We’ve all seen the commercials of glammed-up A-listers astride horses galloping on a beach at sunrise advertising… fragrance. But beyond these dramatic (if not vague) ads and the accompanying scents lining department store beauty counters, there’s an entire world of innovative independent fragrance brands set on redefining the industry.
Barcelona-based fragrance brand 27 87 recently launched its Per Sē formula, which will evolve over time to reflect modern fragrance trends. Abel turns the food industry’s waste water from washing cherries into a naturally derived cherry note, while Eauso Vert is crafting complex, genderless scents rooted in escapism and co-founder Tanya Gonzalez’s Latin heritage.
“In true form and fashion, indie brands are the most innovative in the industry,” Moodeaux founder Brianna Arps notes. “We’re the ones that are actually driving innovation.”
Ahead, explore 12 independent fragrance brands that should be on any perfume fan’s radar.
27 87
Photo: Courtesy of 27 87
Originally from Germany, Romy Kowalewski studied in Barcelona and later founded 27 87 in Spain in 2016 with the goal of revamping traditional perfumery: “It’s time for a perfume brand that captures the here [and] now of the present moment,” she says. With stark white bottles meant to represent a blank canvas for the wearer to impart their own experiences onto the fragrances, 27 87 gets its name from its unique bottle sizes, which are available in 27ml and 87ml. (It also stands for Kowalewski’s birthday.)
The Barcelona-based brand has 10 fragrances on the market available to U.S. shoppers on FWRD, including Genetic Bliss, a molecular perfume interacting with each individual’s scent alongside woodsy notes of Akigalawood, belambra and creamy sandalwood. In its quest to hone in on modernity, 27 87’s latest launch, Per Sē, is the “first olfactive logo of the industry” that will evolve over time in order to accurately capture the present moment. Its first edition combines violet leaves, pink pepper, aldehydes, floral bouquet, orris butter and bamboo, but future iterations of Per Sē may feature different notes.
Scents to try:
Per Sē, $310, available here
#Hashtag, $230, available here
Genetic Bliss, $310, available here
Abel
Photo: Courtesy of Abel
Before founding New Zealand-based fragrance brand Abel in 2013, Frances Shoemack got her start in wine making. When her personal search for a natural and sustainable perfume yielded no results in the high-end beauty industry, she transferred her wine-making skills into the fragrance space, with the help of experts like master perfumer Isaac Sinclair. With the brand’s emphasis on transparency, all of Abel’s scents are formulated with natural ingredients, upcycled materials and biotechnology (i.e. producing fragrance notes using plant sugars or other living organisms through a fermentation process).
While formulating what is now Abel’s best-selling oceanic scent Cyan Nori, Shoemack and Sinclair worked virtually during the pandemic to naturally capture the smell of the brand’s coastal headquarters in Wellington. The key note? An algae absolute (see: seaweed) exuding the ocean’s saltiness.
As for its newest scent — a Parisian-inspired gourmand with notes of tart cherry, rum and tuberose called The Apartment — Abel achieves its cherry top note by distilling and extracting the scent from the water that the food industry uses to wash the fruit. “Because we had this hard line around 100% natural from the get go, it’s forced us to be really creative and find natural solutions for these problems,” Shoemack says.
Scents to try:
Cyan Nori, $180, available here
The Apartment, $130, available here
Laundry Day, $180, available here
DedCool
Photo: Courtesy of DedCool
DedCool got its start on Instagram in 2016 after founder and lifelong fragrance lover Carina Chaz set her sights on “creating a new conversation around fragrance” with a brand younger consumers could identify with. The Los Angeles-based brand soon turned its digital beginnings into retail placements by developing consignment relationships with mom-and-pop shops and later entering Barneys New York. Now, DedCool is sold at Sephora and offers a 13-scent lineup, including its Xtra Milk Fragrance defined by bergamot, white musk and amber notes.
With a brand ethos of translating fragrance across multiple touchpoints, DedCool has expanded its scented SKUs to include laundry products, body care, incense, room sprays and air fresheners. It’s even partnered with fellow Sephora partner Ouai to translate the hair-care brand’s Melrose Place scent into detergent and dryer sheets.
