Sens Unique Paris: Perfume Selection Through Conversation

A perfume has a story to tell.

Renata Faizutdinova (translated from French)

Looking for a perfume does not mean you can name its ingredients from the outset. You might want a holiday, or someone to hold you. In the Marais district of Paris, one shop makes such everyday wishes the starting point for choosing a fragrance. Sens Unique is a specialist retailer that brings together perfumes from different creators and helps visitors discover their differences through conversation.

Its shelves bring familiar names such as Etat Libre d’Orange and Pierre Guillaume together with BeauFort London, Neandertal, and others. Visitors can revisit brands they know or venture toward unfamiliar creators. Behind this selection is the story of an owner who learned the perfume business while working as an interpreter.

Contents

Essential Information
The Founder and the Shop’s Beginnings
Selecting Multiple Brands and Introducing Their Creators
Service and Time to Explore Fragrance
1. Starting with Today’s Mood Rather Than Ingredient Names
2. Following the Customer’s Pace, Without Rushing a Purchase
Timeline
An Aside: The One-Way Meaning Behind the Name
References

Essential Information

Name: Sens Unique
Paris boutique opened: 2011
Key figures in founding and shaping the shop: Renata Faizutdinova and the business partner she met through perfume distribution
Address: 13 rue du Roi de Sicile, 75004 Paris, France
Business: Multi-brand perfume boutique and online shop
Official website: Sens Unique

The Founder and the Shop’s Beginnings

From Studying Finance to Interpreting in Perfume Distribution

Renata did not grow up dreaming of a career in perfume. She studied finance and initially went into fashion. Asked how she first encountered perfume professionally, her answer was simple.

By pure chance.

Renata Faizutdinova, 2015 (translated from French)

In her third year in France, she took a student job interpreting for a Russian perfume distributor working with French houses. Accompanying him to meetings with Pierre Guillaume, Claude Marchal, and Majda Bekkali, she gradually took on the French side of the distribution business. The distributor became her business partner, and they came to share the idea of opening a boutique in Paris.

Beginning with Ten Brands in the Marais in 2011

The Paris boutique opened in 2011 with a selection of ten brands. Renata wanted to create opportunities to encounter perfumes that were not yet widely known. The Marais was also a neighborhood she knew well, having lived nearby. With its small shops, opportunities to experience art, and people curious about unfamiliar things, it became the home she chose for the boutique.

In 2013, a modern black easel and an antique-style gilded easel stood beside the perfumes in the shop window. A visit report from that year recorded around twenty brands and described staff talking about fragrances by Pierre Guillaume, Majda Bekkali, MDCI, and others. Tools for displaying creative work, and people who could talk about its makers: together, these shaped the early shop floor.

Expanding to Caen and Creating a Box for Sampling at Home

The story extended beyond Paris. In February 2015, a new boutique was reported to be opening on Place Saint-Sauveur in Caen, Normandy. This was a historical expansion; the current official store directory lists the Paris boutique.

The first Sens Unique Box appeared in December 2016, offering perfumes around a monthly theme. It brought together six 2 mL samples: five followed the theme, while the sixth added a surprise through a new release or personal choice. Themes such as travel, literature, music, leather, or rose invited exploration across different brands. It was an attempt to assemble a selection that could unfold like a piece of writing.

The initial idea of Sens Unique Box was to offer the Sens Unique experience directly at home to everyone

Renata Faizutdinova on Sens Unique Box (excerpt)

The idea was to offer time with fragrance whether or not someone could visit the boutique. It extended the experience from a shop lined with bottles to comparisons made at home. The box described here is its original format, not an invitation to join a current subscription service.

Selecting Multiple Brands and Introducing Their Creators

Established Niche Names and New Discoveries on the Same Shelves

In October 2026, the official website included sales pages for Etat Libre d’Orange, Pierre Guillaume Paris, Laboratorio Olfattivo, BeauFort London, Neandertal, and other brands. Etat Libre d’Orange’s pages, for example, listed You or Someone Like You and The Ghost in the Shell, while BeauFort’s included Coeur de Noir and Fathom V. This is a multi-brand retail offering of individual perfumes, rather than simply a list of brand names.

