DECORTÉ: From Kozaburo Kobayashi’s Ideals to Collaboration on Fragrance, Japanese Names, and Containers

Good products are the lifeblood of a company; fragrance is the flower of cosmetics.
Kozaburo Kobayashi

Glass bottles tied with ribbons like obi sashes, and Japanese names such as Kihin, Yui, Urara, and Rin: DECORTÉ’s perfumes embody an idea of using fragrance to depict even a person’s bearing and gestures.

Tracing that background leads to KOSÉ founder Kozaburo Kobayashi, whose experience encompassed both making and selling cosmetics. The ideal of luxury inherited by the brand, born in 1970, later developed through collaboration with perfumers and designers into an approach that considers fragrance and container together.

Key Information
The Founder and the Origins of the Brand
The Brand’s Commitments
References

Key Information

Brand name: DECORTÉ (Cosme Decorte)
Launched: December 1970, Japan
Founding and operating company: KOSÉ
Figure who laid the foundations for the brand’s creation: Kozaburo Kobayashi (founder of KOSÉ)
Origin of the name: A combination of the French words cosmétique (cosmetics) and décoration (a medal or decoration)
Official website: DECORTÉ

The Founder and the Origins of the Brand

From Composing Perfumes to Visiting Retailers across Japan

Kozaburo Kobayashi was born in Ibaraki Prefecture in 1897. After finishing school, he moved to Tokyo alone and joined the cosmetics manufacturer Takahashi Toyodo in 1912. He first worked in manufacturing, gaining experience in cosmetics development and perfume composition. He learned how to make products under a factory manager who was skilled in creating fragrances.

In 1921, when the company launched its own brands, Kobayashi moved into sales. He put the product knowledge acquired in manufacturing to use in his sales work, becoming head of the sales division in 1939. For at least five years, he spent about 20 days a month traveling to cosmetics shops around Japan. From making fragrances to bringing products to customers, experience on both sides formed the basis of his approach to cosmetics.

Takahashi Toyodo’s buildings and other property were destroyed by fire during the war, and the company temporarily dissolved. Seeing that demand for cosmetics persisted after the war, Kobayashi founded Kobayashi Gomei Kaisha on March 2, 1946. This would later become KOSÉ. Three of its first eight products were perfumes: Violet, Heliotrope, and Muguet. These were products from KOSÉ’s founding period; Cosme Decorte had not yet been born.

Turning the Ideal of “True Luxury Products” into a Brand in 1970

Cosme Decorte, launched in December 1970, gave form to the ideal of luxury that Kobayashi had envisioned for many years. Its name, combining cosmetics and a medal or decoration, conveyed pride in wearing beauty.

Kobayashi’s aspiration to “create true luxury products” lives on in the brand today. It is an approach that considers the encounter with a product through fragrance, its feel on the skin, design, and customer service. The pressed powder released in the brand’s first year came in a 20-karat gold compact. Alongside the contents, the form and material of the object held in the hand were elements that communicated the brand.

Cosme Decorte was created by my grandfather under the philosophy of making cosmetics that give people hope and inspire them to dream.
Kazutoshi Kobayashi (KOSÉ President at the brand’s 50th anniversary)

These were the words of Kozaburo’s grandson, Kazutoshi Kobayashi. Even in 2020, when the brand marked its 50th anniversary, the feelings and experiences brought by products remained an important part of discussing its founding philosophy.

Polge and Wanders Collaborate on Fragrance and Container in 2011

In 2010, Cosme Decorte appointed Dutch designer Marcel Wanders as art director for AQ MW. On March 16, 2011, it released Vice & Virtue Eau de Parfum No.1. Olivier Polge (in Japanese) was responsible for the fragrance, while Wanders oversaw the overall creation.

Its subject was the contrast between vice and virtue. It sought to contain opposing images, clarity and intelligence on one side, sensuality and stimulation on the other, within a single creation. The contrast also appeared in the container, which combined a clear square bottle with a peach-colored, drop-shaped bottle.

