Eaux Sombres

The ship is called l'Incognito. It is coming home.

Its hull is moored at the quay of the port of Antwerp. But the Incognito has come from far away. It has crossed the world, and carries its scents.

From India, it brings patchouli and spices. From the islands of the Indian Ocean, heady ylang-ylang. From the Persian Gulf and the Suez Canal, incense, myrrh, Egyptian jasmine. From the Mediterranean Sea, honey from Haifa. From Istanbul, the rose, bewitching and deep. From Spain and Gibraltar, labdanum. From the Atlantic Ocean, the sharp, briny air. From Portugal, tobacco in infusion, falling on the blue stones of the wet quay, piercing the invisible sun prowling beneath the waters.

Antwerp. The damp quayside. The smell of fuel oil mingled with that of the Scheldt. And all these scents of the world settling gently on the cobblestones of the city.

Eau de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

A late summer night. An unlit French country road. Louison is alone at the wheel of his vintage black Saab 900, eyes fixed on the tarmac, alert — a deer, a wild boar, a fox could leap from the darkness at any moment.

On the radio, a podcast. The BBC pays tribute to Barbara Cartland, that eccentric of the English aristocracy who dressed exclusively in pink, whose homes were decorated in every shade from rose to lilac, mauve to violet, with occasional touches of unabashed kitsch. A woman who wrote romantic novels, who had built an entire empire from her stories, who adored violet perfumes, and who carried it all off with sovereign nonchalance.

Then the journalist asks a question. An uncomfortable one. Almost indiscreet.

"Do you have any fantasies? If so, what are they?"

A long silence settles. Louison thinks she must be offended. But no.

Her answer comes, in a voice unexpectedly sensual, like that of a woman whose desires are only just awakening, yet who is already of a very considerable age.

"I like young boys... and leather."

A burst of laughter in the dark. The forest rushing past on either side. Focus on the road.

Eau de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

There are figures in history who seem to have crossed the centuries without ageing.

Hildegard of Bingen is one of them. Born in the 12th century, visionary, poet, musician and herbalist, she is considered today as the first true naturopath and modern phytotherapist. Her astonishing predictions, her avant-garde medicine, her music and her spirituality have left an indelible mark on history. Nine centuries after her death, her teachings remain strikingly relevant.

How could such an extraordinary and richly gifted figure have taken so long to capture the attention of our contemporaries?

Louison discovers her during his perfumery studies, while simultaneously attending evening classes in herbalism and aromatherapy. He has always felt deeply this connection with nature, with plants, and that ancestral instinct that drives us to believe nature offers the remedies humanity needs to heal itself. In Hildegard, he recognises a kindred spirit, a woman who had understood, nine centuries before him, what few then dared to affirm.

Eau de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

The scent of someone you love.

Not their perfume, their scent. The smell of their skin upon waking, after they have gone. That olfactive imprint left on the sheets, in the hollow of the pillow, in the atmosphere of the room. A presence without a body. A memory that still breathes.

Omnipresence.

That of the energy that surrounds us, invisible, yet always there. In us and all around us, between us. That divine breath that some call God, others the universe, others still the living world. The name matters little. The presence, itself, does not lie, there where the visible and the invisible meet.

The omnipresence of the architect of the universe, that indescribable yet so perfect mechanism. Our beliefs that carry us. Our doubts that make us grow. That tension between what we know and what we sense, between what we see and what we hope for.

Eau de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

Brussels. A December weekend.

It is bitterly cold. Louison is pushed through the door of Saint Catherine's Church by a gust of wind that leaves him no choice. An exhibition of orthodox icons from around the world has been installed there for a few days.

He is not of the Christian faith. But he has always been fascinated by liturgical art and symbolism — by those subtle and profound links that unite Christian symbolism with the Kabbalah of Judaism. Invisible bridges between beliefs, that few people take the time to contemplate.

Inside, time stands still. Visitors are in rapture before the beauty of the icons, illuminated by candlelight — blue, red, green, gold. Louison begins to smell. The dusty scent of stone walls. The dry cold of the blue stone floor. The freshly polished wood of the pews. He takes out his small notebook and notes everything down.

A priest approaches. He watches, intrigued. "Why are you smelling everything?" Louison looks up: "Oh, don't worry... I create perfumes." The priest looks at him as though he were a heretic escaped from an asylum.

