Esxence | The Birth of Milan’s Perfume Event and Its History of Connecting Creators, Retailers, and Enthusiasts

The sense of belonging that has developed among brands and people in the industry, the awareness that there is a genuine community around artistic perfumery.

Silvio Levi, 2018

Held in Milan, Esxence is both a trade fair where perfume brands present their new creations and an event where the people who make those perfumes, the people who introduce them in shops, and enthusiasts meet face to face. The opening words describe what co-founder Silvio Levi identified as Esxence’s greatest achievement.

Even when a perfume has been created, it cannot reach people far away without places that understand and introduce it. Esxence began in 2009 as a place to bridge that gap. Following the work of Levi, who was also involved with the Paris perfume shop Nose (in Japanese), reveals how the shop and the event have addressed the same problem.

Basic Information
Before Esxence Began
A Timeline of Esxence
How Brands, Retailers, and Perfumers Connect
What Can Perfume Enthusiasts Discover at the Event?
The Next Edition and Information for General Visitors
An Aside: The Smell of Grass Remembered by a Co-founder
References

Basic Information

Name: Esxence – The Art Perfumery Event
First held: 2009, Milan, Italy
Co-founders: Silvio Levi and Maurizio Cavezzali
Organizer: Equipe Exibit. Now developed as a BolognaFiere Cosmoprof business
Audience: artistic perfumery brands, retailers, distributors, perfumers, specialists, and perfume enthusiasts
Next edition: the 17th, February 24–27, 2027, Allianz MiCo Milano Convention Centre. Event information checked on October 15, 2026
Official website: Esxence

Artistic perfumery is a term for perfumes that emphasize creative originality and their creators’ expression. Esxence’s selection process considers not only the perfumes themselves but also a brand’s consistency, its distribution network, and its approach to communicating the background of its creations in shops.

Before Esxence Began

From Science to Perfume Distribution

Born in Milan, Silvio Levi studied organic chemistry and worked in research at a pharmaceutical company. In 1995, Levi left scientific work and became president of Calé, a perfume importer and distributor. This meant entering a field concerned not just with making scents, but with bringing perfumes from abroad to Italian shops and explaining their backgrounds.

When Levi entered the world of artistic perfumery in 1994, what stood out was how little it had yet taken shape as a coherent industry. Individual shops and distribution companies had relationships, but a community that shared experiences and challenges across national borders was not yet sufficiently established. It needed not only a wider variety of perfumes but also a place where the people supporting them could meet.

Experiments in Florence and Bologna

Calé supported Pitti Fragranze, which began in Florence in 2003. Then, in 2005, an invitation-only perfume area called Masterpieces was established at Cosmoprof, the beauty trade fair in Bologna. Calé also helped run it, providing a setting within a large, conventional beauty fair where artistic perfumes could be introduced at an unhurried pace.

But a system in which Italian distributors introduce each brand is not the same as one in which brand owners and export managers themselves meet counterparts from abroad. Levi was aiming for the latter. Brands could explain themselves in their own words, and retailers could talk about their own markets and customers. The intention was to move beyond introductions through intermediary companies toward dialogue between the people directly involved.

2009: Creating a Place for International Dialogue in Milan

After the Masterpieces experience came to an end, Esxence was born in 2009. In 2018, Levi said that, after it had become difficult to pursue the concept in Bologna and Levi had announced a departure from the project, the new Milan event was launched in fewer than 30 days. Co-founder Cavezzali supported the initiative from the event company Equipe.

Milan was chosen for its air connections, urban infrastructure, and accessibility to the media. Gathering somewhere easy to reach from around the world gives small brands without an overseas distribution network an opportunity to find new partners. Milan was chosen not simply as a place where perfumes are produced, but as a city that brings people and information together and leads to new business relationships.

The Connection with Nose in Paris

Levi’s activities spanned the event in Milan and the shop in Paris. The 2014 entry in Calé’s official history records the introduction in Italy of an iPad-based fragrance diagnostic system developed with Nose Paris, which Calé co-owned. This records a co-ownership relationship in the account of an event in 2014; it does not state the year in which the investment began.

Nicolas Cloutier, who leads Nose, also spoke about Esxence in 2015:

Esxence is like a big family gathering, where we can see one another after a long time and catch up.

