Goldfield & Banks: A Luxury Perfume House Claiming an Australian First

“The day I learned that Australia had no luxury perfume house was the day I realized I had to create the first one.”
— Dimitri Weber, founder

Essential Information
The Founder and the Origins of the Brand
What Defines the Brand
The Fragrance Lineup
By the Way…

Essential Information

Founded: 2016
Founder: Dimitri Weber
Based in: Australia
Official website: https://www.goldfieldandbanks.com

(A note on pronunciation: in Japan, the name is often rendered as “Gōrudofīrudo ando Bankusu.”)

The Founder and the Origins of the Brand

Childhood and an Awakening to Perfume

Dimitri Weber was born to a French father and a Belgian mother and grew up in Belgium. His earliest acquaintance with perfume goes back to childhood memories of appraising his mother’s fragrances. By the 1980s, even his schoolteachers were bringing him small perfume samples to ask his opinion.

“Even as a child, I was already choosing and commenting on my mother’s perfumes. My schoolteachers would come to me with little sample bottles for advice. Having perfume samples in the eighties was something special, reserved for only a handful of people.”
— Dimitri Weber

Weber later studied art and explored a career in fashion, but soon became convinced that “my place is in the world of perfume.” He began his career with a part-time job spraying perfume in department stores on weekends and during school holidays, and soon found his way into the industry’s prestigious houses.

A Career in the Fragrance Industry

He joined the fragrance division of YSL (Yves Saint Laurent) in the early 1990s and went on to work in marketing, PR, and education and training for leading global brands including Jean Paul Gaultier, Issey Miyake, Narciso Rodriguez, Gucci, Tom Ford, Cartier, and Shiseido.

“I hadn’t always wanted to create my own brand. I was living a very privileged life, flying all over the world.”
— Dimitri Weber

There was, in fact, a reason why Weber had not considered going independent. His reasoning was: “Paris alone has countless fragrance brands. Why should I do the same thing?” He felt that merely talking about roses and jasmine from France or Grasse would not bring a “new wave” to the industry.

A Fateful Encounter with Australia

The turning point came in the form of a business trip. At the Paris office of the company where he then worked, a situation arose: “We want to hold a PR event in Australia, but no one wants to go.” While others shied away because it was “too far,” Weber volunteered.

“No one from the Paris office wanted to go, so I decided to take it on. In the world of luxury fragrance, Australia’s plants and ingredients are well known. All the sandalwood used in luxury perfumes comes from Western Australia, whether it’s Dior, Chanel, Hermès, or Goldfield.”
— Dimitri Weber

The journey did not end as a mere business trip. Weber fell in love with Australia. His relationship with an Australian partner whom he met soon afterward became the decisive reason for moving. In 2014, as he approached 40, he left behind a stable European career and relocated permanently to Australia.

Founding a Perfume House on “Barren Ground”

After moving, Weber was astonished. Despite its favorable climate and fertile land, and its wealth of unusual botanical ingredients quietly prized by the world’s luxury perfume industry, he could see no luxury perfume house conveying that abundance. There were skincare and body-care brands such as Aesop and Jurlique, but he felt there was room for the kind of fully fledged house he envisioned, with Australian botanical materials in the starring role.

The problem was not a lack of ingredients, but a lack of technique and know-how. If that was so, Weber was convinced he could bridge the gap. He would create a “hybrid house,” making the most of Australian ingredients while drawing on at least 30 years of knowledge and contacts in the perfumery industry cultivated in France. This was the starting point for Goldfield & Banks.

The brand officially launched in 2016.

The Story Behind the Name

The brand name consists of two words.

“Goldfield” comes from the Australian legend that “sandalwood grows where gold lies buried,” while also evoking “fertile land.” For Weber, Australia was quite literally a land with “gold” in the form of fragrance ingredients beneath its surface.

