The spirit of a decade
In the late nineteenth century, French perfumery was thriving but still dominated by floral toilet waters and colognes. Everything changed when organic chemistry delivered new molecules: coumarin, synthesised in 1868, and vanillin, obtained in 1874, became available to perfumers. In 1882, Paul Parquet used coumarin in Fougère Royale for Houbigant and created an accord that does not exist in nature. Seven years later, in 1889, the year of the Paris World's Fair and the Eiffel Tower, Aimé Guerlain launched Jicky. Lavender, bergamot, vanillin and coumarin met a touch of animalic civet: the perfume puzzled people at first before being recognised as one of the first modern perfumes. The decade thus laid the foundations of two great families, fougère and amber, which still structure perfumery today and shape much of what we smell on shop shelves.