You should have noticed that the "Chinese perfume" thing has become a popular term on Weibo and Xiaohongshu.
Increasingly, these perfumes are popping up in the hands of bloggers and KOCs, pushed onto your timeline, and what they all have in common is that they all have some kind of "Chinese mood" that is difficult to define.
The Chinese perfume mentioned this time is not like "Yunnan Dangui" and "Suzhou Peony", which you are already familiar with international products, nor is it the kind of ancient domestic fragrance that is "cheap and large bowls and shoddy".
This "olfactory movement" from local brands has found its own track, that is, the artistic conception that belongs to and can only belong to Chinese - from the taste of "after the empty mountains and new rains, the weather is late and autumn", to the detour of "the pen is cloudy, the ink is as fragrant as ever", and even the most authentic and kind fragrance of osmanthus flowers, magnolias and gardenias.
The most popular "Chinese perfumes" on the market almost always use traditional spices, oriental botanical notes and familiar floral fragrances to evoke a period of emotional resonance. Unlike the "Chinese style perfumes" produced by international big names, this is a more local expression of identity. We can also see their tributes and continuations of the Chinese artistic conception when mixing and conceiving.
What's even more surprising is that Chinese perfumes, from the naming to the design of the bottle, are actually trying to convey the traditional Chinese aesthetic and the inspired style fished from those forgotten corners.
This time, we will present you with 20 bottles of Chinese perfumes with different styles from 14 local brands, and explore how they can tell a "Chinese story" through the magic of smell and vision.
In the deep room, "Burning Incense and Watching Yesterday" is one of the most romantic Chinese traditions.
In fact, although "perfume" is a new consumer trend, the tradition of "using incense" is ancient. For example, "Four two Xuan Ginseng three two pine, musk half a honey and the same." The poem "Pills like marbles and golden furnaces, and flowers spewing the wind" not only gives the note sheet and the way of using incense, but also describes the taste of the final "kiyoru incense".
When perfume brands need to imagine the "Chinese smell", the best material library is the ancient literary and artistic heritage, expressing traditional art, allusions and smells with fragrance, and what we smell is a story from a hundred years ago.
Peking Opera Series - Dan
Tea aroma type
Head fragrance: green orange, green mango, rose petals
Body fragrance: small flower jasmine, white tea, tuberose
Base fragrance: musk, amber gelatin, violet
Peking Opera Series - Sheng
Head fragrance: bergamot, green leaves, freesia
Body fragrance: TieGuanyin, rose, gardenia
Base fragrance: plant musk, amber crystal, lingxiang bean
To view the notes, please slide to the left
What perfumes and Peking opera faces have in common is that abstract concepts are placed on the material level: the former uses notes to tell concepts and stories, and the latter uses oil paint and makeup to map character and value.
The Peking Opera series of the RECLASSIFIED Perfume Room uses six different teas to outline the different characters in Peking Opera: Tieguanyin (sheng), Jasmine white tea (dan), Keemun black tea (net), Pu'er (end), Biluochun (ugly), and Longjing (dragon set). Such a combination can easily put people into a typical scene: the stage is staged Peking Opera, and the audience under the stage is sipping hot tea.
Just as each face represents a different personality, each tea has its own tonality, and RECLASSIFIED's ingenuity lies in using the character of the tea to depict six different and vivid "human settings".
This is something that only a local brand can do: understand the nuances behind the various Chinese concepts and convey them accurately. RECLASSIFIED defines its brand as a "light salon," and our understanding is that it is willing to experiment with the possibility of mixing unconventional scents while still creating a concept that is generally acceptable to Chinese audiences.
Goose pear tent incense
Top notes: Refreshing and juicy pears, cut open the fragrance of pears that fill the air
Heart: The aroma of white flowers in the morning, mixed with the fresh morning air
Tail note: Agarwood is placed in the incense burner and burned, and a faint wood fragrance wafts out
Dingzhou Gongku printing incense
There is no note sheet
For the question of "how to tell the story of China with perfume", the answer sheet handed over by The Book of Zhen is more simple and straightforward: paying tribute to historical allusions and restoring traditional aromas.