“The power of personalization is so key to our brand, and allowing the consumer to wear a scent that elevates them, and figuring out how to layer it, how to incorporate it into your daily life,” Chaz says. “When we talk about layering, we talk about it within your own personal fragrance, but then we also talk about it throughout all the daily touch points of your life.”
Scents to try:
Aura Fragrance, $90, available here
Xtra Milk Fragrance, $90, available here
Fragrance 01 “Taunt”, $90, available here
Eauso Vert
Photo: Courtesy of Eauso Vert
Despite Faye Harris being based in the U.K. and Tanya Gonzalez in San Francisco, the co-founders virtually built Eauso Vert across an ocean (and an eight-hour time difference). With an extensive combined background in beauty marketing, Harris and Gonzalez first met at Estée Lauder and later teamed up to create a fragrance brand balancing complex, genderfluid formulas with aesthetically pleasing packaging.
Eauso Vert launched in 2022 with five fragrances rooted in escapism, including Vanilla Embers, an amber-y gourmand with notes of Moroccan orange flower and cardamom, and Purple Noon, a solar floral with ginger oil and coconut water top notes. Its second collection consists of three fragrances inspired by Gonzalez’s Latin heritage and developed in partnership with perfumer Rodrigo Flores-Roux: Fruto Oscuro (a fruity blend grounded in guaiacwood), Salvia Salvia (a salty, musky fougère) and Dos Mil Años (a woody scent honoring the ancient tree of life located in Oaxaca, Mexico).
“I really think everything that we’ve developed around the brand has been through the lens of putting blinders on and focusing on what is the storytelling that is going to stand the test of time,” Gonzalez says.
Scents to try:
Dos Mil Años, $185, available here
Purple Noon, $185, available here
Vanilla Embers, $185, available here
Ellis Brooklyn
Photo: Courtesy of Ellis Brooklyn
As a beauty and celebrity columnist for The New York Times, Bee Shapiro decided to create her own fragrance brand out of her Brooklyn apartment while pregnant with her first daughter, Ellis. After starting Ellis Brooklyn with two fragranced body milks in 2015, the brand later launched its eau de parfums with Sephora in 2016. Shapiro describes Ellis Brooklyn as a “scent-first company” tapping into the latest in scent technology, whether that be innovative ingredients or more sustainable sourcing methods.
Many of Ellis Brooklyn’s scents are inspired by American destinations and experiences: Earlier this year, the brand released Miami Nectar, a tropical gourmand with pink pineapple and coconut water top notes inspired by an electric Miami summer. It also launched Dear Sky in August as an ode to the American West with fruity floral notes of honeydew melon, strawberry leaf, white peony and galbanum.
“I have always believed that our sense of smell is often taken for granted, and that we are paying so much more attention now to what we breathe in is just such a wonderful thing,” Shapiro says. “Scent is tied to well-being and mood and attraction and so many important, invisible feelings.”
Scents to try:
Miami Nectar Eau de Parfum, $115, available here
Dear Sky Eau de Parfum, $115, available here
Sun Fruit Eau de Parfum, $110, available here
Elorea
Photo: Courtesy of Elorea
Elorea — a portmanteau of “elements” and “Korea” — was co-founded by couple Wonny Lee and Su min Park as a way to honor Korean stories and heritage. “In Korean culture, scent was once central to daily rituals, used holistically for wellness and self-care, but much of this was lost during modernization and occupation,” Elorea’s co-founder and Chief Creative Officer Park says. “Elorea is our way of reclaiming this cultural relationship with fragrance and sharing it with the world.”
The New York-based brand spotlights ingredients such as perilla leaves, Jeju citrus and Korean red pine within its fragrances. Its Timeless Legacy collection, consisting of four signature fragrances (Git, Hanok, Haenyeo and Jang), directly draws from Korean historical fashion, architecture, traditions and cuisine for each of its formulas. At Elorea’s flagship store in New York City, the brand offers an immersive experience for its audience to connect with Korean culture through art, an in-store cafe and collaborative events. Elorea is also opening a new store in Los Angeles, but the brand isn’t yet available in Korea.
