Besides being the main B2B show where you can find producers of raw materials, equipments and distributors, the event is a Congress featuring three days of conferences, round tables and discussions on the state of the industry, its future goals and how it is pursuing them, which gives a glimpse on various aspects and trends, from marketing to scientific research and above all the economic, environmental and social impact of perfumery.

The thing that always strikes me while strolling through the booths is the deep respect for the main professional tool, the nose for nobody sprays perfume, contrary to what happens in Perfume Shows. There’s no rush; professionals talk gently while dipping blotters and showing you their new specialties and their applications, and in case you spot supernovas of perfumery like Calice Becker, Ralph Schwieger or Emilie Copperman passing by, be sure to say good morning, for you’re not day-dreaming .

Registration and badge pick-up opened in the morning on June, 24, though the World Perfumery Congress officially kicked off in the late afternoon with the welcome cocktail at the PalExpo. The atmosphere was pretty surreal as the foyer looked like an 1980’s bank basement with a beaded grey ceiling embedding cold lights (even flickering ones) that could easily be the set for the next Lanthimos movie. Thankfully every kind of kindness was served, and meeting new and old faces including my fellow Essencional team members Karen Marin and Laurence Klove made everything enjoyable. Now let’s get through the main highlights from the Sensory Event for Fragrance Leaders, where Global Innovation & Creativity meet.

Talks & Panels

Tuesday morning the World Perfumery Congress came alive, and the packed calendar or talks and panels kicked off with the talk Leading Fragrance Claims: Charting the Trendsetters held by Aishwarya Rajpara, a Senior Research Analyst for the London based company Euromonitor International. Specialized in beauty and consumer health industry with a particular interest in fragrances, Mrs. Rajpara highlighted how for Gen Z customers are driven to by perfume for its mood-enhancing notes, while for millennials is key the expensive feel it exudes. So e.g. longevity which seems a current obsession is hopefully going to take a back seat. Speaking about marketing, “natural” is an ever-working claim, but in recent years “vegan” and “cruelty free” are gaining traction in Western Europe, reinforcing the first one as well. The highest growing claims with a +50% ramp-up in the last 3 years were “non-irritating”, “Sustainable sources” (packaging), and “Biodegradable” (packaging). If the first claim points out how safety is a non-negotiable value, the latter interestingly shows that the consumer is more and more aware of the environmental impact of his choices.

“AI helps me to think out of the box” – Symrise Senior Perfumer Pierre Guéros opened the panel The Perfumer’s Take on Artificial Intelligence with what sounds a warm welcome to this disruptive technology. He also added that AI like perfume is meant to provoke emotions, so they have more than what’s on the surface to share. Moreover it can predict in advance among thousand trials what will be the most successful for the public, speeding up the creative process of a perfumer. Moderator Simon Van Cauwerberge, project manager at Foodpairing AI, a Belgian company accelerating product development by using AI, passed the token to Robertet Senior Perfumer James Krivda who pointed out that he never saw an AI tool creating something new, so the perfumer still needs creativity, though he admitted they extend the exploration of combinations of raw materials as using them feels like you are “sculpting” a fragrance. “It still requires context understanding, but it’s a time saving tool. So we are left more time for creating something else” added Givaudan Senior Perfumer Linda Song. Interestingly Perfumer Christophe Laudamiel asked if AI proved to shorten the development process as many mods are actually developed and presented to customers for motivational and acceptance reasons as he pointed out. A candid admission about this came from Pierre Guéros – “I use AI every week, but for specific customers that are more interested in knowing he used it”. So while many fear it, surprisingly one more advantage of AI happens to be on the marketing side.

Wednesday started with what’s definitely the most touching, insightful, and original talk of the Congress, thanks to DSM-Firmenich Senior Perfumer Soraia de Costa Silva unfolding an up-close and personal speech in Renewing my journey as a perfumer. This highly communicative woman engaged the audience with her smile and singing accent, starting from her early days in Brazil as a quantum chemistry student when her love for the smell of places brought her to Paris to attend the ISIPCA. Thirty years have passed since she signed her first contract and a freshly graduated perfumer, and as she finds a great formula, she still feels the same joy scientists felt when the Higgs boson was discovered. The idea of exotics was something she never met before coming to Europe: for a native Brazilian, mango is a common fruit as much as strawberries are for Europeans, so for her the latter were exotic!

