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Jean-Claude Ellena | |
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| Born | 1947 (age 76–77) Grasse, France |
| Education | Givaudan |
| Occupation(s) | Perfumer, writer |
| Years active | 1976 to present |
| Known for | Inhouse-Perfumer of Hermes (2004-2019) |
Jean-Claude Ellena (born 1947) is a French perfumer and writer. He served as the in-house perfumer at Hermes from 2004 and 2016, prior to the appointment of incumbent Christine Nagel.
At an early age, Ellena picked jasmine with his grandmother in Grasse to sell to perfumers. Beginning with menial jobs, he became an apprentice at the factory of the essential oils maker Antoine Chiris in Grasse at the age 16 working on the night shift. He has reminisced, "Among other essential oils, we made a lot of oakmoss, and after I’d put the distiller on, I’d lie down on a bed of it and sleep". [1]
In 1968, he became the first student at what was at the time the newly formed perfumery school of Givaudan, one of the oldest perfume factories, in Geneva, Switzerland. He left Givaudan in 1976 with two others perfumers for Lautier in Grasse. In 1983, he joined Givaudan Paris as chief perfumer and Roure-Givandan and then he worked at Haarmaan & Reimer in Paris (which merged in 2003 with Dragoco to form Symrise). In 1990, he became one of the founding members of the Osmothèque, an international scent archive based in Versailles. [2]
Ellena has been profoundly influenced by pioneering perfumer Edmond Roudnitska, particularly by his article, "Advice to a Young Perfumer", in a magazine given to him by his father. [3]
Between 2004 and 2016 he was Hermès's exclusive in-house perfumer, [4] appointed by Jean-Louis Dumas and Véronique Gautier. He has created fragrances for several major perfume houses including The Different Company, which he founded before joining Hermès. His daughter Céline Ellena now creates for The Different Company.
In 2005, Ellena created Un Jardin sur le Nil for Hermès. The story behind the creation of this fragrance was the subject of the book The Perfect Scent: A Year in the Perfume Industry in Paris and New York by Chandler Burr. [5] In addition, the story in a limited form and accounts of other scents as well as his autobiography has been published in Perfume: The Alchemy of Scent. He is also a writer of "The Diary of a Nose: A Year in the Life of a Parfumeur."
Since 2019, Jean Claude Ellena became the exclusive Olfactory Creation Director of Le Couvent – Maison de Parfum, stating:
Creating a Singular Haute Parfumerie accessible to all, working with beautiful materials and noble essences, is what seduced me at the Couvent. This vision of the extraordinary perfume that we share. A new approach, different from what we generally find.
Ellena left Hermes in 2016, and Swiss-born chemist and perfumer Christine Nagel replaced him as Hermes in-house perfumer. [6] Ellena's final fragrances for Hermes were Eau de Néroli Doré and Hermèssence Muguet Porcelaine.
In 2018 Ellena worked with the House of Houbigant, to recreate Essence Rare, a fragrance he had first signed in 1973, his first assignment as a young perfumer in New York. [7]
Ellena returned to creating for Editions de Parfum Frederic Malle, his latest work, "Rose & Cuir," debuting in September 2019. [8] He also became the olfactive director of the brand Le Couvent des Minimes. [9]
In 2019 Ellena also started an ongoing collaboration with Perris Monte Carlo, for whom he has created the Collection de Grasse, [10] an exclusive fragrance collection paying tribute to the history and unique craftmanship of the art of perfumery in Pays de Grasse.
Since 2019, Jean Claude Ellena is the Olfactory creation director of Le Couvent – Maison de Parfum. he created for and with Le Couvent a contemporary Haute Parfumerie rich and unique, luxurious and accessible, made from of noble and rare natural materials, 100% vegan: « Creating a Singular Haute Parfumerie accessible to all, working with beautiful materials and noble essences, is what seduced me at the Couvent. This vision of the extraordinary perfume that we share. A new approach, different from what we generally find. » J.C. Ellena
Ellena's father, brother, and daughter Celine are also perfumers. [3] Known for his signature white shirts, Ellena himself never wears perfume or cologne. His daughter Celine designed the Hermès Home Fragrance Collection.
Grasse is the only subprefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region on the French Riviera. In 2017, the commune had a population of 50,396.
Hermès International S.A. is a French luxury design house established on 15 June 1837. It specializes in leather goods, lifestyle accessories, home furnishings, perfumery, jewelry, watches and ready-to-wear. Since the 1950s, its logo has been a depiction of a ducal horse-drawn carriage.
Maurice Roucel is a French perfumer who has worked at the companies IFF, Quest, Dragoco and presently Symrise. Roucel began his career in perfumery on February 19, 1973, while working as the head chromatography chemist at Chanel for 6 years. He commenced his apprenticeship under Henri Robert, Chanel's house perfumer at the time. He joined Quest International and for 12 years developed his craft as a perfumer before switching to work for Symrise in 1996. Most of the fragrances composed by Roucel have his signature scent of Michelia longifolia.
Edmond Roudnitska (1905–1996) was a French master perfumer and author. He is known for creating perfumes such as Dior's Eau Sauvage and Diorissimo, and Rochas's Femme. Many of his creations are still in production. He was the father of perfumer Michel Roudnitska.
