"You can't see what I do, which gives perfumery a sense of magic": Perfumer Geza Schoen Shares

'In those days, it was rare to want to train as a perfumer. You were fully aware that it wasn't Karl Lagerfeld actually creating his fragrances but the role of the nose wasn't so clear'. [Geza] Schoen's father was an art teacher, and as a result he "was exposed to lots of weird things at an early age" and creativity was fully encouraged. Unusually, the young Schoen became fascinated by perfume samples and began to collect them, quickly teaching himself to identify the smells of each one blind. His formal training at the German company Haarman and Reimer took five years, in a class of just four students."

pic exclusively provided for Perfume Shrine: Geza Schoen on the left, with Thorsten Biehl on the right

AnOther magazine presents a documentary series focusing on international craftspeople, in partnership with discerning Egyptian jewellery house Azza Fahmy, and the fifth instalment focuses on Schoen and his fascinating world of niche perfumes (both for his own Escentric Molecules, the memorable blue Wode for Boudicca, the Ormonde Jayne and the Biehl Parfumkunstwerke GS lines).

"I think smell is the most powerful sense we have, and the most fascinating. It is also quite mystical – you can't see what I do, which gives perfumery a sense of magic."

You can watch the feature on this link. Text by Laura Bradley, Film by Stefan Heinrichs

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: Iso E Super and Geza Schoen, GS03 for Biehl Parfumkunstwerke fragrance review.