“Banks” pays tribute to the eighteenth-century botanist and explorer Sir Joseph Banks (1743–1820). Banks sailed aboard Captain James Cook’s HMB Endeavour and landed at Botany Bay, Australia, in 1770, recording many plants previously unknown to European science. The genus Banksia was also named in honor of his achievements. Comparing himself to an “explorer,” Weber says he wants to share with the world, through perfume, the “excitement of encountering an unknown abundance” that Banks must have felt.

“I connected with Banks’s spirit. When I first visited Australia, I too experienced the excitement he must have felt on arriving here, although in my case it was excitement about the scents of this land.”
— Dimitri Weber

The serrated, scalloped design on the bottle labels is also based on the leaves of banksia, a plant Banks discovered and recorded. From the brand name to the packaging design, Joseph Banks’s spirit of exploration runs through everything like a single thread.

What Defines the Brand

The Philosophy of Scent: “A Journey Beginning with One Ingredient”

The creation of a Goldfield & Banks perfume always begins with a material native to Australia. Weber examines individual raw-material samples sent from Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific islands. When one strikes him as “the one,” he sends it to perfumers in Paris or Dubai to explore its potential. Sometimes, a particular Australian “place,” rather than an ingredient, is the first source of inspiration.

“My starting point when creating a perfume is always the material. The days of French perfumers talking endlessly about roses and jasmine are over. Australia’s native plants have far more beautiful stories to tell.”
— Dimitri Weber

The fragrances are characterized by high fragrance concentrations of at least 20%, in pursuit of depth and longevity. Accounts of the early production arrangements have described collaborations with Swiss fragrance company Firmenich and Australian Botanical Products in Melbourne.

A Commitment to Unusual Ingredients

The Australian ingredients used by Goldfield & Banks include many materials that have rarely appeared in modern perfumery.

Australian sandalwood: From Western Australia. Also used by Dior, Chanel, and Hermès, though its place of origin was little known around the world. The house also uses wild sandalwood obtained through partnerships with Aboriginal people.
Agarwood (oud): A 100% organic material grown in tropical Queensland. Goldfield & Banks has an exclusive worldwide supply arrangement for the agarwood used in Silky Woods, which can cost as much as AUD 100,000 per liter.
Boronia (brown boronia): An extremely rare flower that blooms for just a few weeks in September on Bruny Island, off Tasmania’s southern tip. It is said to take as many as 12.5 million flowers to obtain one liter of absolute. This costly material is equivalent to approximately JPY 3 million per kilogram.
Buddhawood: A material said to have been used by Aboriginal people for around 1,000 years. Although it had been used in skincare, Weber says Goldfield & Banks was the first to use it in perfume.
Kunzea: Grown by Bush Pharmacy on Flinders Island near Tasmania, an island Weber described in an interview as having a population of around 500. Its aromatic constituents give it a grassy freshness that suggests restoration and vitality.

Bottle and Packaging Design

The design concept is simple. Weber’s wish to “make the ingredient itself the star” is reflected throughout the packaging. Each fragrance liquid is tinted in a different signature color, producing vivid contrasts when the bottles are placed side by side.

The outer boxes use a deep, dark shade inspired by the “blackness of the night sky.” The bottle labels bear a distinctive serrated design based on banksia leaves, and the caps are engraved with a “heritage stamp.”

The Silky Woods bottle has a special gold finish, created by sandblasting it with a powder containing 24-karat gold. Its radiance visually embodies the value of agarwood.

Sustainability and Ethical Sourcing

Since its founding in 2016, Goldfield & Banks has emphasized long-term relationships with growers and distillers, ensuring full traceability from the field through extraction to the final blend. Most of its fragrances have vegan formulas, and the brand states that it is cruelty-free, with no animal testing, and complies with International Fragrance Association (IFRA) standards. Silky Woods and Velvet Splendour are exceptions to the vegan claim because they contain organic beeswax. Organic beetroot-derived alcohol is used as the solvent, a clean source of alcohol recognized as a pioneering initiative within the industry.

The Fragrance Lineup

At present, all Goldfield & Banks fragrances fall broadly into two collections.