In 1991 over a class of 15 students at the ISIPCA, only 3 were non-European, and lessons were in French despite the school claimed to be international, and there was no such thing as “google translator”. Diversity and Inclusion came way later, and today classes are in English with an attendance including many foreign students. Another great change in these decades saw many more women managers compared to the past, and she’s also a mentor. Moreover if the past was all about French perfumery, now American perfumery is leading the market, and oud gave way to middle eastern scents, not to mention the current rise of Asian perfumes. The bigger lesson Mrs. De Costa Silva gave is we never have to fear challenges, for they bring innovation and opportunities; what happened with IFRA in the 1980s that pushed ingredients innovation, now we’re seeing with sustainability and biodegradability, that will bring us new interesting ingredients and make a better perfumery for the planet in our future. Last but not least, AI is a new tool that will help perfumers to create, but also to keep people at the center of the fragrance creation making it more and more customer-centered.

Like never before, the industry is putting at the center of its research people as well as our planet, as the most precious resource that perfumery must preserve. For real luxury itself, that often is paired with fragrances, sustainability is unquestionable nowadays. In this regard, Mane held the exciting talk Rescuing the rare: Pairing Genuine Plant Conservation with New Responsible Ingredient Creation featuring Victor Mane, Director of Creation, Fine Fragrance & Ingredients and Sophia Gillio, Director of Latin America Strategic Business development in dialog with the Director of Conservation Science – The Red List Project, Ph. D. Vanessa Hardley. Focusing of the endangered Caribbean Juniper, they explained how thanks to the sustainable patented extraction process of Jungle Essence, Mane has been able to map the olfactory profile of the tree which, as Senior Perfumer Mathilde Bijaoui well explained, bears beautiful laurel-like aromatic and balsamic hues paired with a deep vanillic sweetness. This not only allowed the fragrance house to enrich its palette with new raw materials including also Pacific Cycad, and Magnolia Mashpi, but to enter The Red List Project devolving part of its funds for the conservation of the species.

The last day of lectures opened with the talk “Documenting History through Scents,” that gave insights on the results of the three year-long Horizon 2020 Odeuropa Project*. Lecturer of the UCL Institute for Sustainable Heritage and representative for the project Cecilia Brembibre exposed the outcomes of the research aimed at engaging the sense of smell to enhance Western Europe’s heritage while producing accessible, open outputs to discover smells and stories. Thanks to many installations in museums and cultural institutions, the project proved how the use of scents in such contexts can attract a wider audience making the experience immersive, as well as provide historical and artistic context that bring artworks to life. Moreover smell can promote equality, diversity and inclusivity delivering multisensory enjoyment beyond sensory disabilities. Thanks to a pioneering cross-disciplinary initiative in collaboration with International Flavors & Fragrances, an Encyclopedia of Smell History and Heritage has been created where you can basically search for smells like “tobacco” e.g. and find references in famous paintings etc. An Historical Scent Collection of 12 reconstructions has been specifically created by La Fabrica, the team at IFF nurturing collaborations between artists, designers, cultural institutions and Creative Thinkers. Perfumer Bernard Fleming who steered the collaboration between IFF and Odeuropa** guided the public while smelling two iconic smells from the past. The unmistakable mix of medicinal clove and nutmeg carried by the sanitizing camphor-like freshness of rosemary and lavender (backed by the warmth of animal fixatives) immediately rendered the first archetype, the pomander that was used as a main remedy against the plague in the middle-ages. The second blotter delivered to the audience a vivid rendition of walking by the canals in Amsterdam during the golden age of the Dutch Master Painters. The rotten, almost fishy watery opening redolent of the vegetal earthiness of algae slowly delivered on paper the elegiac sweetness of linden blossoms. At the peak of summer the linden tree blossoms correspond with the apex of the stink rising from the water, filling the air and covering the stench with its intoxicating smell. That pretty much clarifies why canals are bordered with them, as explained Mr. Fleming.

Exhibiting Fragrance Companies

As a follow up of the coverage of the World Perfumery Congress where my Essencional fellow writer Laurence Klove highlighted some of the Fragrance Companies exhibiting, please find below more about my stroll through the booths with interesting new raw materials that are going to shape the fragrance landscape of tomorrow.

