Practically and thoughtfully designed for both home and travel, our 30ml perfume spray plainly restates the founding principles of Editions de Parfums Frederic Malle. The original mission of the house was not only to revive the dying art of exquisite perfume-making by giving total creative freedom to the best perfumers in the industry, but also to bring the precious results to a broader audience.

Made from a high shine polyethylene plastic, the phial features a matte anodised metal centre; a subtle contrast of textures. Finished with a convenient magnetic cap, the understated format makes a practical, charming host for the diverse characters within our perfume collection, whether tucked into a bag or proudly displayed on a bathroom shelf.

The story of Portrait of a Lady, in fact begins with another scent from the Frédéric Malle library, the irrepressible Geranium Pour Monsieur. Inspired by antique men’s grooming products — King Louis XVth’s mouthwash, to be exact — Geranium Pour Monsieur was the willful creation of Dominique Ropion, a rare talent widely considered to be the industry’s best perfumer. As Frédéric Malle’s long-time friend, collaborator and sparring partner, the two have enjoyed a 30 year conversation on perfume that began as colleagues at the prestigious Roure Bertrand laboratory and resulted in a slew of modern hits including Carnal Flower and Vetiver Extraordinaire. Yet it was in the unique dry down of their men’s fragrance Geranium Pour Monsieur that Malle and Ropion discovered something peculiar; a specific background warmth that would go on to form the unmistakable base of our protagonist, Portrait of a Lady.

From this auspicious cue, Frédéric Malle and Dominique Ropion conspired to achieve the unthinkable; reinventing the oriental type perfume. A key category of fragrance, the oriental scent type is the most widely used recipe to generate a sensuous perfume; no easy feat to reimagine. Of course, Malle and Ropion were well-armed: compounding decades of expertise with a fond friendship and no limitations on time or expense, months of experimentation began. From Ropion’s state of the art IFF lab in Paris, they inched toward their ambitious goal guided by an exhaustive creative process — one part methodic, to one part organic. As such, their painstaking system of trial and error enlisted or eliminated key ingredients with scientific precision, while a looser free-flow of ideas saw them jam and riff like musicians writing a precocious second album. The as-yet-unnamed perfume was beginning to take shape. Vials of tried and tested ingredients blanketed Malle’s hotel room floor in testament, however one key element proved stubbornly elusive; a fitting top note. 

Spirited debates and exploratory junctures ensued, until a chance conversation over pizza compelled the two friends to try something new. They opted to add rose, that most classic of ingredients, but in wildly overdose proportions (about 10%, equivalent to 400 flowers per 100ml bottle) — something no one else had dared to try due to the wildly prohibitive expense. It was a momentous breakthrough; with the profusion of rose appeared the extraordinary promise of a masterpiece. Now to perfect the formula. Introducing blackcurrant and raspberry linked the exuberant dose of Turkish rose furthermore with Geranium Pour Monsieur’s original elements of geranium, benzoin, frankincense and sandalwood, bringing them even more lust. Clove, bound with cinnamon and patchouli, added more depth and mystery. Portrait of a Lady in all of its potent elegance, boldly entered the world.

Frédéric Malle collaborates with the greatest perfumers of our time. Together they work without any constraints to create the most innovative, yet timeless olfactory works of art.

This carefully chosen selection features 6 extraordinary perfumes including Portrait of a Lady, presented in 3.5ml sprays – an invitation to discover our crown jewels and perhaps mark the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

A new creation from master perfumer Carlos Benaîm.

A sensuous body of lavender is warmed by patchouli, amber and vanilla, and transformed by notes of pineapple and mandarin.
 
Music for a While is a story of seduction: a series of powerful impulses and empowered moments in which life is being lived – for a while, perhaps, as music. 

Experience two different curated selections of our most precious perfumes in 7ml bottles. One comprised of Bigarade Concentrée, French Lover, Geranium pour Monsieur, Musc Ravageur and Vetiver Extraordinaire. The other, of Carnal Flower, Eau de Magnolia, Iris Poudre, Musc Ravageur and Portrait of a Lady.

Discover each perfume as a work of art.

Know the scent of a dress and wear it, in all its forms.

Superstitious is a modern interpretation of the classic floral aldehydic perfume, created in collaboration with Alber Elbaz. Revel in our deeply hydrating Superstitious body butter, our Superstitious hair mist for a lighter way of perfuming oneself, and decorate your perfume bottle with a Superstitious travel case that features Alber Elbaz’s sketch of the third eye.

Sale Gosse celebrates the child in us that has a soft spot for monkey business. Petitgrain, neroli, bergamot and rosemary are infused with a cheeky smile of violet and strawberry for a taste of bubblegum, old-fashioned sweets and getting away with murder. Sale Gosse is available exclusively within France and Italy.

Laguna B, a leader in Venetian glass craftsmanship, has created a limited edition line for Frédéric Malle of five candles in Murano glass. Colorful, playfully extravagant and skillfully executed, each candle is a unique collector’s item, never again replicated.

Vetiver Extraordinaire returns to the spotlight with the launch of our new men’s grooming line, featuring Vetiver Shave Cream and Vetiver After Shave Balm.

