Maison Martin Margiela to Develop a Line of Perfumes with L'Oréal {Fragrance News}

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Antwerp-based fashion designer Martin Margiela of Maison Martin Margiela has announced the signature of a partnership agreement with l'Oréal Luxury Products Division to create a line of perfumes,

"This agreement expresses their shared wish to combine their expertise and reflect the unconventional and innovative world of Maison Martin Margiela through a perfume."......
(image is from Maison Martin Margiela and chosen by the brand to illustrate the news)

Margiella is known for his anti-fame, no-logo stand, preferring to self-efface behind his house. You can read a short bio about him here. One can only note that is interesting to see an a priori prime candidate for a fragrance development project on a smaller scale with a niche perfume house turn instead to l'Oréal or rather see l'Oréal getting all enthusiastic about such an arty partnership. We always thought the two worlds are rather superficially divided, i.e., the mainstream perfumes vs. the niche ones, but there is so much hoopla about niche perfumes that they tend to become essentialized in people's perceptions.

From the press release (via The Fashion Spot),

"Maison Martin Margiela, avant-garde expertise:
Graduating from the Académie Royale d’Anvers in 1979, Martin Margiela joined Jean-Paul Gaultier’s team before founding Maison Martin Margiela in 1988. At the same time, Hermès entrusted him with the artistic direction of its collections from 1999 to 2004.

In 2002, Renzo Rosso, President of the Only The Brave Group joined forces with him becoming a majority shareholder in the House. Today, Maison Martin Margiela is structured around 32 single brand sales outlets and more than 500 multi-brand stores across five continents. In 6 years, their turnover has increased fourfold.

Often characterised as iconoclastic and experimentalist, Maison Martin Margiela bases its creative expression on recycling, transformation and reinterpretation: an emotion, a unique and timeless proposition which challenges shapes and rules.

White, a symbol of simplicity and purity, unifies all the premises and items belonging to the House; it has become its most obvious visual identity, just as anonymity has become its signature.

“In our constant search for new forms of expression and creation,the desire to design a perfume appeared obvious. This perfume must be in our image, an elixir of all that we are and are fond of. The L’Oréal teams give us the human support and skills necessary to launch us on this adventure, while respecting our history, identity and values. This partnership is also a union between two worlds which mutually complement, support, nurture and inspire.” Maison Martin Margiela.

An unconventional perfume expression:
For Patricia Turck Paquelier, President of Prestige and Collections International within L’Oréal’s Luxury Products Division, “By pre-empting the ‘No Logo’ domain, for more than 20 years Maison Martin Margiela has opened up a novel channel in the luxury market with its discrete label with four stitches.

This signature scent will inspire radical new perspectives for perfumes with a more personal approach, following the success of the brands with star logos. A requirement for the thousands of people world wide searching for unostentatious luxury.

As always with Maison Martin Margiela, we will explore new areas with them for an unconventional expression of their perfumes. This will also be a collective story, conducted by men and women who share values such as excellence in quality and their teamwork with L’Oréal.”