Esquire Middle East ventures Henry Jacques’ stunning new Paris boutique
What smells transport you through decades of time passed to specific moments or emotions? Is it freshly cut grass that conjures up childhood holidays? Why does petrichor – the pleasant earthy scent that permeates the air after rain hits the hot, dry ground – evoke a sense of nostalgia?
The profound relationship between memory and smell relates to the olfactory sense being the strongest for memory, and odours are therefore particularly powerful autobiographical memory cues. Scientifically speaking, it’s because the olfactory bulb and cortex are so close to the hippocampus and amygdala, which are crucial for memory retention, that smell is the quickest memory inducer.
More informally, the nature of this fascinating phenomenon is known as the ‘Proust Effect,’ named after one of the most influential authors of the 20th century, Marcel Proust. The author of the world’s longest novel, À la recherche du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time), described in his epic book how the smell of a petite madeleine cake dipped into a cup of tea triggered a vivid childhood memory.
“Today’s customers deeply respect watches, jewellery and couture. Why must we lower our standards when it comes to Haute Parfumerie?”
It’s perhaps little surprise that the revered writer was so attuned to the power of scent, given that he hailed from France, where perfume has enjoyed enormous success since the seventeenth century and which is today considered the perfume centre of the world.
Almost half a century ago, it was a chance encounter with one of the last great noses of the old French Perfume tradition, that sparked the genesis of one of the finest contemporary perfume houses, Henry Jacques.
The Maison’s founder, Henry Cremona, a passionate globetrotter with a deep love for fragrance, has been a purveyor of the finest perfumes for the world’s most discerning and well-heeled elect since 1975, albeit under a cloak of discretion and distinguishment.
The House had been dedicated solely to the creation of bespoke fragrances, each new perfume forming a treasured library of over 3,000 unique scents, until 2010 when Henry Jacques passed the reigns of the business over to his daughter, Anne-Lise Cremona, and the careful decision was made to open the Henry Jacques realm to the public, through a limited number of custom-designed boutiques to showcase the collections.
The first came when Henry Jacques was approached by Harrods of London to open a retail space inside the celebrated British luxury store, but Henry Jacques politely declined as the space wasn’t suitable, prompting Harrods to approach the brand again six months later with the offer of creating the entirely new concept of the Salon Parfum – a dedicated haute parfumerie level on the sixth floor – which Henry Jacques accepted and which became the first official boutique in 2014.
More boutiques soon followed, notably in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha, which were certain to be appreciated, given the Middle East’s long history with perfume dating back some 5,000 years – it was the development of distillation by the Arabs that made perfume manufacture viable and in ancient times the Middle East was at the heart of the industry.
Speaking to Cremona in the capital of modern perfume, prior to the grand opening of the brand’s long-awaited Paris flagship store, she describes how she returned to save and build upon the company’s remarkable legacy. “In 2010, when I came back, it was a small company that was almost going to close because they were only living with a few clients. I came back to help and I never left. I couldn’t understand that the work of my family, my father and my mother – I pay special tribute to my mother Yvette because she was behind the laboratory – could just disappear like that. And that was my mission at that time, just for them not to see that.”
The laboratory near Grasse still exists today and stocks over 1200 natural components. Cremona says, “these are like living ingredients and it took several decades to build the lab because behind every component there is a family, a person, a story. I could have never done that myself and that’s why I’m very humble, you need several generations to reach this level.”
The Henry Jacques laboratory uses these pure essences to create perfumes in various forms, with 50 meticulously selected perfumes forming Les Classiques, the limited edition Les Exceptions masterpieces taking the art of great perfumery to the next level, and Les Sur-Mesures (bespoke) maintaining the tradition of the company.
“Perfume is that last and best reserve of the past, the one which when all our tears have run dry, can make us cry again”
Of the perfume industry in general, Cremona regrets the lack of real quality. “The artisanal exists in so many domains, yet in perfume, which is the ultimate refinement because it’s not something that you see, you imagine it, we ask you to buy one at the last minute, in an airport, with just an image of pure marketing.”
The industry changed dramatically with the advent of globalisation, and the eminent traditions in the perfume business that were so precious in the Middle East, England, and in France, were largely abandoned in the scramble for mass sales. Today, as consumers and sophisticates, we deeply respect haute horlogerie, haute joallerie, haute couture, haute cuisine… but Cremona asks the question, “Why must we lower our standards when it comes to Haute Parfumerie?”
The stand Anna-Lise Cremona takes is that her parent’s legacy gets to evolve and that standards for fine perfumery are elevated. To this end, Les Classiques – the 50 fragrances at the heart of the Henry Jacques’ universe – are created in three forms.
Les Essences, housed in minimalistic crystal flacons and exceptionally concentrated, and applied directly to the skin via a crystal rod, reincarnating this forgotten ritual. Les Brumes, a more casual and modern way of enjoying high perfumery with a unique ‘splash & spray’ convertible flacon. And finally, solid perfumes, the Maison’s latest balm-like interpretation which is housed in a covetable patented precious case called the Clic-Clac, named after its rather addictive opening and closing mechanism.
As the glitterati passes through the rare Parisian gardens at the suitably prestigious 2 Avenue Montaigne flagship store address, Cremona tells me, “I knew that we had to lift the veil and I had to invent a way to do it. But I was convinced that there are enough people who could understand us, because when you like very good wine, when you like architecture, art, design… you cannot not be sensitive to beautiful perfumery.”
Marcel Proust would doubtless agree, given that he once wrote that, “Perfume is that last and best reserve of the past, the one which when all our tears have run dry, can make us cry again.”
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