Portraits JOSHUA TARN
Artworks INFINITE VIBES
Text CELIA ELLENBERG
Sittings editor GARTH ALLDAY SPENCER
Director of photography SIMON BIU
Fashion assistants SONYA MAZURYK, GEORGIA EDWARDS, JEROME KATENDE KASUSULA, PINNY YAOWARATANA and BELLA MAGEE
Production ZAC APOSTOLOU
Instagram: @cotyinc
coty.com
To celebrate the launch of Infiniment Coty Paris, the 14-strong collection of genderless, sustainable fragrances powered by performance-enhancing technological innovation, Coty’s enterprising CEO, Sue Nabi, and her creative partner, Nicolas Vu, share the inspiration behind what is a return to form for the 120-year-old French brand that invented modern perfumery.
clockwise from top left: the five fragrances that make up Infiniment Coty Paris’s I Am Day collection,
Entre Genres, Soleil d’Ikosim, Noir Encens, Encore Une Fois, and Aristo Chypre
Like most remarkable origin stories, the details around fragrance entrepreneur François Coty’s big break are slightly different depending on who you ask. There is a general consensus, however, that the events that transpired at Paris’s Grands Magasins du Louvre department store in 1907, three years after Coty started his namesake business, went something like this: a seasoned salesman fresh from a truncated perfumery education in Grasse, Coty—whose early scent creations had been systematically rejected by the established boutiques of the day—was once again being shown the door. In his pocket was a small sample of La Rose Jacqueminot, a blend of flowers, honeyed spices, and a sillage-extending synthetic rose note brimming with potential. Frustrated, Coty smashed the bottle on the floor—or the counter (this is one of many hazy details). As the shattered flacon released its intoxicating aroma, a crowd swarmed (calmly approached?) Coty, demanding (politely asking?) where they could purchase the fragrance.
One account claims that the bottle he smashed was Coty’s last, while another insists that he sold his remaining
sample bottles on the spot. Yet another claims he staged the whole exercise, paying customers in advance to feign excitement. But the final detail of the story is widely confirmed: La Rose Jacqueminot subsequently became a wild success, effectively launching the French house that would become a global beauty power player.
“Guerlain actually did it first,” Sue Nabi says of the novel concept of using both natural and synthetic ingredients in fragrance blends, an innovation that is often credited to Chanel No.5, with its unmistakable aldehyde notes. “But Coty really invented modern perfumery by cornering the market on synthetics that increase performance,” insists Nabi, who took over as the company’s CEO in the fall of 2020. This distinction interested Nabi, a 20-year L’Oréal veteran who ran both Lancôme and L’Oréal Paris before striking out on her own in 2015 with her partner, Nicholas Vu, to launch the biotech-backed skincare brand Orveda. Having helped make Lancôme’s fruity floral La Vie Est Belle an international phenomenon, Nabi—who has a keen eye for industry shifts—noticed an interesting evolution happening in the fragrance category. Not unlike when
François Coty was trying to break into the market, a small number of big corporations had long controlled perfume sales, turning the specialized industry into what Nabi describes as a factory line. “They were making fragrance after fragrance, putting most of their money into advertising and not into the juices themselves,” she explains. But with the arrival of smaller, niche fragrance brands over the past 10 years, which prioritize higher concentrations of precious ingredients—much to the joy of the followers of #perfumetok, TikTok’s designated perfume channel with its billions of views—a new fragrance audience now expects a new level of quality and staying power, she suggests. With disruption in Coty’s DNA, the house’s new boss smelled an opportunity.
from left: Coty’s CEO, Sue Nabi, and her creative partner, Nicolas Vu, the creators of Infiniment Coty Paris
“It’s really an alignment of stars,” the 56-year-old Algerian-born executive says of the fortuitous events surrounding the arrival of Infiniment Coty Paris, the brand’s new luxury fragrance pillar that launches this month in the U.S. with 14 original eaux de parfum. When Nabi and Vu left L’Oréal together in 2013, they aspired to build a new perfume concept that relied on high concentrations, noble ingredients, no budget constraints, and no marketing briefs in order to make scents that were driven by quality, performance, and science. Coincidentally, when they arrived at Coty, the company’s research and development team had been working on the development of a new technology called Molecular Aura, a fermented sugar molecule that allows fragrance notes to diffuse with more strength and longevity. “It slows down the evaporation profile of selected ingredients by gently bonding with them to extend these scent signatures throughout the day,” explains Séverine Dallet, Coty’s senior manager of fragrance design. Not only does this push the boundaries of the olfactive experience, Dallet continues, it “reshapes the rules of creation” by rendering the traditional olfactive pyramid—top notes, like citrus, which are small and light and evaporate quickly; heart notes such as heavy florals, which are bigger molecules that evaporate more slowly; and base notes, even heavier molecules, such as woods and musks, that evaporate even more slowly—totally obsolete. As a result, the depth of Infiniment standouts, such as Entre Genres, an enveloping trio of musks spiked with hints of mandarin, has been extended by up to 30 hours.
