Gourmand Family

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The History of Gourmand Fragrances

Gourmand established itself as a category through the enormous success of Thierry Mugler’s Angel (Angel, 1992, Olivier Cresp). It is fundamentally created by combining the synthetic fragrance material ethyl maltol (in Japanese) in an overdose (in Japanese) with natural patchouli (in Japanese), which evokes chocolate. This combination worked so well that Angel is often described as one of the most successful and remarkable perfumes of the past few decades.

Incidentally

In fact, Angel’s prototype can be found in a perfume called Nirmala, released by Molinard in 1955. There may or may not even be a story about a court dispute over their similarity.

To begin with, the idea of gourmand, or delicious-smelling fragrance, was not itself new in the perfume industry (Edmond Roudnitska (in Japanese) even created Diorissimo in opposition to the very sweet scents then beginning to become fashionable). What Angel did was use a high concentration (0.5%) of a sweet-smelling material, ethyl maltol. In other words, it did not simply smell like dessert; it smelled extraordinarily sweet. This was made possible by using ethyl maltol, which is four to six times as sweet as the candy-smelling material maltol, together with a large quantity of patchouli to balance it (simply combining these two in the right balance produces a scent close to Angel).

Angel’s revolution was not so much in bringing the already established concept of gourmand to the forefront of perfumery as in breaking down the invisible wall between flavor (in Japanese) and perfume, taste and scent, and bringing into perfume the same impulse as the stimulus we experience as appetite.

Gérald Ghislain

After that, there was a competition to see how much of this ethyl maltol could be included. Lancôme’s La Vie Est Belle (2012) and Yves Saint Laurent’s Black Opium contain ethyl maltol at a concentration at least ten times that in Angel.

Gourmand fragrances are chiefly delicious, tempting-to-eat scents that recall the sweets we ate as children. They are varied, including caramel, chocolate, candy, coffee, and cognac almonds. Vanilla, amber (in Japanese), and spices are also frequently used, and many of these fragrances feel warm.

Representative Gourmands

Angel (Thierry Mugler, 1992, Olivier Cresp): the scent of bitter chocolate and cotton candy drizzled with caramel.
Lolita Lempicka (Lolita Lempicka, 1997, Annick Menardo): the scent of Fanta built around anise.
Love, Don’t Be Shy (Love, don’t be shy, Kilian, 2007, Calice Becker): created a new category of sexy gourmand. The scent of guimauve, or marshmallow.
Tobacco Vanille (Tom Ford, 2007, Olivier Gillotin): a mist of vanilla that has become lukewarm.
Gourmand Coquin (Guerlain, 2008, Christine Nagel): rum chocolate.
Like This (Like This, Etat Libre d’Orange, 2010, Mathilde Bijaoui): pumpkin pie.
Candy (Prada, 2011, Daniela Andrier): an abstract dessert.
La Vie Est Belle (Lancôme, 2012, Olivier Polge, Dominique Ropion, Anne Flipo): a fruity dessert created after three years and 5,000 trials.
Wasanbon (Parfum Satori, 2013, Satori Osawa): the scent of wasanbon sugar, born from a distinctly Japanese sensibility.
Noir Exquis (L’Artisan Parfumeur, 2015, Bertrand Duchaufour): coffee and vanilla.
Noir Aphrodisiaque (Kilian, 2016, Calice Becker): the scent of orange-peel chocolate, created in collaboration with the luxury pâtisserie Jacques Genin.
Black Phantom (Kilian, 2017, Sidonie Lancesseur): Irish coffee.

Recommendations from Perfume Lovers Who Love Gourmands

People who love gourmand perfumes have shared their recommendations! If you are looking for a gourmand scent, do take a look. And if you have a perfume you would love to recommend to someone who is unsure which gourmand to choose, please feel free to reply to this tweet at any time.

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