Letters from the Paris atelier

The atelier is two rooms above a flower market in the Marais. The first holds the desk where new compositions are sketched; the second, the shelves where they are stored, sometimes for years, before we are sure of them.

On revising

A composition is rarely finished on the first attempt. We re-open files months later and almost always make small subtractions — a note removed here, a base softened there. The instinct, by now, is toward less.

"If a fragrance survives a year of revisions, it usually survives the wearer's life."