But Louison's mind is elsewhere. He looks at the icons, these women holding children in their arms. And he thinks: every woman holding her child in her arms is a saint. Like our mothers who held us. These silent, absolute saints of everyday life.

Scented Candle — Weight: 220g / 7.76oz — 100% soy wax — Burn time: 55 to 60 hours — Made in France in our atelier.

Give time to time.

A misty dawn. A stream. A majestic heron. The symphony of the living, frog, bird, peacock in full display, a ballet of dragonflies. The fox cub, the fawn, the pheasants. Those flashes of life that run between things.

Bare feet in the morning dew. An atom of life.

The smile of the elementals, they come and go, taking all the time in the world. Fantastic reality.

At the heart of Jewish tradition lies a fundamental rule, perhaps the most important of all: to glorify life. The living. Always.

For resilience is part of the DNA of this ancient people. With it comes respect, the thirst for knowledge, education, instruction, this deep conviction that one must go as far as possible in all things, reach for excellence, never stop learning, growing, rising.

Lehaïm is not simply a toast. It is a philosophy. A cry from the heart. A way of being in the world, fully, intensely, with gratitude.

Have faith in life. Cry it out, again and again.

Extrait de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

A love story like almost none other.

An Italian friend, a redhead from Tuscany, meets an Indian prince in New York, a man of rare beauty and elegance, yet of a disarming simplicity. The spark is immediate, absolute. Except that his family had arranged his marriage to a princess since childhood. An Italian wife was out of the question.

But love resists. It grows stronger under pressure, as only true love knows how. The family eventually relents. Three receptions are organised — New York, Paris, India. Louison is invited to the Parisian wedding.

A fairy tale evening. Bollywood performances, sumptuous evening gowns, colours spilling out everywhere. And unforgettable scents — saffron above all, permeating every dish at dinner. Rice with vanilla and saffron. That warm, spiced, enveloping fragrance, mingling with jasmine flowers, the sound of sitars and the laughter of guests.

It is this scent that Louison carries home with him. The scent of an evening where love won.

The prince and princess live today between New York and India, surrounded by their children. To the great joy of parents who finally understood that love knows no borders.

Eau de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

Montmartre. The morning funicular.

A friend of Louison's has just ended her first love after fifteen years together. She is sad, lost, not ready. She boards the funicular each morning as one mounts a scaffold, mechanically, her gaze elsewhere.

But every morning, he is there. A tall, elegant, athletic young man, a Latin from the South of France. He watches her. Sometimes with insistence, sometimes with a gentleness that tells her he has sensed her sadness. She feels his gaze upon her and pretends not to notice.

One morning, she calls Louison to say she will be late for lunch. Her voice is different. "Is everything alright?" asks Louison. "Oh yes," she replies. "I had an erotic dream about the funicular boy!" Louison bursts out laughing: "My dear, your libido is waking up!"

Days pass. Their eyes meet, slowly growing familiar. Her dreams become more and more intense — but she must keep them secret. Her burning secret.

One morning, he moves a little closer. She doesn't dare look at him. They step off the funicular. He has worn so much perfume that she can follow his trail through the streets of Montmartre. She finds him seated at a café terrace.

She approaches. "Good morning... you smell wonderful, but did you spill your bottle on yourself?" He looks up and smiles. "Good morning. Yes, I spilled it on purpose so that you could follow me and we could meet."

They laugh. He invites her to lunch. She accepts. He invites her to dinner. She accepts.

They have been living a great love story ever since. And have two beautiful little girls.

Eau de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

London, Restoration England.

Amber St. Clare is sixteen. She is alone, pregnant, penniless, in the teeming streets of London. Abandoned.

And yet.

Through her intelligence, her beauty and her courage, this young woman will climb every rung of a society that gave her nothing, from dark alleyways to gilded apartments, from highwaymen to courtiers, all the way to the bed of King Charles II himself. Favourite of the Merry King. The highest position a woman could hope for in the England of her time.

She lives through the Great Plague. The Great Fire of London. Betrayals, passions, conquests. She accumulates lovers with sovereign nonchalance: "Adultery is not a crime, it is an entertainment," she murmurs.

But deep in her heart, through all her adventures and all her ordeals, Amber remains faithful to one man. The one she truly loves. The one she can never have.

