LOOKING GOOD
Fluid
FRAGRANCE Perfume is rediscovering its gender-neutral roots By Adriana Ermter
MAY / JUNE 2021
Brigitte Bardot wore Jicky perfume exclusively. It was her signature scent. Sean Connery’s too (at least, if Hollywood rumours are true). Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Roger Moore and Joan Collins are also said to have favoured the now-iconic Guerlain eau. It’s easy to understand why. Overflowing with sharp vetiver, earthy lavender, sweet bergamot, spicy vanilla and warm amber, the French classic is neither too feminine nor overtly masculine. It is simply wondrous, a sensual and assertive spritz worn by women and men equally – just like it was intended to.
each year, and Jicky remains a staple on retail countertops. Its gender-fluid status is a reminder that unisex perfumes are not a blip on trend’s radar but rather the original construct of perfumery. According to Mintel, a global market research and intelligence agency, in 2010 gender-neutral scents held only 17 per cent of the fragrance industry worldwide. By 2018, the category had catapulted to 51 per cent of the US$20.75 billion market, and it continues to grow. Beauty industry magazine Cosmetics Business credits millennials and their desire for transparency in beauty and grooming products, combined with their need for universality, for the forward propulsion of gender-fluid eaus. This cultural shift has caught on, with consumers rethinking the way they wear fragrance. As more men and women spritz outside of the 20th century’s gendersegregated box, Statista, a global provider of market and consumer data, predicts that the global fragrance industry’s current worth of $45.5 billion will explode. And gender-free perfumes will play a large role in that growing revenue.
Reportedly named after perfumer Aimé Guerlain’s schoolgirl crush, Jicky’s label featured just four words: Parfum, Jicky, Guerlain, Paris. No Pour L’Homme or Pour Femme. Born in 1889 – the year the Eiffel Tower opened, the Canadian Pacific Railway was completed, Blanche Bingley-Hillyard outplayed Lean Rice at Wimbledon and Moulin Rouge launched in Paris – Jicky was free of gender assignment. Back then, fragrance categorization was straightforward, determined by the floral, spicy, herbal, woody, animalic or other notes swirling inside each glass flacon. If you liked what you smelled, you bought the bottle. Jicky was an immediate success. “Unisex scents are becoming more popular because they reflect a major shift in our society,” says Sophie Vann Guillon, CEO of “Lest anyone think that unisex perfumes are a modern invention,” Valmont Cosmetics in Morges, Switzerland. “Gender does not have explains Luca Turin in his book Perfumes The Guide, “[Jicky] the same meaning nor societal understanding as before: look at was worn by both women and men 10 years before an electric social movements, new linguistic codes, fashion trends.… These car, the Jamais Contente, broke the world speed record and hit influences logically impact the world of fragrances, where no gender 100 km per hour.” is interesting but only emotions are the new rule.” Fast-forward 132 years to an industry that currently pumps out approximately 400 new fragrances for women and men globally 6
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