Senteurs d’Ailleurs: Bringing Beloved Scents of Southern France Into Brussels Life

“We fight this uniformity alongside houses that maintain a passion for the perfumer’s craft.”

Pablo Perez, Head of Perfumery (translated from French)

Senteurs d’Ailleurs in Brussels began as the shop of a couple who loved southern France. Today it specializes in perfume and cosmetics, but its development has been driven by a family and staff searching for scents around the world, and by customers who share perfumes they discover on their travels.

The name Senteurs d’Ailleurs evokes “scents from elsewhere” in French. Fittingly, its selection expanded from Provence to the wider world. Yet the aim was never to stock everything. Which perfumes to welcome, how to introduce them, and how to support customers during the time it takes to find their own fragrance: the shop’s history lies in these choices.

Essential Information
The Founders and the Beginnings of the Shop
Thinking Behind Selection and Service
1. Preserving Reasons to Choose, Rather Than Multiplying Similar Scents
2. Translating Customers’ Words Into Clues for Finding a Fragrance
Current Shops and Ways to Try Perfume at Home
1. The Roles of Perfume, Beauty, and Treatments
2. Spending Time With a Scent Before Buying, Even Online
References

Essential Information

Name: Senteurs d’Ailleurs
Opened: 1997, Avenue Louise, Brussels, Belgium
Founded as a family business by Pierre Donie and his wife Josiane. Their daughter Laurence joined and helped develop the shop.
Brussels shop: Place Stéphanie 1A/3, 1000 Bruxelles, Belgique
Waterloo shop: 171, chaussée de Bruxelles, 1410 Waterloo, Belgique
Official website: Senteurs d’Ailleurs

The Founders and the Beginnings of the Shop

From Finance to the Scents of Southern France They Loved

Pierre Donie was not a perfume specialist from the outset. After working in finance for 24 years, he left that profession at 47. The next venture he chose with his wife Josiane was a fragrance shop, a field they taught themselves. They shared an attachment to Provence and the scents of the south.

The first shop opened on Avenue Louise in 1997. The official history names three opening brands: L’Occitane, Esteban, and Comptoir Sud Pacifique. Bringing Mediterranean products to Brussels was an idea reflected in both buying and interior design.

Their daughter Laurence also joined early on. With experience in sales and management, she recognized customers looking for something different from established perfume counters. A shop presenting the southern French world the family loved became one responding to its customers’ curiosity.

Discoveries Customers Brought Home and the Move in 2002

Beauty journalist Sofie Albrecht describes the early shop as a space with yellow, patinated walls. Well-traveled regular customers brought news of new brands. It was not only the shop teaching its customers: their discoveries expanded the shop’s possibilities.

The official history identifies 1999 as the year the emphasis shifted toward distinctive brands. Pablo Perez joined in 2000. Later entrusted with the perfume department, he developed his experience alongside the shop under the Donies and their daughter Laurence.

The next turning point for which Pablo gives a specific year is the move in 2002. In different premises, perfumes found at more select retailers, including Frédéric Malle and L’Artisan Parfumeur, became increasingly prominent.

A 2005 visit by local newspaper BRUZZ already shows this change. Staff introduced Matin Câlin, inspired by warm milk, and the cocoa-themed Amour de Cacao, while Iunx had a wall-mounted display at the time. The shop was providing tangible ways into perfume beyond choosing a famous name.

Creating Separate Spaces for Perfume and Cosmetics in 2011

In 2011, the shop moved to nearby Place Stéphanie. Here, two spaces took shape: Haute Parfumerie for perfume and Haute Cosmétique / Institut for cosmetics and treatments.

An ELLE Belgique visit in 2018 described the contrast between the predominantly black perfume space and the predominantly white cosmetics and treatment space. POLLEN’s 2021 report likewise portrayed the perfume side as intimate, reminiscent of a collector’s study, and the cosmetics side as bright and spare. The shop’s selection was presented through separate settings for exploring scent and discussing skincare.

For its twentieth anniversary in 2017, the shop introduced Lilas Noir, a limited-edition candle commissioned from Alberto Morillas of Mizensir. Its black-and-white presentation reflected the shop’s colors. The relationship had grown from buying and introducing products to marking a milestone together with a maker. The candle is one example of that accumulated connection.

