Carine Roitfeld welcomed guests with a pchit, pchit, pchit of scent — her very own, named Carine — Friday night at Kith Paris, a day after it launched there.
The fragrance’s patchouli notes wafted through the air as cool kids, models and fashion folk, including Rick Owens, Michèle Lamy and Delphine Arnault, milled about.
“For me a smell is very important. It’s a way to remember things or people. I am very faithful with perfume,” said Roitfeld, explaining that for a decade she wore Yves Saint Laurent’s Opium and Fleurs d’Oranger from Serge Lutens.
“And I’m faithful to this one,” she said, of her eponymous fragrance. “A perfume is a part of you.”
The Carine scent is her most personal fragrance yet, and it changes on each person’s skin, making it their own, she said.
“For me, this is a very personal project, because it is a brand Carine and I launched a few years ago,” said her son, Vladimir Restoin Roitfeld, of Carin Roitfeld Parfums.
He likes perfume’s timelessness. The first scent Restoin Roitfeld ever wore? Grey Vetiver, by Tom Ford.
Miss Fame recalled Davidoff Cool Water was her first, at age 12, gifted from her mother.
“She was like: ‘You’re gonna really need to keep the ladies off,’ and I’m like: ‘Honey, I don’t think I need a fragrance to worry about that,’” said Miss Fame, with a laugh.
She loves the emotion that comes from wearing specific fragrances. “This finishing touch can bring you to a very specific place,” said Miss Fame. “I like a smoky, kind of earthy smell. I like tobacco, patchouli, which I know Carine is using in this fragrance.”
Lauren Wasser has a penchant for fragrances that are sweet and have some woody notes. “The Comme des Garçons Hinoki is really good — one of my favorites,” she said.
Wasser is juggling numerous projects. “I’m in the midst of doing my documentary, based on my whole story,” said the model, who wears gold-colored prosthesis legs. “Things that never have been seen or said, and showing how I got exactly to this place. How hard it was, how many obstacles I had in front of me and being able to see that anyone can do anything. You just have to put your mind to it.”
A focus today is training for the New York City Marathon, although the busy fashion week schedule has made that tricky.
Back to fragrance. Makeup artist Tom Pecheux remembered when he was a smoker, the smell of smoke mixed with Opium was always a hit, with people commenting on how good he smelled. Next, he spritzed on Ambre Sultan by Serge Lutens.
“Now, most of the time, I wear Vladimir, by Carine,” he revealed.
DJ Michel Gaubert is a longtime fragrance lover himself. “It can change my mood — make me feel better,” he said.
This night Gaubert was wearing a Perfumer H scent, adding: “I like Leather, Tobacco and Charcoal.” But his first fragrance was of a totally different cadence — Christian Dior’s Eau Sauvage.
For more, see:
Carine Roitfeld Launches New Fragrance, Scraps Plans for Russian Magazine