The ‘happiness’ of Matisse is distilled in Guerlain’s new fragrance

We’ve all experienced those Proustian moments when a waft of scent brings back the experience of a latent childhood moment in vivid detail, or summons the recollection of an ex-lover who still makes you twitch. Smell is the human sense most intrinsically and immediately connected to memory and emotion. Perfume, as its emissary, is liquid memory. 

Acclaimed Parisian perfumers Guerlain have been producing and bottling exquisite scents – and memories – since 1828. Throughout its illustrious history, the perfume house has nurtured a relationship with art, not only looking to the avant-garde movements of the day to inspire their scents and bottles but creating a culture of artistry that envelopes and informs the brand and everything they create.

“As early as 1828, when Pierre-François-Pascal Guerlain first opened the house, he asked painters such as Louise Abbéma, a feminist pioneer, to decorate his boutiques. As for Jacques Guerlain, he bought paintings by Claude Monet, Édouard Manet and Camille Pissarro, despite the fact they were disparaged by critics and the general public at the time,” explains Ann-Caroline Prazan, Guerlain’s Director of Art, Culture and Heritage. “When he opened his boutique at 68 Avenue des Champs-Élysées in Paris, he entrusted the decor to the young artist Jean-Michel Frank. Monet’s painting “The Magpie”, now hung in the Musée d’Orsay, was in his workshop... He sought beauty for inspiration.” 

Twice a year, Maison Guerlain hosts exhibitions of artworks from the Guerlain family’s private collection as well as loans from institutions and collections globally, displayed amid the grandeur of their elegant flagship store on the Champs-Élysées. Now, the perfume house has brought their passion for art to life in a collaboration with Maison Matisse. 

Jasmin Bonheur is the latest fragrance in Guerlain’s L’Art & La Matière collection. The perfume takes its starting point from the work of Henri Matisse, the revered French artist often referred to as “the painter of happiness” for his enchanting, vibrant evocations of the world around him. Inspired by Matisse’s gouache cut-out masterpiece “Les Mille et Une Nuits” with its bold motifs of hearts, jasmine flowers and leaves in vibrant colours, jasmine become the natural focus of the project. 

“I designed an elegant, colourful jasmine fragrance, tinting this white flower with vibrant olfactory nuances inspired by the palette of Henri Matisse, one of the artists who best expresses happiness” – Dephine Jelk, Guerlain

The scent of jasmine is a notoriously fragile and difficult fragrance to capture. The smell so often changes once it’s bottled, no longer recalling the intoxicating beauty of the fresh flower. Guerlain perfumer Delphine Jelk worked on Jasmin Bonheur over a period of a year, using jasmine grown on the French Riviera, Italy, and Morocco to create an authentic aroma true to the fresh flower. Jelk explains: “I designed an elegant, colourful jasmine fragrance, tinting this white flower with vibrant olfactory nuances inspired by the palette of Henri Matisse, one of the artists who best expresses happiness.”

To return to the artist himself, Matisse was unequivocal when it came to the potency and potential of our sensory experience: “Everything we see that passes through the retina is imprinted and then amplified by the imagination. You have to find the right quantity and quality of tones to impress the eye, sense of smell and mind,” he once explained. “To experience the jasmine plant as a whole, for example. To express the quantity and quality of its colour. Look at this composition: a garden. This garden is the memory of the sensations I felt in nature that I project, that I enlarge in space.”

Visit the gallery above for a closer look at the range.

Jasmin Bonheur, a collaboration between Guerlain and Maison Matisse, is available now