The allusion to "incense in the goose pear tent" comes from Li Yu, the lord of the Southern Tang Dynasty, who although he was not proficient in politics, he had a good understanding of all the interests of life, including of course Hexiang. The traditional method of making incense in the goose pear tent is no longer available, and there is a saying that the top of the pear is cut off, the core is hollowed out, and then agarwood and sandalwood are added, and then heated together.
However, the usage at that time was to put it in the bed tent as an "indoor fragrance", while the "goose pear tent incense" of the Book of Gilded Was sprayed on the body, and although its fragrance contained the two key elements of pear and wood fragrance, it gave people a completely different feeling: it was like suddenly cutting a fragrant pear in the air, which gave people a more flexible feeling than the hidden low-key of "incense in the tent".
The "Dingzhou Gongku Yinxiang" simply does not have an incense table, and the official description is only "stack incense, sandalwood, lingxiang, herbs, dried pine, the above one rhubarb half two, thatched incense half two." "Whoever makes a seal, seals, and must mix incense with a little bit of almond powder, then it is easy to get out if it does not sink, and it is imitated later."
Empty mountain
Woody tones of the forest
Top notes: rosemary, cedar, grass
Heart notes: pine needle, cliff cypress
Base notes: rosewood, woody
Nan Ke Ji's name comes from "Nan Ke Yi Meng" - in the heart of the main person Li Zi, creating perfume is like weaving a dream. Interestingly, she was originally engaged in the field of traditional Chinese medicine, and the "four qi and five tastes" in traditional incense and medical theory are actually full of ingenious commonalities.
The inspiration for "Empty Mountain" comes from Wang Wei's famous sentence "After the new rain on the empty mountain, the weather comes late in autumn", hoping to show the flow of light and shadow in the mountain within a day through the structure of wood and the front, middle and back tones. The process of reading the note sheet is like reading the "herbal encyclopedia" in the mountains, in a way like shooting a quiet day in the mountains by pointing a storyboard at different plants.
Pine smoke daisy
Far Eastern tuning
Chinese kumquat, incense burning (supercritical extraction), ink notes, lotus flowers, cedar, sandalwood, patchouli, musk seeds, white musk, amber
Musk Moon
Top notes: Cardamom Kumquat Red pine leaves Lavender White musk
Heart notes: Jasmine Frankincense Cedar Patchouli
Aftertaste: musk Laudan fat Olive balm vetiver
The concepts of "Pine Smoke Dai Ink" and "Musk Moon" come from a very specific artistic creation scene: in ancient ink making, the raw materials came from the soot of pine wood burning paper, while the production of high-grade emblem ink often added spices such as musk and ice chips, so that the ink fragrance was preserved for a long time with the calligraphy and painting. "Musk Moon" comes from the name of a piece of "literati ink" collected by Han Xizai, the prime minister of the Southern Tang Dynasty during the Five Dynasties period.
However, although the story and record are "real", it is too abstract a concept compared to the "ink tone" in perfume. Compared with the more imaginable fragrances such as "floral fragrance" and "wood tone", how to reflect the "blending" feeling of ink painting? AROMAG's answer with "pine smoke dai ink" is that it no longer distinguishes between the front, middle and back tone structures, but "creates a smooth, low and soft scent transition, and the feeling of the ink flowing slowly on yantai".
Many people will overlook that perfume is not only a lifestyle and consumer goods, but also a "molecular chemistry". Being able to convey the concept of "literati pen and ink" through perfume technology is enough to impress this perfume.
From Chinese painting to poetry, the artistic beauty of "Chinese classical" often lies in the blank space. We sometimes feel that the taste of a bottle of perfume is "too full", like spreading all the flavors in front of people as soon as we meet, which is the fault of a perfumer who does not know how to leave blanks.