The Native Collection

A collection in which a plant ingredient indigenous to Australia plays the “starring role” in each fragrance. Deserts, rainforests, coastlines, islands: Australia’s diverse landscapes are distilled into individual bottles. Representative fragrances include the following.

White Sandalwood: An exotic, enveloping fragrance centered on the silky creaminess of Western Australian sandalwood.
Pacific Rock Moss: An aquatic fragrance inspired by Australia’s rocky coastline. One of the house’s most popular fragrances worldwide.
Blue Cypress: A smoky, woody creation using blue cypress essential oil.
Wood Infusion: A rich woody fragrance layering several wood essences.
Desert Rosewood: Its principal material, buddhawood, is a rare ingredient absent from most other perfumes, interpreted here in a distinctive way by perfumer François Merle-Baudoin. In a November 2023 interview with The Luxe Review, Weber himself described it as “the perfume I loved most for a long time.”
Southern Bloom: A rich floral fragrance built around an absolute of boronia, which blooms only in September on Tasmania’s Bruny Island. It won silver for Best Niche Fragrance at the 2019 Pure Beauty Awards.
Bohemian Lime: A fresh, invigorating citrus fragrance using Australian finger lime. It was selected as a finalist in the 2021 Belgian Beauty Awards.
Sunset Hour: Its fruity, warm scent places it among the house’s leading favorites worldwide. Weber says that Sunset Hour, Silky Woods, Bohemian Lime, and Pacific Rock Moss also rank among the most popular in Japan.
Ingenious Ginger: A fragrance Weber describes as “the first perfume I made entirely for myself,” composed of Australian ginger accord, Italian bergamot, lemon, Australian sandalwood, amber, and other notes.
Mystic Bliss: A powdery, woody fragrance starring kunzea essential oil from Flinders Island. The perfumer is Florian Gallo of Firmenich.

The Botanical Series

A series built around the concept of “plants from around the world grown in Australia’s rich soil and elevated into perfume through French perfumery techniques.” Inspired by Joseph Banks’s voyage of 1770, every fragrance embodies a spirit of exploration and discovery.

Silky Woods: An opulent fragrance built around an exclusive worldwide supply of Australian agarwood. Its bottle, finished with 24-karat-gold sandblasting, is visually striking as well.
Purple Suede: A contemporary floral-woody fragrance using Tasmanian lavender. Weber has described it as his “all-time favorite in the collection.”
Island Lush: A woody-spicy fragrance centered on South Pacific sandalwood, intertwined with nutmeg, ginger, guaiac wood, vetiver, and agarwood.
Tales of Amber and Rose Magnitude, among others, also belong to this series.

The World of Fragrance in “Three Stages”

Goldfield & Banks calls each fragrance’s top notes “Sunrise,” its heart notes “Summit,” and its base notes “Sunset.” This overlays the passing hours of a fragrance with scenes from an Australian day, from the clear air of dawn through the dazzling peak of the afternoon to the soft afterglow of twilight. It is a storytelling approach unique to the brand, reinterpreting the traditional French fragrance pyramid through an Australian view of nature.

By the Way…

Beyond his own brand, Weber loves the “classics.” He names Féminité du Bois by Serge Lutens, the original formula of Guerlain’s Shalimar, and the original formula of Chanel’s Coco Extrait as his favorite perfumes outside the collection, eloquently illustrating the importance of a perfume’s formula.

Weber himself has named fragrance influencer Demi Rawling as someone who helped raise the brand’s early profile. This story of social-media word of mouth contributing to the brand’s global expansion could be seen as one example of the “influencer economy” in today’s niche-fragrance market.

Bush Pharmacy on Flinders Island, which supplies the kunzea essential oil, is a family-run farm taken over by Ben Backhaus, son of its late founder Steve Backhaus. “My father was born in Germany, celebrated Australian ingredients, and understood how much export markets valued them. Spending time with Dimitri brought back fond memories of him,” Ben says. The human bonds nurtured between growers and brand add another dimension of richness to its fragrances.

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