Olivier Polge, Perfumier

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Olivier Polge
Olivier PolgeCourtesy of Coty

With its unusual core of violet leaf underscored by woody chypre notes of patchouli, bergamot, oak moss and labdanum; Balenciaga Paris, the long awaited first olfactory creation from Balenciaga under Nicolas Ghesquière’s reign, beguiles and seduces

With its unusual core of violet leaf underscored by woody chypre notes of patchouli, bergamot, oak moss and labdanum, Balenciaga Paris, the long awaited first olfactory creation from Balenciaga under Nicolas Ghesquière’s reign, beguiles and seduces in an understated fashion. But if fragrance derives its power from a potent cocktail of memories and emotion, its creator Olivier Polge's first memories of scent are rather more prosaic. “For me, it goes back to my childhood holidays spent at my grandparents’ house. It is a scent memory of damp stone in their staircase.”

The son of legendary perfumer, Jacque Polge (the in house “nose” at Chanel for the last 28 years), the younger Polge insists he fell into the perfume business by accident. “What did I learn from my father? Everything but perfume!” Laughs Polge, “I originally studied Art History. I probably got into the perfume business in spite of myself. This is not something I was planning. But one day I arrived at a laboratory (International Flavours and Fragrances) for perfume training and I realised that there was a real craft to it.”

Polge has gone on to create such distinctive, memorable scents like Victor & Rolf’s Flowerbomb, Burberry’s The Beat and scored a hit with Dior Homme where he took the unusual step of creating a synthetic Iris scent for men. In 2009, he was awarded the prestigious French Prix International du Parfum. Though he doesn’t wear a scent himself, he still espouses the intangible aspects of it. “Fragrance can certainly play a role in the erotic. Maybe because it is immaterial and can play better with your mind.”

With Balenciaga Paris, Polge sought to embody the brand codes: “What we were going for was a unique combination of the classical Couture elements inspired by the heritage of Balenciaga and a modern identity brought in by the vision of Nicolas Ghesquière. For that, I wanted to create a fragrance using beautiful and qualitative ingredients on a timeless and sophisticated structure.”

Collaboration is key to Polge’s working process: “A fragrance is the story of an encounter between people and this is really important to me.” Working with Ghesquière and his muse, Charlotte Gainsbourg proved inspiring for him. “In a way, Nicolas’ precision came along through the interest he showed in the perfume creation process. He wanted to understand and to be really part of the development. I met with him on a regular basis and he shared a lot of his olfactory memories with me like flowers, urban smells, woody scents. For him, creating a fragrance was the opposite exercise to cutting or shaping clothes as it is immaterial.”

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