Perfume Gallery Preserves, Re-Creates Fragrances

DEBBIE ELLIOTT, host:

Ever wondered what Napoleon smelled like or which fragrance Romans wore out to dinner? Probably not, but if you have, the answers lie at the Osmotheque. It's a sort of museum of perfume, a conservatory of fragrance located in the city of Versailles outside Paris. Its mission is to collect and catalogue scents and to recreate perfumes of the past. Susan Stone has more.

SUSAN STONE: A good perfume can evoke a memory, a reverie, or even a dream. But like all those things, perfume can be fleeting. Jean Kerleo knows. He designed scents for 50 years for firms like Jean Patou. Now he runs the Osmotheque, a collection of at least 1,700 fragrances, many reproduced from the original formulas.

Mr. JEAN KERLEO (Osmotheque): All of this, the perfume we have at the Osmotheque is the perfume of the first century, the perfume royale.

STONE: To make this ancient blend, Kerleo turned to a philosopher. Pliny the Elder describes the scent in his encyclopedic natural history.

Mr. KERLEO: It has three kinds of cinnamon in it and also honey and also a Roman wine.

STONE: Kerleo dips the tiniest portion of a white paper strip swiftly into a small dark bottle in an expert motion. The bottom centimeter emerges soaked with an oily golden liquid. It's strong, spicy, so blatantly cinnamon you can practically taste it.

Mr. KERLEO: Its use was very special. In Roman period they spent a lot of time for eating. But before eating they use this perfume. And this perfume was used as an appetizer.

STONE: Our appetites are set for the next fragrance. This treasure was rediscovered with the help of the Lord Mayor of Versailles.

Mr. KERLEO: And he tell me I have some papers I acquired when one house here in Versailles has been sold and it is papers what have been written by a valet of Napoleon I.

STONE: Among the valet's papers was the formula for Napoleon's favorite Italian eau de cologne. The Osmotheque reproduced it. So what did Napoleon smell like?

Mr. KERLEO: (Speaking French)

STONE: Napoleon's scent is not for sale, but a half liter of it is safe in the cellar of the Osmotheque, preserved at 12 degrees Celsius and protected from oxidation by the gas argon. Kerleo pulls another unassuming bottle from a collection coded by colored dots. It looks like a scientific sample, but it holds a legend - the first fragrance featuring an artificial product.

Mr. KERLEO: The first perfume using one synthetic product in 1884 was Fougere Royal of Houbigant.

STONE: Fougere means fern in French but the notes in this perfume include oak moss, lavender, real musk oil, and most importantly that first synthetic, coumarin. The blend is the great grandfather of modern day manly scents like Canoe and Drakkar Noir. The creators of some of the Osmotheque's biggest treasures are as forgotten as their perfumes. For instance, Paul Poiret, who popularized both the sheath dress and the brassiere before Coco Chanel. His perfumes also predate her Number 5.

Mr. KERLEO: In the collection of (unintelligible) something surprising, a perfume called Le Fruit Defendu, forbidden fruit. People were horrified by this perfume because they said it was ecoeurant.

STONE: Ecoeurant means nauseating. Not a word you associate with perfume. But it was 1914 and World War I was raging. Kerleo opens the tiny bottle and puts it on the counter.

Mr. KERLEO: It was (unintelligible) product. I think it was a big mistake to launch a such product during the war.

STONE: What sort of smell could cause such outrage? Gunpowder? Rotting flesh? No. Sugary sweetness.

Mr. KERLEO: It was too sweet, too frivole.

STONE: Kerleo says that against the backdrop of the war's bloodshed and butchery, Poiret's perfume was a scented slap in the face. Now it smells similar to many sweet scents on the market. Today there are hundreds of new perfumes released every year, but few surprises.

Mr. KERLEO: There is an evolution in the world of perfume. Sometimes there are floral products, sometimes there are romantic, and now a little bit like the evolution of present day life, is it became very strong, violent, to the present period. I think in one or two years there will be a big change, but nobody knows the future evolution.

STONE: Until that time, Kerleo will continue to collect endangered species, as both scents and memories fade. For NPR News, I'm Susan Stone. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.