Cofinluxe

Cofinluxe: The Art of Fragrance

The relatively small perfumer, Cofinluxe, views its work as fine art. It sets to encapsulate more than just a simple emotion or impulse into their fragrances. Instead, it seeks to build everyday experiences, or extraordinary experiences, into one complex scent. Often, one fragrance will have several variations, showing the work from different angles.

Artistry

Jean-Pierre Grivory certainly sees himself and the perfumers of his company as artists. He created his company in 1976, then called Cofci. The name did not become Cofinluxe for more than 20 years, in 1998. The house creates its own unique brands, Watt and Café, but it also creates artist-based fragrances under licence, like Warhol, Dali, and Morgan de Toi.

Usually, perfume is linked to fashion, which is an art of its own. Sometimes, it is linked to jewelry, or to celebrity. Rarely does anyone link it to visual works of art or to experience, as Cofinluxe has done. Fragrance are often said to be composed of notes, like a symphony. To Jean-Pierre Grivory, it is more like a painting, the blending together of colors on a canvas. The final result is a force that affects everyone who experiences a little differently, but always makes those who sense it feel something new.

Because of this viewpoint, perfumery at Cofinluxe is both an art and a science. There is certainly skill and hard work involved, but there are equal levels of intuition and creativity. This creates a unique creation process involving the abilities of a master crafter, the innovation of a virtuoso, and a sense of the world in which everyone lives.

This marriage of art and fragrance are the inspiration behind Cofinluxe. The founder of the company, Jean-Pierre Grivory, is about more than just fragrance. Jewelry, painting, fashion, and watchmaking are all interests, all of them equally artistic endeavors in his mind.

Cofinluxe gained the license to create Parfums Salvador Dali in 1983, the first perfume based purely upon art. These perfumes are made to evoke the same sensations as the work of the master of surrealism. There is truly nothing like these fragrances in the world.

Soon, the company gained licenses for Charriol, the watch and jewelry maker. Parfums Charriol are strong yet beautiful, intricately woven, bright and sparkling, just like one of Charriol’s creations.

On its own, Cofinluxe created two concept brands: Parfums Barthet, based on the life of the designer Alexandre Barthet. These are celebratory and luxurious scents, perfect for young women. The second is Parfums Love Love de Toi, which are for younger girls, sweet, cool, and fun.

The largest lines of Cofinluxe fragrances come from their brands that represent everyday life: These are Café, The, Taxi, and Watt. To Jean-Pierre Grivory, fragrances to be easily available to everyone, simple enough to be understood, but complex enough to remain interesting.

Taxi is 21st century perfume for the modern urban man. It defies easy description, straddling the lines of contemporary and classic to create something wholly its own. This fragrance contains notes of bergamot, star anise, sandalwood, nutmeg, musk, and ambergris.

The Watt line is all about currents of energy and light. They come in bottles shaped like light bulbs, and each fragrance is coded by color.

Watt Blue is a man’s scent, contemporary and alive. It contains notes of oak moss, rosemary, mint, cedar, sandalwood, and bergamot.

Watt Mauve is a deep refreshing fragrance, composed from violet, lemon, patchouli, jasmine, and vanilla.

Watt Pink is delicate and delightfully feminine, floral and fruity. It is composed from hyacinth, peach, rose, violet, and apricot.

There are several more Watt offerings, each of them with their own personality, for different people, or even just for different moods or situations in one person.

Café is one of the earlier perfume lines from Cofinluxe. The original was a subtle cosmopolitan fragrance, exotic and familiar all at once. It is spiced with rosemary, and softened with warm amber, perfect for evenings out.

Art for Everyone

The goal of Cofinluxe is to make art of any kind accessible to more people, whether through fragrance, through jewelry, or through more traditional modes of artistic expression. The company does a lot of work to encourage the fostering of talent and bring a greater awareness to the world of art.

Cofinluxe is known as a great sponsor of the arts, promoting such events as the Film Festival of Paris, the Academie des Beaux Arts Award, and other artistic endeavors. It also sponsors perhaps the most famous art museum in the world – the Louvre.

In essence, it is the mission of Cofinluxe to make the world a more beautiful place. Few can claim to have done better work in that regard than them.