With their quality, performance, and science boxes effectively ticked, Nabi and Vu set out to tap into some of the other big ideas currently consuming fragrance obsessives, starting with sustainability. Infiniment marks the debut of a new upcycled alcohol that uses captured carbon dioxide from factory pollution, instead
of the ethanol more commonly found in fine fragrance, to fill each of its keepsake glass bottles that arrive in a protective case made of plant fibers. Next, the duo tackled transparency, ensuring that in addition to the upcycled alcohol, each scent contains only purified water, concentrated fragrance oil, and the Molecular Aura molecules creating maximum impact with minimal ingredients. Finally, they mined the mind-scent connection, adding a wellness element by working with neuroscientific modalities to map the brain’s responses to the main families of human emotion—sensuality, pleasure, tenderness, self-love, and others—using these findings to ensure that each scent triggers one of these emotional centers.
The bottle was a passion project for Vu, who designed the flat front and faceted back of each flacon to be infinitely refillable and easily stacked together to make what he describes as a canvas of glass. “The idea was to create a virtuous cycle,” Vu continues of the genesis of “artcycling,” an ambitious idea in which Vu and Nabi envision customers bringing their empty Infiniment bottles back to stores and counters, after which they will be given to local artists to transform into works of art that can then be auctioned off, with proceeds going to the charity of each artist’s choosing. To introduce this concept, Coty partnered with the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, first in London and then in New York: To date 14 artists who work across mediums have been tasked with creating unique works using the bottles. Started by its founding executive director, Touria El Glaoui, in 2013, 1-54—an homage to the 54 countries comprising the African continent—emerged from a lack of representation on the global stage for artists from Africa and its diaspora. “It’s a testament to the power of creativity to breathe new life into everyday objects and make a statement about the potential for beauty and artistry in the most unexpected places,” El Glaoui says of the collaboration with Coty, which will be ongoing.
As I walked the 1-54 galleries at Somerset House in London last October, one of these collaborative pieces stood out to me. The Kenyan fine art photographer Thandiwe Muriu had used her practice that leverages vibrant geometric prints to transform Infiniment’s bottles, which she had filled with blue ash and burnt poems as a visual interpretation of Noir Encens, a peppery incense eau that also happens to be my favorite of Infiniment’s 14 offerings. It is yet another testament to the power of creativity—the kind that can come full circle, effectively breathing new life into an iconic, century-spanning idea.
In keeping with Infiniment Coty Paris’s olfactory ability to tap into human emotions, 10 asked seven interdisciplinary artists to interpret their favorite scents across mediums—and senses.
Text BELLA KOOPMAN
INFINITE VIBES, AI artist
AI has become the frenzied buzzword on everyone’s lips, with technophiles wondering what it means for traditional ways of working. One of the explorers searching for the answer is the Berlin-based animator Dom Harwood, who goes by the alter ego Infinite Vibes, positioning his work at the intersection of technology and music. Harwood uses AI to augment his audio- inspired animations that, if you stare at them too long, put you in a dizzying dreamland. Infinite Vibes is a next- gen gem, making this rapidly developing space accessible for all to enjoy, allowing observers to sit back, relax, and enjoy a front-row seat to the future.
10: What was your intention with the image animation for Aristo Chypre?
Infinite Vibes: It’s about capturing a feeling. I like the idea that you put something out there and it’s up to people to feel how they want.
10: How can you use technology to evoke emotion?
IV: I think you can use anything to do that. We live in a technological world, so you can address that by making art.
10: How do technology and art co-exist?
IV: Technology probably existed before humans did. I don’t see them as something separate. You think of the first cave paintings, they’re using a form of very basic technology—there’s an unbroken link.
10: What stimulates your creativity?
IV: Nothing in particular and yet everything. We are all just making our way through, somewhat in the darkness.
10: What leaves you wanting more?
IV: I tend to enjoy novelty more than I enjoy things continuing. I get a bit pained from monotony. I’m happy things don’t last forever.