Beyond Brussels: The Waterloo Shop

Later developments included a shop in Waterloo. In Be Perfect Magazine, Pablo explained that customers outside Brussels were visiting the city center less often and had asked for a shop closer to home.

The official announcement also explained that the location was chosen for easy access from southern Brussels and Walloon Brabant. Expanding the shop network was not only about collecting unusual perfumes from distant places. It was also about moving closer to customers with whom the shop already had a relationship.

Timeline

Year	Event
1997	The Donies open their first shop on Avenue Louise.
1999	The selection’s direction becomes more clearly focused on individuality and exclusivity.
2000	Pablo Perez joins.
2002	The shop moves to different premises and expands its presentation of niche perfume.
2011	A move to Place Stéphanie creates two spaces for perfume and cosmetics.
2017	The twentieth anniversary is marked by Lilas Noir, a limited-edition candle with Mizensir.
June 2021	Samples Box launches to support perfume discovery online.
Today	The official website lists Brussels and Waterloo shops, with a treatment institute alongside the Brussels shop.

Thinking Behind Selection and Service

Preserving Reasons to Choose, Rather Than Multiplying Similar Scents

“Our aim is not to offer everything.”

Pablo Perez (translated from Dutch)

In 2022, the shop’s twenty-fifth anniversary year, Pablo recalled that the shop once approached brands to ask to stock them, whereas brands now approached the shop. But its space was finite. Offering fifteen similar fragrances would only confuse customers: a greater number of options could make choosing harder. This was the problem he identified.

For him, “exclusive” is not synonymous with expensive. It means rare and well made; something that relates to the existing selection while adding to it. The shop values longstanding relationships with houses, while considering why each newcomer belongs.

The shop’s attention to makers’ work is also interesting when comparing perfume shops around the world. Their individuality emerges not simply in the brands they stock, but in what they retain and how they present it.

Translating Customers’ Words Into Clues for Finding a Fragrance

“My work as a perfume adviser is above all about listening and observing. And teaching.”

Pablo Perez (translated excerpt from French)

Pablo traces his love of perfume back, probably, to childhood. He likes beautiful, rare, refined things, finding luxury in exceptional craftsmanship rather than ostentation.

Service does not mean imposing those tastes on customers. He also sees his role as translating wishes expressed in everyday language into a vocabulary for exploring perfume. Even when someone says they like “musky scents,” he needs to listen for the smell that person has in mind. The task is to understand what they are looking for, not whether they know specialist terminology.

This approach is not new. In BRUZZ’s 2005 report, staff member Cédric Jernander explained that a fragrance needs time to unfold and that a perfume should suit a person’s own sensibility. Looking beyond a momentary first sniff in the shop to how a scent changes over time has long been part of its guidance.

“No self-service here: we advise, encourage discovery, take people on a journey, and share our passion.”

Pablo Perez (translated excerpt from French)

These words in Be Perfect Magazine capture the work a physical shop continues to do even after the spread of online retail. The emphasis is less on reaching freely for a shelf than on a person helping make an unfamiliar fragrance more approachable.

Current Shops and Ways to Try Perfume at Home

The Roles of Perfume, Beauty, and Treatments

The current official directory lists perfume, cosmetics, and the institute at Place Stéphanie 1A/3 in Brussels, and a perfume and cosmetics shop at 171 Chaussée de Bruxelles in Waterloo. The office and e-commerce department have separate addresses, which should not be confused with the shops when planning a visit.

The official treatment menu lists facials using brands including Biologique Recherche, Dermalogica, and La Mer, as well as face and body massages. The beauty department is distinguished not only by its cosmetics selection, but also by a setting in which specialist staff can discuss how to use products and the condition of a customer’s skin.

Spending Time With a Scent Before Buying, Even Online

In June 2021, during the pandemic, Samples Box launched to support sampling through e-commerce. It addressed a problem particular to selling perfume online: a screen cannot convey a smell.

The current official page offers both a choice of five fragrances selected by the customer and themed selections assembled by the shop. Each 2 ml spray sample comes with blotters, allowing fragrances to be tested on paper or skin at home. In the shop, conversation with staff supports discovery; online, it is the time spent with samples. The family shop that once introduced the scents of southern France has expanded the very ways people can discover fragrance.