To explain a mysterious Chinese concept through perfume, it requires the ingenuity and hard work of the brand. Here, the way to "leave blank" is to continue to write connotations for the original plain things.
paper
Elegant intellectual woody fragrance
Tranquility: Yunnan jasmine, white orchid, orange blossom, incense burning
Zen wood: papyrus, cardamom, sandalwood, rock orchid, milkwood amber, musk
ink
Elegant intellectual ambergris wood fragrance
Energy: bergamot, grapefruit, sage, ambergris
"Paper" and "Ink" are the joint perfumes of Gotori and the independent perfume brand Fukado, which before closing in 2020 had created many impressive perfumes, such as "Rashomon" and "Libertine" from Japanese culture, and "Big Dream" from "The Theory of QiWu". The founder of Fuxiangtang was not a perfumer, but a "perfumer"—a role that acts as a bridge that connects concepts, inspirations, and specific scents.
The cooperation between Wuduoli and Fuxiangtang has to some extent completed the balance of "niche ambition" and "commercial completion", such as the two bottles of "paper" and "ink" that we have seen.
"Paper" and "ink" are very abstract concepts – but then again, perfumes that immediately make people recognize "this is paper" and "this is ink" as soon as they smell it, and it doesn't arouse much interest. Therefore, the concept of "paper" and "ink" given by Wuduoli becomes more interesting, in the concept of these two bottles of perfume, paper represents tranquility, and ink represents energy, the former is the carrier of thoughts and emotions, while the latter has a detour of "falling pen and passing away, and the residual ink fragrance is as it was".
With these interpretations to smell the perfume, you can feel the delicate texture of the rice paper, and the afterglow left by the brush dipped in ink on the paper.
cassia
Sweet osmanthus fragrance
Top note: green
Heart notes: Osmanthus, Indian jasmine, Damascus rose
Base notes: violet, musk
This year is undoubtedly the "Osmanthus Year" of the Perfume Festival, but in fact, as early as the autumn of 2016, Fuxiangtang launched "Gui" - an original bottle of osmanthus flowers that are "full of memories and love", and the perfume of the same name in Wuduoli is the forerunner of this "national style osmanthus fragrance".
"Gui", as one of the most popular products in Wuduo, may be the most suitable perfume for autumn: it is not like "Yunnan Dangui" that buries the smell of osmanthus under the heavy citrus and tea flavor, nor is it as light and sweet as Lu Dan's "August Night Osmanthus"--the interpretation of "Gui" in Wuduoli is the direct and profound fragrance of osmanthus that is smelled on the streets of southern cities in late autumn.
Mulan Return
Top notes: grapefruit bitter orange blossom
Heart: Magnolia Gardenia Jasmine leaf
Back note: Roman chamomile fir
The head of O D'HORA and the perfumer Jenny received an orthodox perfume education in France, influenced by the French tradition's fascination with "old incense", and the first feeling of this perfume is also "nostalgia" - "Mulan Gui" reminds people of the magnolia tree in the yard of childhood, and the smell of the dresser box of the elders.
It is worth mentioning that the core raw material of this bottle of perfume comes from the natural flower materials of the native area of China, although it is difficult to distinguish the origin of various floral fragrances in the sense of smell, but after knowing this matter, will you feel that the taste of "childhood memories" is more pure?
Bitter
Top notes: bergamot, fig, pink pepper
Heart notes: aldehyde, tea, tobacco, rose, honey
Aftertaste: cedar, amber, male cloves
"Bitter End" is also a perfume that tells stories with structure:
The acidity of the lemon and the pungency of the pepper in the top note collide with a rich bitter tone, but the middle back note slowly reveals the sweetness of honey and wood – meaning "bitter and sweet".
Ambivalence is a tool to make perfumes more complex and interesting, just as on the product page of this antique perfume, the model holds the bottle in one hand and opens popeye magazine with the other hand.
gardenia
There is no obvious change in the front, middle and back notes, and the pure gardenia floral fragrance with ultra-high reducivity
In addition to the complex "story sense" perfume, simple and straightforward perfumes that only want to restore a taste can sometimes poke at the needs of many people, such as this bottle of "gardenia". This fragrance belongs to Aynoir's Urban Garden collection, and each perfume only "captures the real Chinese aromas that people remember."