Scents to try:
Hanok Eau de Parfum, $150, available here
Heaven Eau de Parfum, $130, available here
Git Eau de Parfum, $150, available here
Moodeaux
Photo: Courtesy of Moodeaux
Brianna Arps’ world immediately flipped upside down after being laid off from her job as a beauty, fashion and lifestyle editor in 2018. Searching for a sense of normalcy, Arps leaned into her beauty routine, took an online introductory course on aromatherapy at The School for Aromatic Studies and decided on launching a fragrance brand — all in that same year. After three years of development, Moodeaux was born in 2021 with its hero scent Worthy: a blend of citrus, floral and woodsy accords.
Centered around human moods, emotions, memories and universal connections, Moodeaux now has three scents: Worthy, PunkStar (a rock ‘n’ roll-inspired mix of juicy fruits, incense, leather and saffron) and Brand New (a fresh fusion of yuzu, cardamom, pink pepper and coconut). When it comes to building its audience, Moodeaux embraces experiential marketing through hosting pop-ups and partnering with retailers such as Urban Outfitters, Credo Beauty and Thirteen Lune.
“We’re creating a world where people feel empowered to boldly express themselves and flaunt how they feel,” Arps says. “When you really get clear about what you’re doing as a brand and then you invite people to step into your world in an experiential way, whether that’s through your own accord or through retailers, we found there’s no way that you can’t find your community in doing all of those things.”
Scents to try:
Brand New Eau de Parfum, $98, available here
Worthy Eau de Parfum, $98, available here
Punk Star Eau de Parfum, $98, available here
Nette
Photo: Courtesy of Nette
Carol Han Pyle‘s first childhood memories include watching her mother dip and carve pillars by hand in her own candle shop, which ignited Pyle’s lifelong love of fragrance. After working as Elle.com’s fashion market editor and later creating social media agency Community Atelier, the pandemic forced Pyle to reevaluate her career and ultimately inspired her return to fragrance with Nette in 2021. Nette first launched with candles and expanded into perfume last year with its Sephora-exclusive launch of Pear Jam. (Learn more about Pyle’s story on The Fashionista Network.)
Across its versatile scent library, storytelling is a cornerstone of the brand: “Each one of the fragrances is really inspired by a story that lives in my head and a character that lives in my head,” Pyle says. For Nette’s La Forêt Eau de Parfum — a fresh, woodsy scent with notes of sandalwood, cedarwood, ISO E Super and bergamot — Pyle’s scent-defining character is a “really chic author of dystopian best-selling novels, dressed head-to-toe in The Row, sitting in a glass house in the middle of the forest working on her next novel.” For Pear Jam, Pyle was inspired by Demi Moore’s character in “Ghost” receiving a bag of Japanese pears in her New York City loft.
This emphasis on storytelling extends to packaging — the brand writes poems for each fragrance and prints them on the bottles. Looking ahead, Nette is focused on brand building and expanding its audience by intentionally collaborating with creators whose followers will likely resonate with the fragrance brand.
Scents to try:
Pear Jam Eau de Parfum, $120, available here
La Forêt Eau de Parfum, $120, available here
Opening Night Eau de Parfum, $120, available here
Noyz
Photo: Courtesy of Noyz
Launched this June, Noyz burst onto the fragrance scene with six scents, Ulta Beauty and Harrods retail partnerships and an emphasis on content-creator storytelling. Founded by Shaun Neff and crafted by Robertet perfumer Jérôme Epinette, the brand aims to embrace “raw emotions and experiences” through its scent library.
“Our goal is to create fragrances inspired by real storytelling that people can actually relate to — scents that smell great and make our community feel great wearing them,” Noyz CEO Malena Higuera says. “Our inspiration lies in being authentic in self-expression; aspiring to be oneself is better than a distant, idealized fantasy.”
In pursuit of centering authentic emotions, Noyz’s Sh**ty Day eau de parfum (aptly encased in packaging resembling broken glass) offers a sensorial reset for those inevitable bad days through uplifting notes of eucalyptus leaves, salted figs and cedarwood. Its newest scent 12:00 (a warm gourmand with notes of jasmine petals, raspberry, ambroxan and spun sugar) represents “the moment the clock resets itself,” which Higuera says is a brief period where “there is hope, endless possibilities and new realities when time stands still.”