This 2011 eau de parfum had a mechanism that sprayed the contents simultaneously from two outlets with a single press, allowing them to mingle. Duality was incorporated not only into its name and description, but also into the action of using it.

A different form appeared for the 45th anniversary in 2015. Wanders placed a glass pearl inside a crystal-cut bottle and likened its neck to a Dutch collar. From the contrast of the original two containers to a form that conveyed its appeal through cutting and decoration at the neck, this history shows the world of fragrance expressed through both mechanisms of use and ornament.

Choosing Japanese Names for KIMONO at the 50th Anniversary

For the 50th anniversary in 2020, KIMONO was created around the kimono as a subject, to communicate elegance to the world from a new angle. Product manager Asuka Fujinaga, who led the planning, sought to reflect in fragrance the dignified bearing and graceful gestures associated with wearing a kimono. Four eaux de toilette, Kihin, Yui, Urara, and Rin, appeared on December 1.

Partly at the perfumers’ suggestion, we adopted Japanese product names for the first time as a brand.
Asuka Fujinaga

The Japanese names were also a choice that emerged through exchanges with overseas perfumers. Collaboration extended beyond translating a cultural subject prepared by the planning team into fragrance, reaching into the choice of words themselves. The names Kihin (elegance), Yui (connection), Urara (beauty), and Rin (dignity) each help convey the character of their fragrance.

The new fragrances were also introduced in the United Kingdom. A November 2020 British Vogue article produced in partnership with the brand focused on the different feelings associated with wearing a kimono and the muted colors of the glass bottles. The concept of conveying the wearer’s bearing, rather than simply using Japanese clothing as an external motif, was central to their introduction overseas as well.

The Brand’s Commitments

Japanese Flowers and Fruits Depicted by Four Perfumers

The initial four KIMONO fragrances were created in collaboration with four perfumers from the fragrance company IFF. Delphine Lebeau and Nelly Hachem-Ruiz jointly created Kihin; Caroline Dumur created Yui, Lebeau created Urara, and Julien Rasquinet created Rin.

Their shared idea was to center the compositions on a “Japan accord,” a combination of scents evoking flowers and fruits characteristic of Japan. An accord is a coherent scent created by combining several fragrance materials. All four creations also contain natural sublime rose essence, adding floral depth beneath their different expressions.

In Kihin, which Fujinaga described as the main fragrance, the elegance of Japanese iris is depicted through powdery floral expression, jasmine, and layers of patchouli and sandalwood. Yui, meanwhile, develops from a sudachi-like freshness into a soft, lingering vanilla impression. Elegance and an approachable sense of happiness were given different constructions within the same floral series.

Obi Ribbons and Colors for Each Fragrance

Wanders also designed the KIMONO bottles. A ribbon tied around the center of each glass bottle corresponds to a kimono’s obi. The pink, gold, gray, and sand shades used for the individual fragrances also extended into brushstroke-like expressions on the outer packaging.

The design treats a perfume bottle like a small kimono, connecting name, color, and fragrance. In Vice & Virtue, the contrast between containers communicates duality; in KIMONO, the shape and color of the obi communicate differences between fragrances. The method changes from one creation to another, while the form also carries the concept.

Water-Based Perfumes: Scenes of Water and White Obi

The current KIMONO range also includes the alcohol-free, water-based perfumes Hikari and Mai. Unlike the initial four fragrances, both were composed by SHOJI KUMASAKA.

Their subject was the purity of water as it appears in Japanese life and culture. Inspiration expanded from scenes of experiencing the seasons through water, such as sprinkling water on the ground, bamboo water features, morning dew, and the sound of rain. Hikari depicts the sparkle of drops falling from hydrangeas onto water with a green floral scent, while Mai layers the transparency of Japanese tea over sweet vanilla. These are two water-based creations intended to diffuse softly.

For Wanders’s container, a white ribbon was tied in a design inspired by the long, trailing darari obi worn by maiko. While retaining the kimono idea shared across the series, the expression of the obi was changed to suit the purity of water. This way of working back and forth among fragrance, name, and container reveals Cosme Decorte’s understanding of elegance.