KACHEN #21 (Winter 2019) English edition

MADE IN LUXEMBOURG
THE FRAGRANCE
OF VIRGINIE
© VITO LABALESTRA
© VIRGINIE DEPOORTER
MORE INFOS
ateliervirginie-luxembourg.com
Atelier Virginie
... and for a visit in the workshop, contact:
contact@atelier-virginie.lu
In German there is a saying, in which being able to "smell"
someone ("sich-riechen-können") means being able to get
along. Stepping into a shop, hotel, or restaurant we make
instant decisions whether or not we like a place based not
only on what we see but what we can smell. All this means
that if you have an educated nose, besides talent of course,
as Virginie Depoorter possesses, you can aim to pamper
and delight people’s olfactory senses.
The Frenchwoman, from Châteauroux in the Indre
department, has dedicated one of her series to her
chosen home and its scents: "Bambësch" for example
smells of a walk in the woods, "Schueberfouer" of fun
fair sweetmeats, and "An de Wéngerten" envelops every
room with the vibe of Mosel vineyards. In her workshop
Atelier Virginie Luxembourg in Helmsange, which
belongs to the commune of Walferdange, Virginie creates
her products by hand according to the motto: "quality not
quantity". Once the candles have burnt down, the artisan
offers a refill. This means that the beautifully scented
treasures for your home are even more sustainable than
their composition of glass and natural ingredients already
makes them.
Her passion for scents and the business idea based on
this developed a few years ago from a not so positive
experience. An operation on her hand when she was fifty
meant she could not continue the work in her workshop,
which she had established in 2002. At that time she
specialised in making hand lanterns, which she decorated
with a creative kind of tissue decoupage on glass, and
later focussed on the designing of jewellery, which she
made from precious metals and decorated not only with
jewels but also with fabrics. But after her operation she
had to take a break and was forced to rethink her work…
14
TEXT Jessika Maria Rauch
Without further ado, her friends gifted her a perfume
course in Grasse. It soon became clear that this change
boded well and Virginie’s hand-poured candles, refined
with natural scents, quickly found fans. The new line of
business developed fast and so she now sells her special
gift and decorative items "made in Luxembourg" in many
places in the country, such as the Luxembourg House,
Atelier Veraille in Esch, Pall Center Oberpallen, Lucien
Schweizer, and Couturier Ezri Kahn. The latter has
created his own line with Virginie.
KACHEN No.21 | WINTER 19