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The 21st edition of Pitti Fragranze, the Pitti Immagine salon dedicated to the world of international artistic perfumery, which took place at the Stazione Leopolda in Florence, has ended. Lots of news for fans of niche perfumes, but the event was also an opportunity to see the trend of a multi-faceted market, constantly evolving and with the presence of new players. It was the numerous talks that turned the spotlight on new trends, the comparison between different generations, Artificial Intelligence and the Metaverse which also influence the world of perfume, the importance of the past which should not be put aside, because as he said Greek historian Thucydides in the 5th century BC «we need to know the past to understand the present and orient the future».
Artificial Intelligence and the Metaverse in perfumes
At MoMA in New York, digital artist Refik Anadol used Artificial Intelligence to reimagine 200 years of art from the famous museum’s permanent collection. And something similar happened at Pitti Fragranze with Symbiotic Experience, perception reinvented, an installation whose protagonists were 4 digital artists who work with Artificial Intelligence to inspire the sillages composed for the occasion by 4 important noses: Alberto Morillas, Coralie Spicher, Serge Majoullier and Jérôme Di Marino. The result? A unique, immersive, synaesthetic experience, where physical and reinvented reality find a perfect point of union. Smell in the Metaverse may sound strange as smell is the only sense not perceived in the virtual world, yet at Pitti Fragranze we tried to overcome this boundary with Agharti, the perfume of the Metaverse. The new Italian brand Agharti Scent Score has proposed four fragrances, all based on sustainable ingredients and enclosed in bottles inspired by the Metaverse. The creative director, Barbara Loddo, owner of Aquacosmetics, imagined the stages of a journey towards the center of our planet in a magical world. Fragrances materialize from the four essential elements for life, starting with the green scent of the earth to arrive at the refreshing one of water, passing through the heat of fire and the lightness of air. The 4 jus: Hidden Shores, Burning Core, Floating Lands and Waterways Spell, were orchestrated under the supervision of the essential house Mane.
Artistic perfumery, the news on stage at Pitti Fragranze 21
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The new purchasing methods and the new olfactory lexicon
The change has been underway for several years, social media increasingly influences our lives and could not fail to have an impact on the universe of fragrances. The age range of those who purchase niche perfumes has shrunk. They are young people aged 20-25 and above who are looking for something particular because they have seen it on channels like Instagram and Tik Tok. Just mention a few numbers: #perfume has 23 billion views, while #fragrances have 10 billion (considering all social media, ed.). The new players are the influencers, such as Alessandro Malandruccolo (@alexperfume) with over 530 thousand followers on IG and Matilda Morri (@sssinister_), who collects over 700 thousand views on Tiktok, who describe the perfume with an evocative, immediate and provocative language, which it focuses more on performance than on raw materials, sweeping away the superstructures of an elite sector, such as niche perfumery. With their bizarre expressions, without knowing it, they have democratized a closed sector, bringing Gen Z closer to niche fragrances. But is this change a good thing? Like all changes, questions and doubts arise. According to Matteo Stringhini, owner of 50ml, a shop in Milan but strong in online sales, many young people buy a perfume sight unseen without smelling it. According to him, a “blind” purchase made on the Internet should always be accompanied by a sample, so that the person can smell the perfume and understand whether what he has chosen is actually his perfume and also give him the possibility of returning it if he does not find its taste. He, however, has doubts about the language that influencers use and a fear for the future, Roberto Drago, co founder of Kaon and Laboratorio Olfattiva, with 37 years of experience in the sector. «Perfume needs a story, if you are paid it is dangerous to talk about a perfume in an absolute way, and not in a personal way, also without telling its story, what lies behind its creation, the artistic activity of the nose. Today I see a barbarization, it seems to have become more important to bend to the logic of turnover and address those who have no skills, those who only have followers and are paid to talk about it. This does not respect the brand and much less the consumer. I also see another danger, there is the risk of bypassing the work of the shopkeeper who sells perfumes and knows the sector well, which is instead essential. Clearly not all influencers are incompetent, but the medium remains dangerous for the artistic perfumery sector, with the strong risk of giving itself over to commercial perfumery.”
A journey through the time of artistic perfumery
21 years have passed since the first Pitti Fragranze was held in the lemon house of the Giardini Corsini, owned by Princess Giorgiana Corsini, and then after a few years it changed location, for organizational reasons: there were too many exhibitors, and landed at the Leopolda. Twenty years that have seen artistic perfumery evolve more and more, with important changes, some too incisive to the point of making it less elitist. Ulrich Lang, Laura Bosetti Tonatto, Raffaello Napoleone and Lorenzo Villoresi retraced this journey, encouraged in their stories by the journalist Mariangela Rossi. The most impactful memories? Villoresi recalled a famous phrase by Jacques Guerlain to make a perfume you need: patience, patience and patience. And in recent years it seems that everything must be fast and immediate, but perfume is not a minestrone as Laura Bosetti Tonatto said, it takes time, you have to study rigorously, you can’t improvise and human contact is fundamental. Everyone agrees that it is important to use social media, but you shouldn’t let yourself be used, they serve to amplify your business, not to distort it.