10: What qualities do you find most attractive?
IV: That’s easy. Kindness, thoughtfulness, intelligence and good humor.
10: What tradition would you start?
IV: I love the idea of everybody in the world stopping and singing a song or a note.
10: What’s your favorite way to spend a day?
IV: A nice day with friends in nature—I don’t think it gets any better.
10: What smell triggers you the most?
IV: I find all smells trigger imagination in good and bad ways. I wake up every morning thinking about coffee.
10: Who and what has made an unforgettable impression on you?
IV: I went to see Poor Things. I thought every aspect was stunning. Amazing acting, sound design, music—it left a huge impression.
10: What creative field other than digital art do you find the most relatable?
IV: I’ve spent most of my life as a musician. Also, my mother was a huge cinephile, so I grew up seeing films every night through my childhood.
10: Why do you call yourself Infinite Vibes?
IV: I don’t like to reveal exactly why because I think there’s more fun leaving people to work things out. But it comes from my view of metaphysics, what I think of the bigger questions.
ENCORE UNE FOIS: addictive amber, vanilla
After smelling Aristo Chypre, Infinite Vibes created an artwork and animation that entices the senses and lingers in the imagination, an image that expresses an impossible-to-ignore sensuality
HARRI, fashion designer
The London-based designer Harri, 29, may blow up his garments to craft their unconventional, bulbous shape but nobody can claim he’s stuck in a creative bubble. Known primarily for crafting latex trousers that taper at the ankle before ballooning into buoyant, air-filled inflations, the Indian-born talent honed his craft at London College of Fashion. He was handpicked to be a British Fashion Council NewGen recipient, which allowed him to secure his first slot at 2023’s London Fashion Week. And he proved himself to be one to watch, utilizing graceful choreography to show off expressive, independent movement. Harri’s contoured creations are a wonder to behold.
After smelling Encore Une Fois, Harri, through the medium of dance, curated a series of images (seen on the next spread) that express the feeling of wanting more, driven by overwhelming desire
10: What was your first reaction to Encore Une Fois?
Harri: It’s very soft, smooth, and easy. It reminds me a lot of my time spent traveling.
10: What was your intention with the shoot?
H: The best part was that usually we work with body shapes and forms. Working with Encore Une Fois, it was about [responding] to scent. It was a new way of seeing, feeling, and imagining things—a new challenge.
10: What feels nice on your skin?
H: Skin feels nice on my skin, always.
10: What leaves you wanting more?
H: A day in a good gallery, sculptures, and ceramics.
10: What can’t you get enough of?
H: A good sculpture by Henry Moore is something I can’t get enough of. Also, a good day at work maybe.
10: What tradition would you start?
H: At work, I’ve begun burning two incenses, because that’s something I always saw growing up.
10: What’s your favorite way to spend the day?
H: Always in the studio with my team.
10: Does fragrance trigger your imagination?
H: A lot of memories I have are of places I associate with smells and fragrance. I grew up in a remote village in India, where my family had a small storage area full of petroleum products. I spent [half] my time at home and half in temple with my mum. There were two contrasting smells in my life, one very industrial—a petroleum smell—and then the smell of cut flowers, sand, and sandalwood.
10: What do you find hard to resist?
H: Combining art and fashion.
10: How do you create desire through design?
H: I do it from my desire to create something that people have never seen before.
10: If you hadn’t become a fashion designer, what would you be?
H: I was an athlete before I was a fashion designer— I liked the determination and dedication. I liked the dynamics of dedicating yourself to a craft and spending a lot of time perfecting it.
ENCORE UNE FOIS: addictive amber, vanilla
Harri’s creative response to Encore Une Fois by Infiniment Coty Paris
DANCERS: DELILAH GROCOTT CAIN AND SEIRIAN GRIFFITHS. HAIR: SKY CRIPPS-JACKSON AT THE WALL GROUP USING SAM MCKNIGHT AND THE ORDINARY
HALE ZERO, DJs and sound designers
from left: the Hale Zero brothers Rafael, Greg, and Carl Haley.
