Zoologist: An Animal Kingdom from Independent Perfumery’s Frédéric Malle

“At the time, I was deeply dissatisfied with my career. I felt very anxious and frustrated. Perhaps it was what people call a midlife crisis. Everything was based on gut feeling.”

— Victor Wong, founder of Zoologist Perfumes​

Basic Information

Founded: 2013, with the first releases in 2014
Founder: Victor Wong
Headquarters: Toronto, Canada
Official website: zoologistperfumes.com

The Founder and the Brand’s Origins

Music Heard at Primary School in Hong Kong

Unexpectedly, the seeds of Victor Wong’s passion for perfume were planted in a music lesson. At his primary school in Hong Kong, he heard The Carnival of the Animals by French composer Camille Saint-Saëns. Depicting fourteen animals in sound, including lions, elephants, cuckoos, and swans, the suite impressed on the young Wong a sense of animals as a source of creative expression.​

Wong later moved to Toronto, Canada, where he became a 3D modeler in video-game development. Beneath it all, however, there remained a deep affinity with animals and a longing for creative expression.

A Hotel Stay That Changed Everything

The immediate catalyst for the brand was an experience in a hotel. Wong tried the Le Labo Rose 31 hand lotion provided in his room and was astonished by its scent.

“It was completely different from the scent I expected from hotel toiletries. Rather than the usual clean, fresh smell, it was rich, floral, and complex. I even wondered whether it was too feminine to wear outside. Little did I know that this was the entrance to the rabbit hole of niche perfumery.”

— Victor Wong​

The experience rapidly drew him into the world of niche fragrance. Then, in 2013, feeling profoundly stuck in his job at a gaming company, Wong made a decision.

A Single Basenotes.net Post Changed the Story

Driven by dissatisfaction with work and a desire to create, Wong decided to start a project of his own. He had no industry connections, entrepreneurial experience, business strategy, or market research.​

His first step was a single post on the fragrance enthusiasts’ online forum Basenotes.net. He asked whether any perfumers would help him develop scents for a brand he wanted to launch. Two independent perfumers replied, and the Zoologist story began.​

“I had no industry connections, experience as an entrepreneur, business strategy, or market research. Everything was based on gut feeling. I posted on the Basenotes.net forum asking whether any perfumers could help me make perfumes, and two independent perfumers responded. The rest is history.”

— Victor Wong​

An Unexpected Advantage from the Games Industry

His career as a 3D modeler proved unexpectedly useful in running a perfume brand. Working in a game studio had given him a direct understanding of product development: what might sell, what might not, and whether to take risks and break conventions. It also taught him practical product branding through packaging, marketing copy, and social media. Former colleagues helped illustrate his bottle labels, bringing old friendships into the brand’s beginnings.​

From Hobby to Full-Time Work

For the first few years, Wong kept his job in the games industry, spending evenings after work packing orders and developing the next fragrance. In 2014, the year the brand was born, its first three releases were Beaver, a leathery fragrance by Chris Bartlett; Rhinoceros by Paul Kiler; and Panda, also by Paul Kiler.

Only five bottles sold in the first year. Today, the brand sells around twenty thousand bottles annually and supplies fifty-four shops in at least twenty-five countries. As the company grew, Wong eventually left his job to devote himself to Zoologist.

The Brand’s Commitments

Choosing Only Storytellers

Central to Zoologist’s approach is Wong’s decision not to employ a dedicated in-house perfumer. Instead, he collaborates with different independent perfumers and accomplished classically trained perfumers from around the world, carefully matching each individual’s personality to the animal they will interpret.

“I look for perfumers who are storytellers: people who can create visual images through scent, and who are willing to add something unusual to a formula, even at the expense of wearability.”

— Victor Wong​

For example, a perfumer known for highly unconventional fragrances might be assigned a less familiar animal or a challenging concept. Someone who makes beautiful, classical fragrances might be given an animal associated with elegance. This skillful casting brings consistency and diversity to the collection at the same time.​

The story of Thai perfumer Prin Lomros, who one day tracked down Wong’s address and mailed him around fifteen prototypes, vividly illustrates perfumers’ enthusiasm for the brand.

