Smell-A-Visionary

Last month, I sat at a table at Le Singe Vert in New York City with the perfumer Francis Kurkdjian, sipping espresso and discussing one of his more recent creations, Carven Le Parfum Eau de Parfum. But as our conversation turned to his personal work–the master perfumer has an eponymous fragrance house that produces several scents for men and women, as well as unique projects like scented leather bracelets and bubbles—Kurkdjian grinned slyly and pulled a small box from his bag. Inside it was a tiny paper pinwheel. “It’s scented, so you can smell it as it turns,” he said, blowing on it to make it spin and holding it up to his lapel to show how he would wear it. “I have two nieces and the second niece found out that my scented bubbles were named after her older sister,” said Kurkdjian. “She said I want something, too, and she asked, can you make something that flies or something that turns and twirls?”

Paper planes proved impossible, but the pinwheels made their debut last weekend at the Art du Jardin garden art show in the Grand Palais in Paris in an installation called “Flora Tournicota”: rows of large spinning pinwheels and flowers on display, laced with his own musky and floral perfume, Aqua Universalis. Visitors could sit at a bench and whiff the fragrant breeze. The smaller buttonhole versions of the pinwheels are planned to be available for purchase next spring 2014.

Photos: Nathalie Baetens