Frédéric Malle says with a smile that a razor blade gliding through our shaving cream is like a great skier carving their way with precision down a ski slope. Thick and nourishing, lightly scented with Vétiver Extraordinaire and topped with menthol, this luxurious shaving cream leaves the skin feeling refreshed and well cared for. Our after shave balm adds further comfort to your newly shaven skin: also cooled by a finishing touch of menthol, the balm’s woody freshness is an invitation to kiss and be kissed.

As for Vétiver Extraordinaire itself, it was the fruit of Dominique Ropion’s triumph as the first perfumer to gain access to a molecularly-distilled pure extraction of Vetiver essence. He was also the first to exceed the standard 8% concentration of other Vetiver perfumes by using a substantially larger 25%. With this unprecedented dose of Haitian vetiver essence, he created a modern, fresh bouquet of woods and the masterpiece we know of today as Vétiver Extraordinaire.

Discover the Vetiver Shave Cream and the After Shave Balm

A new boutique, a new coastline. Our first West Coast boutique has opened on Melrose Place in Los Angeles, a city that has inspired Frédéric Malle's work for years, from his perfumes to his designs.

Prompted yet again by his need to innovate within different contexts, Frédéric Malle reveals a décor that was his own vision: a fusion of contemporary design with vintage Hollywood glamour; and it feels just like home. His creative collaboration with Konstantin Kakanias, an L.A-based artist and illustrator of Malle’s book “On Perfume Making”, has resulted in two beautiful rooms:

The first, characterized by a black and white fresco hand-painted by Kakanias across all four walls, embellished with flowers the artist had previously sketched with Frédéric’s perfumes in mind.

The second, canvased in a Peter Dunham deep purple, printed fabric; at its center, an 18th century antique desk purchased by Frédéric Malle himself at auction, and an elegant sofa whose fabric was made by the renowned French manufacturer, Prelle.

The crisp, elegant design of Frédéric Malle’s boutique is softened by his flair for extravagant home comforts, a contrast true to his personal style; a style which, wherever he goes, makes one feel welcome in his world.

Allow yourself be captivated by the scent of this exotic wood, as Frédéric Malle had once been as a child, when he found himself standing in the entrance of a Parisian apartment before a great sandalwood statue of Buddha. It was not until years later, however, that, still troubled by the memory, Frédéric requested it be realized as a candle fragrance that could melt into the fabric of your domestic space and transport it elsewhere.

Like all of our candles, Bois de Santal enhances a home’s unique smell rather than stifles it, imbuing what is familiar with the dream of what is not.

We are excited to announce the return of a dramatic, festive and colorful perfume, and the epitome of what Frédéric likes to call “clean sex appeal”. Bergamot, tangerine and green apple fizz against a lusty backdrop of cinnamon and musk in a creative interpretation of a Caipirinha cocktail and its original Brazilian setting: samba on the beach, bursts of orange and blue in low light, crashing waves and the ecstatic laughs of the young and sexy.

Frédéric Malle has always admired Sophia Grojsman. She was the perfumer he coveted most outside of those of the prestigious Roure Bertrand Dupont laboratory, where he worked. When he eventually left Roure to become one of Paris’ most respected consultants, he approached her. Over the years, their professional relationship became personal, a meeting of minds. The fruit of her collaboration with Frédéric, after he teased her about never having attempted a men’s fragrance before, is probably the most masculine perfume she has ever made.

We have a new hand soap collection! Six of the highest quality fragrances in the perfume industry are now available in the form of rich and nourishing soaps. Their design is somewhat playful, like so much of Frédéric Malle’s world. He had imagined a soap shaped like a hockey puck that could be rolled around in one’s hands, wrapped in waxy-white paper, hand-folded, like a Chinese hand fan. A testament, once again, to Frédéric’s artistic flair.

Stunning pieces, and perfect gifts, that can be purchased either individually, in custom sets of three and six, or as a coffret featuring the full collection.

Try your hand at something new with Crème pour les mains au beurre d’iris by Olivia Giacobetti, an homage to iris and its history as perfume for the gloves of the Medici family- a 16th century trend known as “sweet gloves” to mask the smell of leather, which Catherine de’ Medici herself introduced to the French court when she married King Henry II of France. Olivia combines her masterful rendition of iris – whose subtle, silky texture is notoriously difficult to harness – with a perfect textural balance of shea butter, vitamin C and lemon tree honey for instant hydration. Give your lovely hands the royal treatment!

Alber Elbaz, an illustrious fashion designer, has met his match in the perfume world. The result of this unique collaboration, born from the convergence of creative vision and mutual admiration, is the elusive scent of a dress: a classic floral aldehydic perfume that structures Alber’s vision of an elaborate fabric in which everyone can find their own beauty. As a confessionary gesture of shared superstition, Frédéric and Alber have signed the black bottle with Alber’s sketch of the evil eye, drawn one day in a Parisian café on the corner of a napkin.

Alber resists a world that seeks to impose categories rather than free us from them. He considers intuition to be an inexhaustible source of freedom in the face of hyper-order, and beauty to lie in the irrational and the inexplicable. Superstitious is an invitation to discover that mystery is, in fact, beautiful.