Nicolas Cloutier, 2015

In addition, official Esxence material updated in December 2019 lists Cloutier of Nose Paris among the professionals from whom Technical Committee members are selected. The name also remains on the list updated in December 2025, currently linked from the official selection page. Under the selection rules, the names of the members actually chosen are not published. Being listed as a candidate must be distinguished from having served on the committee for a particular edition.

Esxence’s current organizer is Equipe Exibit; it is not an event run by Nose. Official announcements in 2026 introduce Levi as co-founder and president of the Technical Committee, and Cavezzali as co-founder and CEO of Equipe Exibit. It is easier to understand these relationships when historical personal connections and the present operating organization are considered separately.

A Timeline of Esxence

Year	Event
2003	Pitti Fragranze, supported by Calé, begins in Florence. It provides a place for industry exchange before Esxence.
2005–2008	Masterpieces runs at Cosmoprof in Bologna, presenting artistic perfumes in an invitation-only area.
2009	Esxence is held for the first time in Milan.
2014	The fragrance diagnostic system of Nose Paris, co-owned by Calé, is introduced in Italy.
2019	The 11th edition is held April 25–28 at The Mall in Milan. Essencional presents research into online perceptions of the perfume sector.
2020–2021	The pandemic interrupts in-person editions. The online program Esxence on Air takes place June 21–30, 2021.
2022	In-person events resume with the 12th edition, June 15–18. The venue moves to MiCo Milano Convention Centre for the first time.
2025	The 15th edition takes place February 19–22 at Allianz MiCo.
2026	The 16th edition takes place June 3–6. On September 19–20, Esxence Boutique is held at Palazzo Bovara to coincide with Milano Beauty Week.
2027	The 17th edition is scheduled for February 24–27 at Allianz MiCo.

How Brands, Retailers, and Perfumers Connect

Assessing Both the Quality of a Fragrance and How It Is Communicated

Applying does not automatically entitle a brand to exhibit. The official selection criteria separate artistic and qualitative assessment from assessment of distribution. They examine whether the creations express a documented brand history and philosophy, whether the perfumes and visual design are consistent, and whether the creations have originality.

The criteria also emphasize a selective distribution network and the knowledge of those explaining the products in shops. Sales staff need information that enables them to communicate a brand’s history, philosophy, and the artistic characteristics of its creations accurately to customers. The event is designed not only to bring together unusual perfumes, but also to get them into shops that can explain why a particular perfume matters.

New brands that have not yet sufficiently established a distribution network or an international expansion strategy have a category called Spotlight. This introduces brands while making their stage of growth clear. The Technical Committee considers them, and the Organizing Committee gives final approval to exhibit.

Not Just New Launches, but the Beginning of Future Collaborations

For perfumers, too, Esxence is a place to engage after a perfume has been completed. In 2015, independent perfumer Cécile Zarokian described it as an opportunity to meet existing and prospective clients, journalists, and collaborators from around the world. Brands have the opportunity to explain their creations, while retailers have time to consider whether these are people whose work they can continue to present in their shops over the long term.

The words of Michael Edwards (in Japanese), who continues to classify and document perfumes, succinctly express what gathering together means.

In four days, I smell the world!

Michael Edwards, 2015

At the same time, choosing becomes more difficult as the number of brands grows. Bodo Kubartz, who appeared on a panel at the 2026 event, sees young brands from Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America standing alongside established European houses, making it impossible for a single trend to explain the whole picture. The role of retailers is also shifting in emphasis from increasing the number of products to placing creations in context and guiding customers in language they can understand. At Esxence, new creations are discussed together with how they will reach people.

Connecting Four Days of Discussion with Research and Education

Levi wants perfume to be understood not only as a finished product but also as creative work. That perspective emerges in these words from 2021, as Levi sought to work at discovering talent.

To bring out what is valuable and offer it to those with the sensitivity to listen.

Silvio Levi, 2021

For that reason, Esxence’s activities do not end with four days of business meetings. Levi and colleagues connected experience gained in the event’s workshops with industry research and ongoing communication. Essencional became a place to investigate the views of brands, retailers, and distributors, as well as perceptions of perfume online, and to incorporate those findings into talks and articles.

Esxence on Air took place in 2021 during the pandemic. It explored how to communicate scent sampling and stories in shops, how perfume is discussed digitally, and what is happening in different markets, while also including talks on perfume history and sustainability. Even when people could not smell perfumes in the same place, the aim was to preserve a forum for exchanging knowledge.