Compared with those perfumes that are willing to tell a long story with a few hours of incense, it is likely that sometimes people need to press the nozzle at the moment of the moment, they can instantly refresh their minds and return to a flower garden that they once wandered.
"Nostalgia" isn't the only card that Chinese perfumes can play.
The use of scents to deal with the complexities and ambiguities of modern life is another ambition of brands and perfumers – they are willing to use scents to restore a specific street and season of a city, or a scene of sitting and talking with friends; in addition to serious and elegant propositions, some light-hearted background stories can also make a bottle of perfume interesting.
What people look for in perfumes is still "expressing themselves to the outside world", and the answer given by these perfumes is a more "modern" version.
Special Edition
Top notes: citrus, bergamot, orange, orange blossom
Heart notes: aromatic notes, rosemary, lavender, bitter orange leaf
Aftertaste: woody, vetiver
Q incense
Top notes: green apple banana pear cherry
Heart notes: Suzuran Cinnamon Elderberry gooseberry leaf
Base note: Woody fragrant Dried fruit Amber Suede Vanilla Honey
A cute detail: two different "panda poof" perfumes represent baby pandas and adult pandas. Q Incense is based on the green apples that young pandas like, with honey, dried fruits and milky vanilla, while the special edition is made with bamboo leaves and fresh orange blossoms that adult pandas like, and the tail called vetiver brings a sense of depth.
In a sense, the perfume of Fauvism has been one step ahead, and while other perfumes are busy creating "human designs", it has begun to create "bear settings".
In September this year, the Fauvists even adopted a baby giant panda for life at the Chengdu Panda Base and named it "Poof".
Using incense to complete the narrative of "plush" and "belly black" is something that no one has ever thought of before - as to whether the person who smells it can appreciate these deep meanings, it is probably everyone's own story.
Incense meets Shanghai
Top notes: White tea Sweet orange citrus
Heart note: Osmanthus Magnolia Rose
Base notes: Cedar White Musk
It is said that this is a bottle of perfume that allows people to enter the "Ancient Garden of Autumn" in one second.
The theme of the city is not a new proposition in perfume. In the understanding of the principal Catherine Zhou, autumn in Shanghai is osmanthus flavor, but unlike the rich fruity flavor of other osmanthus perfumes, the taste of Shanghai is actually not sweet. Most people's understanding of "the smell of autumn" is still the cold autumn wind and the fallen leaves that have been crushed on the road, but the answer given by "Xiang Encounter Shanghai" is a warm and neutral Shanghai autumn.
However, it is a bit of a joke that Pierre, a perfumer from France, has never been to Shanghai, but has faithfully reproduced the autumn gui of Shanghai only by imagination. In house seventeen's Oriental series of perfumes, we don't see the iconic Chinese labels and motifs, but the borderless language of smell still accurately tells the story of China.
Triple tea
Top notes: Bergamot peppermint lemongrass
Heart notes: Violet Tea Jasmine
Bottom note: Atlantic Cedar Papyrus Brown Sugar
Rose burnt
Top notes: citrus rhubarb
Heart notes: smoked rose pink lotus
Base note: patchouli Gilded wood musk
One of the things we really like about watching the summer is that when describing each aroma, we will use the scene description to outline the picture presented by the front, middle and back notes. Take "Triple Tea" as an example, its picture from the front tone "peeled oranges, freshly brewed tea, a bouquet of white flowers", to the heart of "floating tea, smell a little smoky", and finally precipitated in the back tone of "caramel color sunset sprinkled on the pine floor, sitting on the ground to turn over an old book of ash" - this is really a picture and smell with a very high degree of completion and information.
The impression of "rose roast" is not a strong taste of fat powder, nor a freshly picked green rose, but a "slightly drunk rose" that is as ambiguous and warm as shochu. Another rose-tuned work of perfumer Jerome Epinette in this bottle of perfume is the famous "Rose in No Man's Land", and in this Q&A, he and Guan Xia hand over an alternative answer sheet - the unique Oriental Rose.
