Scents Of A Lifetime

Hedi Slimane’s life story follows the trailing aroma of his fragrance collection.

- Lynette Kee

It is notoriously difficult to describe what fragrances truly smell like. To illustrate a certain scent, one tends to paint a picture from a distinct memory of an event or experience. According to Fifth Sense, a British clinical organisation providing support to people with taste- or smell-related disorders, the human olfactory system is most closely tied to the human brain as compared to other senses. To some, the smell of powder, rose and incense evokes a vivid image of a grandmother’s dresser or vanity table, while the earth and musky scents of ginger and sandalwood call to mind the nostalgia of a bookstore in the ’90s.

For Hedi Slimane, his first Haute Parfumerie collection at Celine, comprising 11 fragrances, recalls touchstones from his personal life, from the streets of London to Parisian nightclubs.

In the artistic director’s olfactory journal, Slimane reflects on his life in a record of scents — memories from his childhood in Paris to the years he’s lived in Los Angeles. Among the 11 perfumes, eight are designed for daytime, including La Peau Nue, which contains bergamot, rose absolute, white orris butter, rice powder and vetiver — scents reminiscent of his teenage years. “On rainy afternoons, I used to carefully cut out film reviews that I found at second-hand booksellers along the quays of the Seine,” Slimane noted in his journal, honouring his favourite actresses. “I can still see the golden locks and diaphanous skin of Catherine Deneuve in Manon 70, the wild and androgynous beauty of Jane Birkin and Jo Dallesandro in Je T’aime Mon NonPlus,” he listed on.