Perfume in super-posh packages

By Adriana Ermter

It’s safe to say that in fragrant circles, luxurious packaging began with the bottle and quite possibly with Marc Lalique. In 1907, the jeweller turned glassmaker introduced women to the notion of buying a brand new, exquisitely handcrafted, crystal-glass Lalique perfume bottle before filling it with their favourite scent at his friend François Coty’s perfume shop in Paris. “Prior to this, women would bring in their empty bottles to be filled,” says Julie Carry, the marketing director at Lalique Parfums. “Most of the time these bottles were simply old and used glass containers that they’d found at home.”

COUTURE-INSPIRED WRAPPINGS
Now, lavish packaging is a fragrant rite thoroughly exploited by the elite. Couture labels such as Dolce & Gabbana and Giorgio Armani, with their respective Velvet and Privé Collections, have upped the standard paper-tissue-and-plastic-bag ante. Their sleek, glass perfume bottles Velvet Love and Privé Figuier Eden are swaddled in velvet before being enclosed in weighty, embossed, jewellery-like boxes. Others, like By Kilian’s Bamboo Harmony, come nestled in glossy satin within a black lacquer-like box, complete with a tassel-detailed lock and key.

LALIQUE-STYLE LUXE
“It validates the legitimacy of the brand,” explains Carry, whose new rendition of Lalique’s Nilang fragrance—constructed by nose Christiane Plos—features a round flacon topped with a stunning, lotus flower cap. The crystal-glass bottle is presented to its Parisian, Rue Royale customers on a velveteen-lined tray before being gently placed inside its suede-covered boite.

“From the handmade bottles and the customized packaging to our shopping bags and blotters, we communicate luxury,” says Carry. “It is the legacy Monsieur Lalique intended.”

SUPER-CHIC PERFUME PRESENTS
Might we add too that this luxury and extravagance, whether reflected in an eau de parfum bottled in crystal, swaddled in velvet or boxed in gleaming lacquer, also makes an ideal Christmas gift for the love in your life who deserves a certain amount of high-level indulging.
—Adriana Ermter