"Oriental Incense" is the most distinctive card played by Guan Xia, in the Four Seasons Aromatherapy Series, it uses "Xixi Peach Blossom", "Shuyuan Lotus Pond", "Yihe Golden Gui", "Kunlun Boiled Snow" to present a picture of the fragrance of the four seasons of China. This guanxia interpretation of tea and roses also surprised us: different from the Western understanding of the sweet aroma of tea and the gentleness of roses, the "triple tea" and "rose roast" in a tea and a wine contain bitterness and sweetness, slight drunkenness and warmth, as well as the precipitation of time in tea tasting and winemaking.
FISH
Top notes: Wuyi rock tea clay incense
Heart notes: Sandalwood Rock orchid patchouli
Tail note: musk amber agarwood
This bottle of scent was born in the studio of perfumer Yili in Drum Tower East Street, and perhaps the Bell and Drum Tower nearly 600 years ago will bring different inspiration to her creations. She is a lecturer in the Chinese region of the ESP Advanced Perfume Institute in France, and now studies the smell experience of bottle after bottle of whimsical ideas in her "small workshop" - many people will feel that the pricing of incense is much higher than people's expectations of "domestic perfume", and its existence is also like telling the world, and the elaborate intention is still "not afraid of the deep alley" in the cracks of the assembly line of the large factory.
KALA's perfume gives people a particularly clear sense of picture: the impact of tea aroma and earth, incense burning, it is easy to imagine the process of picking tea between the potholes and streams. The heart of patchouli is the scent of the lips and teeth after the tea is brewed, and the final musk, amber and agarwood provide a heavy aftertaste.
VOICE FROM THE SKY
Top notes: aldehyde, eucalyptus
Heart notes: Omani frankincense, Egyptian laudan resin
Base notes: Hainan agarwood, Indian sandalwood, Haitian vetiver, Sumatran patchouli, ambergris, white musk
"VOICE FROM THE SKY", an extraterrestrial sound.
As the first perfume of perfumer brand Tianle from the sky, this perfume of the same name responds to an ancient religious proposition: perfume was regarded as a ladder of communication between heaven and man at the beginning of human civilization, and in the impermanent modern society, can it still assume such a role? To be fair, this is not a bottle of perfume that everyone can accept, and the perfumer Feng Tianle seems to have no intention of this: he is the heir of the most important fragrance and fragrance enterprise in China, and the works of the "second generation of incense" have directly skipped the stage of "pleasing most people".
In terms of the use of raw materials, this bottle of perfume has chosen to integrate "the most artificial aldehyde fragrance" and "the most religious natural spice". If you read perfume as text, this constitutes the most tense part of the chapter.
And with the passage of time, the entanglement of various smells portrays fierce contrasts like complex emotions, and finally the calm and sandalwood agarwood in the base appears, like a prayer and finally falling asleep.
Why did it take so long for us to see the appearance of a truly attentive "Chinese perfume"?
It's not an easy track to set foot on. To establish a mature perfume industry, from the training of perfumers, the supply of raw materials, to the training of technology, cost and even users, it is a long and arduous effort.
In the past, people would think that perfume was just to disguise the body odor, and the requirement was to stop at "smelling incense". But now, young consumers are constantly looking for space to express themselves, and smell has become a part of their reluctance to let go.
Compared to clothes, hats, shoes and bags, perfume is invisible and can be seen to others almost only at intimate distance. For the rest of the time, it is private and remains with you for hours of incense. Many perfumers choose to cast magic during these hours, telling a story with a structure of front and middle and back notes.
The reason for loving perfume is probably that it is a memory condensed by spices. Almost everyone has had the experience of being brought into a scene by a particular smell, and brain scientists have given the phenomenon a romantic name: the "Proust effect." In "Remembrance of the Lost Water Years", he is brought back by the smell of Madeleine's cake to the Sunday morning of his childhood, when he went to his aunt's house as a guest.
Therefore, perfume will be attached to the label of "human design", because from each bottle of smell, we actually smell a piece of "personal history". Therefore, after witnessing the rapid rise of domestic perfumes, the first thing we think of is that we can finally use our own incense to tell our own stories. ☁️
Written by: Lili
Photography, Design, Editing: Andy
Special thanks: Solo