Reflections 48 For
Reflections 48 For Julian Bedel, the Argentinian founder of luxury fragrance label Fueguia 1833, the path to becoming a perfumer has its roots in both art and science. Raised in a creative environment, with a conceptual artist father and siblings keen on painting and sculpture, his initial foray into high-end scents started when he came across the research of Linda Buck, winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2004, who had helped to identify the genes that control odour receptors. “Her work explored what was happening in our nostrils, explaining in molecular detail how people’s sense of smell works,” he explains. “She discussed how a unique scent can trigger certain memories within people, from their childhood to major turning points in their life.” This lit a creative spark in Bedel (who was already active in the plastic arts), as he was often immersed in a sea of powerful aromas on his family’s properties in Patagonia, which were filled with native plants and herbs such as lenga beech trees. “I came up with the idea for an art installation, one that was sensory-based. I wanted to extract aromas from this natural landscape and deliver them to an audience in a neutral setting to see how they would react to these smells,” he remembers. Soon after, Bedel was working with a local university to distil and bottle ten scents derived from Patagonian botanicals. Then he rented a boutique in downtown Buenos Aires and created a display with the natural aromas packaged in simple glass bottles with rounded flasks atop each one in place of the usual spray blotters to allow visitors to wander the space and pick up each top and take in the smells of the wilds of Argentina. Rather quickly, Bedel saw that his sensory art project had value in the commercial sphere, as people began to enquire whether the scents were wearable and how they could purchase them. “I realised that I would need to learn on the job if I was going to develop this concept as a fragrance brand. I had no formal training and, initially, I was concocting formulas for scents in my kitchen.” In 2010, Bedel formally established his perfume label, Fueguia 1833, in his native Argentina. Here, too, he pivoted quickly after discovering that the country’s internal workings and inflationplagued economy were not conducive for a start-up. He sought out a favourable business environment and opted for Milan, a cosmopolitan city known for hosting creatives from fashion to design and one which had a well-established pharmaceutical industry with access to high-tech equipment. Today, when one visits Fueguia’s production facility on the outskirts of the Lombard capital, the first impression is of walking into a state-of-theart chemistry lab. Staff in white lab coats shuffle about with vials in front of massive stainless-steel distillation containers. I understand that this is no ordinary perfumemaking set-up, as Bedel ventures outside in the crisp winter air to where an employee is carefully feeding dried carqueja leaves into a grinder to transform them into small particles. The plant is just one of over a thousand natural ingredients, from frankincense found in Oman to Haitian vetiver, utilised by Bedel in his quest to create truly unique scents – in this Inside Fueguia 1833’s Milan flagship PHOTOS © FUEGUIA
49 Scent Story case, the carqueja is part of a special two-perfume collection he has conceived for a collaboration with fashion designer Gabriela Hearst. Returning inside, Bedel walks over to a sack of cut-up dried Orris root from the mountains of Morocco. “I love natural materials and am always searching for new and unusual ingredients to use as notes in my fragrances,” he explains. “Each batch of our perfume for a certain scent could be different as we are relying on Mother Nature and there are always aromatic variations in these ingredients of vegetal origin.” Bedel’s boutique scent brand has to date concocted over 100 scents, with each perfume made in batches of 400 bottles. He even holds back a portion of the bottles to age them for several years just as one would a fine wine to see how the aromas evolve over time as the extracts from the natural ingredients mature. Fueguia’s sustainable approach applies also to the packaging, made from leftover cuts of European spruce and cedar that are crafted into bijou boxes in the company’s carpentry workshop. To further entice clients, Bedel has invested time and effort in designing sophisticated settings inside his monobrand stores, each personalised and which span four continents from Mexico City to Tokyo, creating an attractive ambience with wood accents and subdued lighting. Later this year, he plans to open new stores in Paris and Osaka. Later this year, he plans to open new stores in Paris and Osaka. Not known for complacency, Bedel continues to push the envelope in perfume research, investing in devices such as mass spectrometry and highperformance liquid chromatography to identify the molecular construction of scents. He has analysed centuries-old Stradivarius violins to map the sensorial fingerprints that are emitted by these masterful stringed instruments. “The aged wood gives off distinctive aromas that we can capture and map,” he enthuses. A trained luthier with a love of vintage wooden guitars, Bedel has been drawn to such odours from a young age. It’s no surprise his preferred Fueguia fragrance is Jacarandá, inspired by exotic hardwoods like Brazilian rosewood and mahogany. “The scent is deep, almost resinous, without any spice. To me, it’s the epitome of sophistication.” Such an emotional reaction is what Bedel hopes to evoke in each of his customers – a waft of forgotten memories that remains fresh each time you wear it. More Scentmakers on Our Radar The high-end niche perfume market continues to come up smelling of roses with new concepts. In the footsteps of Fueguia 1833, one promising brand to watch is Mexico’s Xinú (xinu.mx). Started in 2016, the perfume house looks to Mexico’s botanical bounty to develop unisex fragrances. Composed by respected nose and perfumer Rodrigo Flores-Roux, handpicked ingredients include agave, cedarwood and Mexican green lime seen in its Aguamadera scent or the Mexican tuberose, mock orange blossom and marigold found in its OroNardo fragrance. The brand’s boutique in Mexico City’s Polanco district evokes the spirit of a naturalist’s study with table displays sporting olfactive tools, plant life and sketches. Another noteworthy scentmaker is Germany’s Romy Kowalewski of 27 87 (2787perfumes.com). Based in Barcelona, she adopts a modernist approach and uses minimalist, uncoventionally sized packaging. Among her distinctive creations is #hashtag, a scent aiming to capture the digital world in a bottle using cool metallic notes constructed from combining Somalian incense, Moroccan cedarwood and iris from the Landes region with fresh aldehydes, a component commonly found in laundry detergents. Her latest launch, Per Se, from the Latin “by itself”, is a perfume whose formula changes with every new release. Julian Bedel samples his creations CENTURION-MAGAZINE.COM
