NEZ: The Olfactory Magazine – Issue 03 Spring/Summer 2017

03 | The Sex of Scent 

Love Has a Nose
The close links between perfume, sex and seduction have been forged over a long period of time and are rooted in myths, beliefs, religion and medicine. Is perfume still gendered today and, if so, what olfactory form does this gendering take? What mechanisms guide our nostrils towards some people but not others, whether they’re wearing perfume or not? We delve into the subject of gender and olfactory attraction, through the prism of history, marketing, anthropology, sociology and biology.

Odorama

• The Herbarium: Blackcurrant bud by Patrice Revillard
• Molecule under the microscope: Iso E Super by Olivier R.P. David
• What’s that smell? Flowers (pollination, reproduction, protection) by Olivier R.P. David
• Analysis: the car (new car smell, petrol, leather seats, the garage, magic trees) with scented pull-out card by Béatrice Boisserie

Connections

• Artist: Peter de Cupere by Koan Jeff Baysa
• Author: Baudelairean Aromas by Clara Muller
• Open letter to a young perfumer by Jean-Claude Ellena
• Olfactory portfolio: From Pigalle to Montmartre by Céline Ellena
• Interview: Hippolyte Courty, owner of L’Arbre à café by Juliette Faliu
• Perfumer’s Column, by Céline Ellena

Magazine

• Interview: Perfumer Francis Kurkdjian by Sarah Bouasse
• Report: Symrise Madagascan Vanilla by Cécile Clouet
• Flashback: The Roaring Twenties by Yohan Cervi
• The Fantasy Perfumery 1929: Louise Brooks, Agatha Christie, Helena Rubinstein, Al Capone, Charlie Chaplin, Duke Ellington by Léa Walter

Feature: The scent of sex

• Sex sells: Seduction and the sexes in perfume advertising, by Delphine de Swardt
• Incense, Cologne and testosterone: A history of male fragrance, by Eugénie Briot
• Does love have an odour? Attraction through smell and hormones, by Éléonore de Bonneval
• Pheromones: fact or fiction?, by Éléonore de Bonneval
• The aroma of desire: sex dolls, strip clubs, scented products, love potions, by Guillaume Tesson

Perfume pages

• Analysis: The impact of blogs Awards on perfume brands by Eddie Bulliqi
• Meet the brand: Arquiste by Angela Sanders
• A genealogy: Ambre Antique by Coty by Juliette Faliu and Alexis Toublanc

Opinion: Synesthesia by Alexis Toublanc

Perfume reviews and editors’ picks

Published: May 2017
English only
144 pages