Scented Candle — Weight: 220g / 7.76oz — 100% soy wax — Burn time: 55 to 60 hours — Made in France in our atelier.

A love story like almost none other.

An Italian friend, a redhead from Tuscany, meets an Indian prince in New York, a man of rare beauty and elegance, yet of a disarming simplicity. The spark is immediate, absolute. Except that his family had arranged his marriage to a princess since childhood. An Italian wife was out of the question.

But love resists. It grows stronger under pressure, as only true love knows how. The family eventually relents. Three receptions are organised — New York, Paris, India. Louison is invited to the Parisian wedding.

A fairy tale evening. Bollywood performances, sumptuous evening gowns, colours spilling out everywhere. And unforgettable scents — saffron above all, permeating every dish at dinner. Rice with vanilla and saffron. That warm, spiced, enveloping fragrance, mingling with jasmine flowers, the sound of sitars and the laughter of guests.

It is this scent that Louison carries home with him. The scent of an evening where love won.

The prince and princess live today between New York and India, surrounded by their children. To the great joy of parents who finally understood that love knows no borders.

Scented Candle — Weight: 220g / 7.76oz — 100% soy wax — Burn time: 55 to 60 hours — Made in France in our atelier.

A manor house, lost in the middle of nowhere.

Louison spends a few days there with friends. The garden overflows with flowers, the vegetation growing freely, at its own pace. The house seems outside of time, welcoming, filled with a magnificent energy. One senses that it is happy to receive visitors.

At night, the woodwork creaks softly. Louison is not frightened. He always leaves a small lamp on in his room.

The walls are covered in wallpaper with immense flowers, flowers one would not find in the garden. Flowers from another world. At night, by the light of the lamp, he can admire their dance in the shadows. They have sensed his presence.

One of them draws closer. Its shadow brushes his ear. It whispers:

"We are on the wall. We have a fragrance. Lighter than nature. In the countries of the future or the ancient lands. Here is our ornament. And we repeat it from floor to ceiling. A fear of being misunderstood, for we have neither freshness nor seasons, nor sky, nor bees, nor breezes."

He falls asleep. And all of them came to him. They wrapped around him to protect him from the spirits of the night.

Extrait de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

There are cities one visits. And there are cities that inhabit us.

Jerusalem is one of the latter. A mystical city, charged with an energy like no other in the world, that of centuries of prayers, tears, faith and hope that have permeated every stone, every alleyway, every breath of air.

Louison is deeply connected to it. Bound by blood, by history, by belonging to a millennial people for whom Jerusalem is the eternal capital and the living soul.

In the souks, scents speak before words. Spices, cardamom, clove, star anise, mingle with the fragrance of cardamom tea drifting from small cafés. The incense of places of worship floats in the warm, dry air. The thousand-year-old stones of the old city release their own perfume, that of time, golden dust, olive wood.

It is this city that Louison wanted to capture in a bottle, not its geography, but its soul. Not its history, but its energy. Not its conflicts, but its light.

Extrait de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz

Brussels. A December weekend.

It is bitterly cold. Louison is pushed through the door of Saint Catherine's Church by a gust of wind that leaves him no choice. An exhibition of orthodox icons from around the world has been installed there for a few days.

He is not of the Christian faith. But he has always been fascinated by liturgical art and symbolism — by those subtle and profound links that unite Christian symbolism with the Kabbalah of Judaism. Invisible bridges between beliefs, that few people take the time to contemplate.

Inside, time stands still. Visitors are in rapture before the beauty of the icons, illuminated by candlelight — blue, red, green, gold. Louison begins to smell. The dusty scent of stone walls. The dry cold of the blue stone floor. The freshly polished wood of the pews. He takes out his small notebook — the one that goes everywhere with him — and notes everything down.

A priest approaches. He watches, intrigued. "Why are you smelling everything?" Louison looks up: "Oh, don't worry... I create perfumes." The priest looks at him as though he were a heretic escaped from an asylum.

But Louison's mind is elsewhere. He looks at the icons, these women holding children in their arms. And he thinks: every woman holding her child in her arms is a saint. Like our mothers who held us. These silent, absolute saints of everyday life.

Eau de Parfum — 50 ml / 1.69 oz