What Can Perfume Enthusiasts Discover at the Event?

Smelling Perfumes and Hearing from Their Creators

For general visitors, the central experience is smelling creations at individual brands’ displays and hearing their backgrounds. The official introduction to the event mentions discovering brand stories in the exhibition area and taking part in experimental experiences and workshops. The venue provides a way to encounter, on the same day and in the same place, brands that are not normally found alongside one another in shops.

However, the format does not mean that brand founders or perfumers are present at every booth throughout the event. Participants, programs, and the extent of public access vary by edition. In 2026, for example, of the four days from June 3 to 6, the day open to the general public was the final day, June 6.

Experiencing Paintings, Sound, and Landscapes Alongside Scent

Some programs change the very way perfumes are smelled. At Calé’s 2022 display, two perfumes, Roboris and Libera Mente, were presented with 360-degree imagery and sound: Death Valley just before rain, and a scene moving from the bustle of a city to the stillness of a Japanese garden. Watching images, listening to sounds, and smelling the perfumes conveyed the landscapes imagined by the creations through several senses.

Also in 2022, part of “Fleeting – Scents in Colour,” a project by IFF and the Mauritshuis museum in the Netherlands, was recreated at the event. Foot-operated scent diffusers were placed beneath reproductions of 17th-century paintings so visitors could experience the smells of the landscapes depicted. Bringing a museum project into a perfume event broadened interest from the fragrance inside a bottle to the smells of life portrayed in paintings.

Learning About Perfume History, Ingredients, and Nature

In the 2025 program, Accademia del Profumo presented the history, production techniques, and uses of Calabrian bergamot, while the Osmothèque (in Japanese) shed light on perfumes of the 1920s. Alongside discovering new perfumes, there were ways to return to the ingredients that precede them and to creations from the past.

An olfactory walk around CityLife led by BRAVANARIZ founder Ernesto Collado was another example. Small groups walked together, taking in plants and landscapes through their noses. Moving away from finished products on blotters, the program encouraged participants to reconsider the act of sensing scent itself.

The 2026 Exhibitions and a Smaller Event for the Public

The 16th edition in 2026 took “Sensing The World” as its theme and brought together more than 400 brands, including 108 first-time brands. The official closing report announced at least 20,000 cumulative visits. This is an attendance count accumulated over four days and should not simply be taken to mean 20,000 distinct visitors.

The displays included Roberto Vallini’s wood sculptures with scents developed in collaboration with the Italian Perfumery Institute, “Iris alla Radice della Bellezza,” which focused on iris, and historical perfumes from the Osmothèque. A bookshop created for the first time with Fashion Room added a place to browse books on perfume and beauty. Alongside an interview with Michael Edwards, talks covered neuroscience, artificial intelligence, social media, and Asian markets.

On September 19–20 of the same year, Esxence Boutique took place at Palazzo Bovara as part of Milano Beauty Week. It was designed for some of the brands that had participated in the main event to speak directly to consumers and enthusiasts about the inspiration and backgrounds of their creations. It also included activities with the Italian Perfumery Institute and “Sogni di Natura,” connecting painting, nature, and scent. In a different format, it links a large international trade fair with a setting for closer conversations with the public.

The Next Edition and Information for General Visitors

As of October 15, 2026, the 17th edition has been officially announced for February 24–27, 2027, at Allianz MiCo Milano Convention Centre in Milan. The official “Where & When” page says that further details will be released later.

The public opening day, opening hours, and admission requirements for 2027 should be checked in the official information for that edition. The 2026 schedule, which opened to the public on the final day, and even older information about free registration cannot be reinterpreted as the conditions for the next edition. The starting point for checking dates and the venue is the official event information.

An Aside: The Smell of Grass Remembered by a Co-founder

Among Cavezzali’s childhood memories is the smell of grass freshly cut with a scythe in the mountains of Trentino. The first perfume Cavezzali bought was Grey Flannel; lavender and sage are among the everyday smells cited as favorites. Even the co-founder of an event that brings together brands from around the world connects fragrance with familiar landscapes.

To make perfume a cultural concept, too.

Maurizio Cavezzali, 2025

These are the opening words of the answer to a question about the next challenge. Beyond finding perfumes, it is about nurturing a culture of knowing, wearing, and talking about them. The founder’s brief words convey why exhibitions, learning, and exchange belong within the same event.