That breadth does not mean trying to gather every celebrated name in the world. In 2022, Renata explained that she selected around thirty brands for a 25-square-meter boutique, giving each enough space. Brands that become more widely distributed may be replaced by new creators. Rather than expanding the shelves indefinitely, the approach is to keep choosing a range the shop can meaningfully guide visitors through.

In that same 2022 account, Neandertal, BeauFort, Nasomatto, and Eris appeared as examples for customers seeking unexpected fragrances. That historical selection should not, however, be treated as a current stock list. A perfume shop’s character emerges both from the brands it has carried and from what is on its shelves today.

Learning in a Perfumer’s Laboratory and Bringing It to the Shop Floor

Introducing a fragrance to visitors also requires the work of understanding it. In 2013, Pierre Guillaume said that when he began working with Sens Unique, he invited a sales associate to his home to spend a week in his laboratory. The aim was for the associate to understand his creations and be able to discuss them as he did.

He also recalled that, at a Phaedon presentation, the associate smelled the new fragrances once and identified them in a blind test five minutes later. This was a specific example recounted by the perfumer at the time. The relationship between shop and creator involved not only expanding the brands on offer but also helping people learn scents and explain their differences.

A Collaboration with Pierre Guillaume Reflecting the Boutique’s Character

One result of that relationship was La Nuit de l’Orchidée, introduced in 2020. Renata wanted a fragrance that reflected the boutique’s spirit and atmosphere. Rather than beginning with a list of ingredients, she described a feeling in which darkness, warmth, baroque influences, and modernity coexisted.

The relationship with Pierre Guillaume had developed from the initial introduction of Parfumerie Générale to selling several collections and hosting events with the creator. A dedicated counter he designed himself was another way to convey his world. The collaborative perfume did not mean the boutique had become a place selling only its own products. It was one collaboration born of the work of introducing multiple creators.

Service and Time to Explore Fragrance

Starting with Today’s Mood Rather Than Ingredient Names

The question Renata uses to begin a consultation is not a test of perfume expertise.

What would make you happy today?

Renata Faizutdinova, 2015 (translated from French)

A longing for a holiday, a romantic mood, or a wish for a hug can all be enough. People perceive fragrances differently. Rather than defining a narrow vocabulary in advance, she moves between stories and descriptions of ingredients according to the person’s response. Work that began with interpreting now connects a customer’s words with perfume.

Following the Customer’s Pace, Without Rushing a Purchase

In 2022, Renata described the time needed to choose a bottle as anything from a quarter of an hour to half a year. Spending an hour was not unusual, and she valued customers being able to visit, experience, and decide at their own pace. The space, with wood, gold accents, subdued colors, and chairs to sit in, was also designed to accommodate that time.

According to the current official information, the Paris boutique opens daily from noon to 8 p.m. Its afternoon-to-evening hours also make room for exploring perfume after work. You can begin a conversation even if you cannot quite explain what you want. That accessible starting point is central to the Sens Unique sampling experience.

Timeline

Year or Period	Event
2011	Opens in the Marais district of Paris, beginning with a selection of ten brands.
2013	A visit report describes a boutique carrying around twenty brands. Pierre Guillaume discusses laboratory training for a sales associate.
February 2015	A new boutique in Caen is reported.
December 2016	The first Sens Unique Box combines a theme with one surprise fragrance.
2020	La Nuit de l’Orchidée, a collaboration with Pierre Guillaume, is introduced.
2022	Renata discusses a selection of around thirty brands and an approach that does not rush customers into buying.
Verified in October 2026	The official store directory lists the Paris boutique at 13 rue du Roi de Sicile. Multi-brand online sales are also available.

An Aside: The One-Way Meaning Behind the Name

In French, sens unique means one-way. The name connects the traffic on rue du Roi de Sicile with sens, the word for a sense, including smell. A former colleague came up with the idea. Once people discover new perfumes, they may not return to their old way of choosing fragrance. Renata also saw that further meaning in the boutique’s name.

References

Store and stock information checked on October 15, 2026.