Chypre is the name of a family of perfumes that are characterised by an accord composed of citrus top notes, a middle centered on cistus labdanum, and a mossy-animalic set of basenotes derived from oakmoss. Chypre perfumes fall into numerous classes according to their modifier notes, which include but are not limited to leather, florals, fruits, and amber.
Bertrand Duchaufour is a French perfumer. He has had a prolific career, beginning in Grasse at Lautier Florasynth and continuing for a number of fragragrance firms as well as working independently and as the house perfumer for L'Artisan Parfumeur. He has drawn praise for niche perfume creations as well as mainstream hits.
Fougère, pronounced[fu.ʒɛʁ], is one of the main olfactive families of perfumes. The name comes from the French language word for "fern". Fougère perfumes are made with a blend of fragrances: top-notes are sweet, with the scent of lavender flowers; as the more volatile components evaporate, the scents of oakmoss, derived from a species of lichen and described as woody, sharp and slightly sweet, and coumarin, similar to the scent of new-mown hay, become noticeable. Aromatic fougère, a derivative of this class, contains additional notes of herbs, spice and/or wood.
Henri Alméras was a French perfumer, author, and painter.
Paul Parquet (1856–1916) was a French perfumer and joint owner of Houbigant. Called the "greatest perfumer of his time" by Ernest Beaux, he is widely regarded as the founder of modern perfumery for having pioneered the use of synthetics in works such as Fougère Royale. His bestselling perfume, Le Parfum Idéal, was described by Robert Bienaimé as a “masterpiece of fragrant equilibrium, harmonious and of good taste as shall never be surpassed”.
Francis Kurkdjian is a French perfumer and businessman of Armenian descent. He is best known for creating the men's fragrance Le Male for Jean Paul Gaultier in 1995, which has become one of the world's best-selling perfumes. He has since created a further 40 fragrances for major companies worldwide, including Elie Saab Le Parfum for Elie Saab; My Burberry for Burberry; L'extase for Nina Ricci; and Narciso Rodriguez for Her for Narciso Rodriguez, Green Tea for Elizabeth Arden.
The Osmothèque is the world's largest scent archive, a leading international research institution tracing the history of perfumery, based in Versailles with conference centers in New York City and Paris. Founded in 1990 by Jean Kerléo and other senior perfumers including Jean-Claude Ellena and Guy Robert, the Osmothèque is internationally responsible for the authentication, registration, preservation, documentation and reproduction of thousands of perfumes gathered from the past two millennia, archived at the Osmothèque repository and consultable by the public.
Jacques Cavallier-Belletrud is a French perfumer formerly with the Swiss fragrance and flavor company Firmenich, who currently works for Louis Vuitton of the LVMH Luxury Group.
Terre d'Hermès is a fragrance launched by French luxury brand Hermès in March 2006. It was created by Jean-Claude Ellena, who was the exclusive in-house perfumier of Hermès.
Pierre 'Frédéric' Serge Louis Jacques Malle is a French businessman, author and 'Editeur de Parfums' who founded the perfume house Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle in 2000.
Yuri Gutsatz,, was a perfumer. He emigrated to Berlin in 1924 and then to Paris in 1933 where he worked for the Parfums de Mury. After the Second World War, he was hired by Louis Amic at Roure Bertrand Fils and Justin Dupont. As a perfumer, he created many perfumes like Carven Chasse Gardée in 1950. and PM of Mary Quant. He participated in perfume projects for Ungaro and Estee Lauder as well as for Cartier, Dior and Van Cleef & Arpels. On December 12, 1975, he registered the trademark Le Jardin Retrouve and founded the first niche perfume house, a few months before the I'Artisan Parfumeur (1976). Yuri Gutsatz was also a perfume critic and vice president of the Société Française des Parfumeurs, and one of the founders of Osmothèque- the perfume conservatory-, in 1990 with Jean Kerleo.
The Grand Musée du Parfum was a Paris perfumery museum that operated from December 22nd, 2016, to July 6th, 2018.
François Demachy is a French perfumer. He trained at Charabot. He was succeeded as Dior's House Perfumer by Francis Kurkdjian, but he remained a perfumer under the LVMH umbrella brands.
Un Jardin sur le Nil is a 2005 perfume created by perfumer Jean-Claude Ellena for Hermès. A unisex eau de toilette, the scent was inspired by the green mangoes Ellena smelled while walking through a grove of mangoes during a visit to the Nile.
Christine Nagel is a Swiss perfumer. She has served as the in-house perfumer at Hermès since 2016. Prior to joining Hermès she created designer perfume hits like Narciso Rodriguez for Her and Miss Dior Chérie (2005), as well as niche perfume like Wood Sage & Sea Salt, one of 47 perfumes she created for Jo Malone London. She has been recognized with awards from the Fragrance Foundation France, the François Coty Foundation, and the Marie Claire International Fragrance Awards.
Miss Dior Chérie was a fragrance created by Christine Nagel for Christian Dior. At the time John Galliano served as Dior’s fashion designer and creative director, overseeing Nagel’s development of the unusual, youth-oriented strawberry-and-popcorn eau de parfum. Miss Dior Chérie was available from 2005 to 2011: after perfumer François Demachy joined Dior, Miss Dior Chérie was reformulated and renamed Miss Dior.
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