After smelling Noir Encens, Hale Zero created a soundtrack about reinvention and rebirth, music that makes you feel rejuvenated and renewed with an unstoppable new energy
GROOMING: SKY CRIPPS-JACKSON AT THE WALL GROUP USING SAM MCKNIGHT AND THE ORDINARY
Comprising the south-London-born brothers Carl, Greg, and Rafael Haley, Hale Zero mix up a cocktail of Afrobeats, ’00s classics and ’90s hip-hop to create a fruity tipple essential for lowering inhibitions and filling a dancefloor. Their stints behind the decks at the afterparties of fashion week shows, the Baftas, and Edward Enninful’s birthday have meant word has quickly spread about their talents, which extend beyond DJing, into musical direction, composition, sound design and runway music. In other words, if Hale Zero aren’t doing the soundtrack, is it even worth turning up? Unlikely.
10: What was your response to Noir Encens?
Carl Haley: It reminded me of my childhood. It takes me back to something my mum had on her dressing table.
Rafael Haley: Strong. Something I would put on if I was going shopping, to the club, or on a date.
10: What were your intentions with the soundtrack?
CH: We want to take people on a journey and feel a host of emotions. Usually we start off calm and chilled and then build a euphoric moment.
10: What’s the significance of the songs? How do they reflect reinvention, rebirth, and rejuvenation?
CH: I picked Bibo No Aozora, a track by the Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto from a film called Babel. It was when we started to look at becoming film composers and that track was a standout for our journey.
Greg Haley: The song I picked was Intimidated by Kaytranada. It gave a very rejuvenated feel.
RH: Grown Woman by Xavier Omär. There’s an energy to it that goes hand in hand with reinvention.
10: As brothers how do you uplift each other?
GH: We communicate a lot—we talk about the things that are in our minds, we don’t hold anything back. That helps us stay connected, stay positive, and encourage each other to keep going daily.
10: What smell takes you back to your childhood?
GH: Curry and roti, a traditional meal in Ghana. It reminds me of growing up and being at home.
10: What’s the best crowd you guys have played to?
RH: The Self-Portrait party at London Fashion Week [last] September. The energy was crazy all night. Shakira popped down and we played one of her songs—that was a moment.
10: If you had to play one song forever what would it be?
CH: Time by Hans Zimmer [from the score for Inception]. That’s the only time I’ve been in the cinema and was not even seeing what was on the screen because the music had taken over.
GH: Another Zimmer piece [also from Inception] called Dream Is Collapsing. That chord progression I can listen to over and over.
RH: I would play the theme tune from The Shawshank Redemption by Thomas Newman.
10: If you guys could be reborn as anyone or anything, who/what would it be?
CH: Virgil Abloh.
GH: Abloh was a creative polymath, someone I feel had the freedom to do anything he wanted to do.
RH: He encapsulates everything we want to do.
NOIR ENCENS: avant-garde woody, incense, black pepper
MOUS LAMRABAT, artist
The Morocco-born, Belgium-raised photographer Mous Lamrabat, 40, looks through a personal lens to explore the rich experience of diasporic communities. Hitting his heartwarming message home with a dash of well-spiced humor, he explores identity and diversity with a spotlight assigned to the beauty of cross-cultural interconnectedness. Think of the West’s most recognizable brands and Lamrabat has likely used them to flip the script as a comment on globalization. Not even SpongeBob is safe from his witty perspectives. With clients including Burberry and Chanel, Lamrabat has a surrealist style that nods to a utopia free from prejudice and judgment and celebrates culture and community.
10: What was your intention with the images?
Mous Lamrabat: I remember Entre Genres smelt very fresh. I wanted to incorporate that in the work and make the images also quite refreshing.
10: What gets your imagination soaring?
ML: Traveling, because your senses are opened, you see everything through a fresh pair of glasses. That’s why I love to travel, to see the things that are new for me.
10: Where is your creative happy place?
ML: I’m most productive right before I go to sleep—that’s the moment when you’re shut off from the world. It’s when ideas come quite easily to me.
10: If you were going to spend a day cloud-watching, where would you do it?
ML: Namibia. It’s the most beautiful place I have ever seen. I’ve always said that when God created Earth, he created that place for himself. The clouds there reminded me of the ones in the opening of The Simpsons.
10: Which creative field other than photography do you most relate to?
ML: Anything that has to do with being creative. The wiring in your head and the way you wire things are what make you a creative person.
10: What’s your favorite tradition?
ML: There are so many traditions and I can only start looking within our own. At the top of my mind is a kiss on the forehead to the elderly as a sign of respect. There are no words used but it says so much.
10: What tradition would you start?
ML: It has to be something with kindness. The world we live in now, if you’re sensitive to what’s going on, you don’t understand how things like this can happen. I would find a way of creating a tradition where you can’t kill one another.
10: What’s your favorite way to spend the day?
