High Five

Chanel head perfumer OLIVIER POLGE sheds light on how the house ensures the continuity of its celebrated fragrances.

- JENNIFER CHEN

Since the launch of the iconic Chanel No. 5 in 1921, the luxury fashion house has had only four in-house perfumers. The current “nose”, Olivier Polge, is seated in front of me today, his first visit to Singapore and my link to the making of the house’s legendary fragrances.

Soft-spoken and at times searching for the suitable English word to express his thoughts – there’s no language adapted to describe perfume; it is different for everyone, he admits – the one-time concert pianist aspirant nevertheless has impeccable credentials. He was born in Grasse, France’s perfume capital in the South of France, to a perfume-making family. His childhood scent memories were redolent of summers in Provence, where the air carried heady scents of lavender, thyme, citrus and shrubs burned by the sun.

When he was four, his father Jacques Polge became the in-house perfume creator for Chanel, and there the latter would remain for 37 years, concocting olfactory masterpieces such as Coco Mademoiselle, Bleu de Chanel, Chance and Allure. Polge succeeded his father when he retired in 2015. By this time, he had trained in the métier in Grasse and gained experience at global company International Flavours and Fragrances, where he produced scents for luxury brands like Dior and Viktor and Rolf. He sealed his place in the pantheon of No. 5 creators when he was asked to interpret the perfume, the best-selling fragrance in the world, for modern consumers. It had last been updated by his father in 2008, when Polge senior delivered Chanel No. 5 Eau Première.

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