Scents to try:
12:00 Eau de Parfum, $85, available here
Sh**ty Day Eau de Parfum, $85, available here
Lost + Found Eau de Parfum, $85, available here
Perfumehead
Photo: Courtesy of Perfumehead
Welcome to the “Osmocosm,” a.k.a. Perfumehead’s nine-scent universe. Before launching the Los Angeles-based brand in 2022, Daniel Patrick Giles stacked his resume with positions such as creative director of Holt Renfrew and chief marketing officer at Benefit Cosmetics, Too Faced Cosmetics and Perricone MD. Now with a luxury fragrance brand of his own, Giles looks to Los Angeles as inspiration for all of Perfumehead’s extrait de parfums (which contain a higher concentration of perfume oil compared to eau de parfums).
“I’m very inspired by fashion, by movies, by design, by color, by music, and so what I do when I’m working on a fragrance is I create these, almost movie scripts, because I see scent very cinematically,” Giles says.
Perfumehead also centers storytelling and community in its marketing: For its launch of La La Love — a gourmand wrapped in sandalwood, saffron, musk and vanilla absolute — Perfumehead profiled 22 Angelenos about what love is and what L.A. means to them. The brand also recently launched roll-on perfume oil extracts available exclusively at Violet Grey in its Canadian Tuxedo, Cosmic Cowboy, Reine des Anges and Room No. scents.
Scents to try:
La La Love, $395, available here
Cosmic Cowboy, $395, available here
Canadian Tuxedo, $395, available here
Phlur
Photo: Courtesy of Phlur
Chriselle Lim relaunched Phlur in 2021 and has since grown the brand into a perfume powerhouse with retail placements at Sephora, Nordstrom, Anthropologie, Space NK and Selfridges. Phlur’s scents — which span eau de parfums, body mists, body care and candles — pull from “everyday moments and feelings” meant to connect the wearer to their daily life.
“Phlur is all about creating fragrances that feel deeply personal and always relatable, scents that go beyond the surface to connect with real emotions and real experiences,” Lim says.
As a digital-first fragrance brand building its audience across its social media platforms (its Instagram boasts nearly 250,000 followers), Lim says Phlur prioritizes authenticity and fostering meaningful connections, which includes engaging with its consumers online. Within the brand’s fragrance offerings, Phlur takes well-known scents and adds unexpected notes to its formulas: Vanilla Skin, for example, combines classic vanilla with spicy notes of pink pepper and woods.
Scents to try:
Soft Spot Eau de Parfum, $99, available here
Strawberry Letter Eau de Parfum, $99, available here
Vanilla Skin Eau de Parfum, $99, available here
Vyrao
Photo: Courtesy of Mamajuju
Though Yasmin Sewell never planned to enter the fragrance world, her search for a way to tap into her interest in energetic healing ultimately led her toward perfumes as an approachable outlet for altering energy and mood. In 2021, Sewell launched Vyrao with five scents that each aim to evoke a different emotion: Free 00 (liberation and sensuality), Georgette (self love), I Am Verdant (transformation and illumination), Magnetic 70 (attraction and protection) and Witchy Woo (courage and creativity). Created in partnership with the International Flavors & Fragrances Inc.’s Science of Wellness Program, Vyrao has since added three more scents to its lineup: The Sixth (mindfulness and intuition), Sun Rae (joy and happiness) and, most recently, Mamajuju (grounding and awareness).
“We don’t speak in a traditional fragrance way,” Sewell says of Vyrao’s marketing strategy. “We don’t use the same language or words or references that I think [the] majority of pure fragrance brands do. All of our language is centered around emotions, healing energy [and] amplifying your spirit.”
From Mamajuju’s earthy notes of living red clay and sandalwood to Sun Rae’s refreshing lemon and ginger top notes, each of Vyrao’s scents also include an “energetically charged” Herkimer diamond crystal meant to promote the perfume’s designated emotion.
Scents to try:
Mamajuju Eau de Parfum, $220, available here
Witchy Woo Eau de Parfum, $190, available here
Georgette Eau de Parfum, $190, available here
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Source: Fashionista.com