ML: One of my happy places is where I was born [Temsaman, north Morocco]. We used to go every year. I have eight siblings, so with my parents, that’s 11 of us. When we used to go in summer, there was no electricity or running water, but I have the best memories. I’d wake up and there would be fresh bread, the sun would be shining, there were chickens and roosters. I know I can’t afford to live like that all year round, but it is a great way to spend your days.
10: What smells trigger your emotions and imagination?
ML: There is this nostalgic thing about Morocco. It has a different smell, the air feels different. There are so many smells and just landing there, getting in the car and opening the window is always for me the start.
10: How do you eat your tangerines?
ML: The small ones, I peel them in one piece. It has to stay in one piece—from the moment it breaks or tears I feel like I’ve failed. I’m quite neurotic about it, and then I split them in two. I don’t eat them one by one, I eat them two by two, and I don’t take them out. I just bite them off
After smelling Entre Genres, Mous Lamrabat chose an image from his archive that expresses lightness, freedom, and untouchable beauty.
ENTRE GENRES: a trio of musks, tangerine
Mous Lamrabat’s creative response to Entre Genres by Infiniment Coty Paris
PHOTOGRAPHER: MOUS LAMRABAT. FASHION EDITOR: LISA LAPAUW. MODELS: NYIBOL DOK JOK AND SITA. MAKE-UP: KARIMA MARUAN. PHOTOGRAPHER’S ASSISTANT: THOMAS CLODINE-FLORENT. PRODUCTION: MARIE JUNCKER AT ARTWORLD
Mous Lamrabat created a piece where the stackable Infiniment Coty Paris bottles become a work of art
PHOTOGRAPHY: MOUS LAMRABAT. ARTWORK PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF INFINIMENT COTY PARIS. © THOMAS LEVY
JOHN GLACIER, poet and musician
JOHN WEARS CAPE BY WALES BONNER. HAIR: BATISEOL GOMIS AT SAINT LUKE USING AMIKA AND DYSON. MAKE-UP: HELAYNA SHELTON USING M.A.C.
The poet and rapper John Glacier, 28, knows how to mastermind a beautiful verse. The Hackney-born artist used poetry to express her emotions before developing beat-backed, conversational music that forces you to sit down and listen. Drawing on reggae, pop, rap, and grime, Glacier taught herself GarageBand and Logic before uploading songs onto SoundCloud. Dropping her debut mixtape, Shiloh: Lost for Words, in 2021, she used tracks to dissect her personal experiences, including living with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. Since then, the multi-hyphenate has been skating the circuit of stardom, collaborating with Frank Ocean’s producer Vegyn and appearing on line-ups for We Out Here and Warehouse Project.
10: What was your first reaction to Soleil d’Ikosim? Where did it take you?
John Glacier: I was inspired enough to write a poem on it! It’s a complex fragrance that brought a lot of hope.
10: Where is your creative happy place?
JG: I feel creative anywhere. I take a lot of inspiration from the world around me and it can come at any time.
10: What’s your favorite tradition?
JG: Me and my family did a lot of dancing at Christmas. I love that!
10: What’s smells trigger your imagination the most?
JG: Something delicate—I love a fragrance that is subtle enough for my imagination to interpret.
10: What’s your favorite flower?
JG: I love the bird of paradise flower—the colors and shape are so unique.
10: What smells take you back to childhood?
JG: Freshly cut grass! It’s such an ever-present smell so it connects itself to lots of memories of my childhood.
10: What are your hopes for the future?
JG: I just want whatever is right for me. I can’t predict the future, but I hope it works out well.
10: How do you convey optimism in your work?
JG: I have my own way of reflecting emotions, so I think reflecting optimism is that way too. I think about how these things make me feel and that tends to come out in its own unique way.
10: What brings radiance into your life?
JG: My friends are my main source of radiance. I have so many inspirational people around me who make me happy, and that’s such an important thing to me.
After smelling Soleil d’Ikosim, John Glacier wrote Dazzling Seas, a poem that expresses radiance, the feeling of being bathed in warmth and life-giving light
Dazzling Seas by John Glacier
From bloom to fall
You never fail
Your scent
Assumes me all
Resume with spring
Your grace within
For seasons yet to come
My orange blossom
love
A unity
of one
Like dazzling seas
And summer breeze
And blossoms under trees
You radiate
The rays
How glorious the days
This optimisms
ours
My orange blossom reap
SOLEIL D’IKOSIM: orange blossom, neroli, vetiver