An Ethical Approach to Making Fragrance

Although its perfumes are inspired by animals, the brand uses no animal-derived ingredients whatsoever. Its official website states:​

“Our products contain no natural animal-derived musks. For ethical reasons, we replace them with synthetics. There is no need to harm animals so that we can smell good.”

— Zoologist Perfumes official website

Animalic notes such as musk, civet, derived from civet cats, and castoreum, derived from beavers, are all expressed through ethical synthetic materials. Respect for the animal world is embodied in the products themselves.

A Fragrance Philosophy with Two Approaches

Wong describes two approaches to developing fragrances. One emphasizes animalic notes associated with the animal itself, such as castoreum in Beaver. The other takes inspiration from its habitat or surroundings, such as the cave air in Bat. Sometimes, as with Macaque, he translates into scent the meditative mood an animal evokes in people. This multifaceted approach gives the collection considerable depth.​

Bottle and Packaging Design

Zoologist’s bottles feature distinctive illustrations by staff artist Daisy Chan. Animals dressed in tailcoats or Victorian royal attire appear on substantial glass bottles, finished with leather-covered caps and gold rims. The fragrance descriptions read like passages from nature documentaries or imagined stories sent from the animals’ habitats.

The brand’s dislike of excessive packaging is another characteristic. Wong himself has described the proliferation of faux-leather boxes nested inside more faux-leather boxes as the thing he dislikes most about the perfume industry.​

The Fragrance Range

As of March 2026, Zoologist has released at least forty fragrances in total. Introducing every one would be impossible here, but the following overview presents the collection’s structure and representative compositions.​

Challenging, Distinctive Fragrances

Bat was created by Ellen Covey in 2015 and revised by Prin Lomros in 2020. Set in a Jamaican cave, its uncanny combination of damp earth, minerals, and fruit became a calling card for the brand. It won in the Independent category at the 2016 Art and Olfaction Awards.

Squid was created by Céline Barel. The melancholy of black ink, salty sea air, incense, and ambergris form an elegy to the deep sea. It won the Fragrance Foundation’s 2020 Perfume Extraordinaire of the Year award, ahead of fragrances including Le Labo Tabac 28, Comme des Garçons Copper, and Frédéric Malle Rose & Cuir.

Tyrannosaurus Rex was created by Antonio Gardoni. An intensely smoldering fragrance, it evokes a dinosaur striding through volcanic smoke.​

Wearable Yet Artistic Fragrances

Hummingbird was created by Shelley Waddington. The nectar of brilliant flowers visited by hovering hummingbirds intertwines with honeysuckle, mimosa, peony, fruit, and airy cream. In 2020, Fragrantica selected it as one of the Best Indie/Niche Perfumes of the Last Decade.

Harvest Mouse was created by Luca Maffei. Alongside Panda, Penguin, and Rabbit, it is a popular, wearable fragrance that ranks among the brand’s bestsellers.​

Other Distinctive Compositions

Macaque by Sarah McCartney is a meditative composition set in Japan’s snow-covered mountains. Nightingale was created by Japanese perfumer Tomoo Inaba. In 2024, the range expanded with King Cobra, by Prin Lomros, and Rabbit, by Fanny Bal.

Challenging fragrances inspired by dangerous and unusual animals are planned for release in 2025: Orchid Mantis by Tomoo Inaba and Portuguese Man O’ War by Antoine Lie.

By the Way…

• Sergey Borisov, co-founder of the prominent perfume-review website Fragrantica, once offered this assessment: “When I look at Victor Wong, I think he is to independent perfumers what Frédéric Malle is to master perfumers.” It aptly captures Zoologist’s role as a place for experimentation by accomplished perfumers from around the world.​
• There is also the story of The New York Times featuring Zoologist in an article about animalic fragrances, whose author subsequently won an award for the piece.​
• Wong says his earliest scent memory is his father’s hair gel. Asked about his own perfume style, he replied that almost all his fragrances contain musk.​

“Zoologist will probably end when I retire.”

— Victor Wong