for a dance school in Paris. Not losing heart, he then decided to pursue another interest. “I had my true revelation at the age of 14, by reading an article about perfumery in a magazine,” says Kurkdjian. “I also saw Le Sauvage with Yves Montand and Catherine Deneuve, in which Montand plays the role
of a perfumer on a remote Venezuelan island. I fell in love with it and told my parents I wanted to become a perfumer.” Naturally, he attended the prestigious Institut Supérieur International du Parfum, de la Cosmetique et de l’Aromatique Alimentaire, the only accredited perfumery school, located in Versailles. Its prestigious scent design and creation programme requires prospective students to possess a Bachelor’s degree in life sciences (chemistry, chemical engineering, biology, biochemistry, botany, pharmacy or pharmacology).
Being a true artistic saboteur, however, Kurkdjian doesn’t believe you need to be a chemist to become a perfumer. “I could make a parallel with a painter who knows his colours and how to mix them, and the value behind each one of them,” he says. “However, he doesn’t formulate the colours himself. He just blends them on the canvas.
“Creating a fragrance is one percent inspiration and 99 percent work. The world of scent is like foreign languages: you must start by learning the alphabet – the raw materials – one by one, describing them, classifying them with your own words and feelings. Then you create words – small fragrance accords – and then sentences.”
As a 25-year-old prodigy in 1995 he created what soon became one of the world’s best-selling perfumes, Le Male for Jean Paul Gaultier. In the following years, he sold dozens of scents to fashion houses and even re-created Marie Antoinette’s favourite fragrance for the Palace of Versailles. His other noteworthy works include Elizabeth Arden’s Green Tea, Narciso Rodriguez’s For Her, My Burberry and Nina Ricci’s L’extase. In 2003, however, the perfumer’s career took a drastic turn when he met Marc Chaya, who would later become the co-founder and CEO of Maison Francis Kurkdjian. “We met at a birthday dinner party after a Jean Paul Gaultier fashion show,” he recalls. “Marc Chaya was surprised not to know my name despite the number of fragrances I’d created.” Not only was it the beginning of a fond friendship, but also the dawn of a house that would go on to extend an unwavering influence over the world of fragrances.
By 2005, Kurkdjian had spent 12 years in the corporate world of fragrances and was longing for freedom and entrepreneurship. Unknowingly replicating the tropes of legends, he embarked on a year-long sojourn around the world – with Chaya as his loyal companion. “During the trip, we talked a lot about fragrances and my vision of the industry,” he says. “I told him I’d open my own fragrance house and that I was looking for someone to do it with me. In September 2009, we launched Maison Francis Kurkdjian together.”
Paris was the inspiration for the house – “the elegance, glamour and true sophistication of women and men, the
je ne sais quoi, as we say, that brings the French harmony and luxury.” Seven years later with Baccarat Rouge 540, he created a fragrance that defined the next generation of olfactory creations, the perfumer’s gift for the fine-crystal maison’s 250th anniversary. “The name Rouge 540 refers to the metamorphosis of clear crystal that, mixed with 24-carat gold powder and heated up to 540 degrees Celsius, turns naturally to the signature red Baccarat colour,” Kurkdjian explains. And its contents are as poetic as the vessel – musk and notes of ambergris at the base of the pyramid, Egyptian jasmine and cedar at the core, with almond and saffron crowning the apex. It’s a graphic, condensed, impactful and forever original gourmand scent that “translates the feeling of transparency and density.”
Rarely do scent creators enjoy the luxury of being confined to one project at a time. Kurkdjian is no exception. “I’ve worked for several houses at the same time throughout my career,” he says, having bestowed his gifts upon brands such as Elie Saab, Carven, Burberry and, naturally, Jean Paul Gaultier – and all while also formulating scents under his own moniker. In 2021, Kurkdjian added another occupation into his ever-expanding oeuvre with his appointment as the creative director of perfume at Christian Dior, succeeding François Demachy.
And what might his concoctions for the esteemed fashion house feel like? His first and so far only creation for the house – Dioriviera – encapsulates the carefree spirits of Provence with an arresting mixture of rose and fig. “You need the art of science and the science of art to be a good perfumer,” says Kurkdjian. After all, touching people with something they can’t see or hear is a tall order.