Agrumaria Reggina, which is among the main citrus companies in Reggio Calabria for what concerns the juice production, presented their first citrus oils library “Prima” targeting fine fragrance that is the outcome of the big investments done in recent years. I was particularly impressed by their red mandarin essential oil, which I could enjoy for its chilling juiciness in the fragrance application developed in partnership with Cinquieme Sens Paris.

Leveraging on their facilities in India, France and UAE, AAC – Associate Allied Chemicals is a fragrance ingredients supplier with an impressive selection of naturals and specialties. It was a pleasure listening to Principal CEO Corinne Maillan exposing their most exciting specialties and giving technical details that only a professional with more than 30 years in the field can rattle off this way. Smoother and with more pulp than the classic blackcurrant buds absolute, Aaravspirene is a specialty that lends excellent radiance and tartness to citrus and fruit accords.

One of the trendiest woods right now is sandalwood consciously sourced. AAC sandalwood oil from Mauritius bears an elegant greenness with rosy hues backed by the typical milky mellowness that make it an interesting competitor to top Caledonian oils. The last rarity I was presented with is vetiver oil from the Philippines, which joins the beautiful features of vetiver, i.e. the savory grapefruit sparkle of Haitian oil darkened by a gentle hint of the smoked cashew-like nuttiness of Javan oil.

One of the newest buzzed about raw materials joining the perfumer’s palette is lemon myrtle, and I was happy to discover it at Australian Native Products. Traditionally grown for the food industry where the leaves are used as a refreshing tea, Backhousia citriodora is a flowering plant in the family of myrtle, and it is endemic to Queensland, Australia. Slightly aromatic, lemon myrtle exudes a refreshing profile similar to verbena, with a modern sweet and savory twist.

Speaking about naturals, Italy got the lion’s share at WPC, and traditional and new Italian raw materials are going to be a big trend in the next future. Capua 1880 proved to be ahead of the game with its collection of charming florals. Smooth and elegant, the sparkling “floralness” of Fleur de Bergamote and the joyful burst of Fleur de Mandarin bring a vibrant top and heart note to modern colognes and trendy fruity accords. The gem in the collection though is Fleur de jasmin from Italian jasmine that exudes all the solar warmth and sweetness of Calabrian summer flowers, with just a olive oil balsamic hint making it even more sumptuous.

Speaking about Italian tradition, I was happy to meet Marika Cilione, who represents the 7th generation running the Cilione company based in Reggio Calabria. She was so kind to present to me their full collection of citrus oils, including the uberchic cedrat, and the trendy lime and blood orange. Of course I also smelled the mother of all citrus notes, bergamot; the raw oil is simply divine starting from its brownish color. I also smelled the furocoumarin-free and the bio bergaptene-free oils, and I was surprised by their richness despite the rectification process. All of them are also fully sustainable. In a word, exquisite.

Cosmo International Fragrances
Celebrating the “Latina Souls'' of Latin America, Cosmo International Fragrances proudly presents the outcomes of its investments in the region through two farms, one in Colombia and another in Peru, devoted to cultivating and sourcing exceptional natural raw materials through a unique “Latine” terroir. The exquisite petitgrain lime essence unfolds the zesty vegetal radiance of fresh leaves with a rich fruity hue. Another interesting release is Peruvian Ginger CO2 extracted from the dried rhizomes that exudes the piquant freshness of the highlands at the juncture of the Andes and the Amazon region backed by beautiful “mineralcy”. Highlighting the rich biodiversity of the region, they also brought the olfactory heritage of the sacred lands of the Incas in Peru with the multifaceted spiciness of Schinus Molle MD (molecular distillation) joining the terpenic freshness with warm balsamic and woody facets. Last but not least, I was happy to smell cacao blank CraftivityTM, a special extraction derived from white cacao beans and developed in collaboration with a master chocolatier that beguiles with balsamic and richly gourmand notes.

Conclusion

Attending the World Perfumery Congress always provides you a crystal ball for fragrance’s future, and top professionals from major industries or independent ones never miss the event for it fosters creativity in many ways and allows people to confront and circulate ideas. Moreover marketing and technical conferences always provide knowledge and professional growth, and make it always memorable. For all of these reasons everybody looks forward to WPC 2026!

See also our articles:

*Odeuropa

https://www.essencional.com/en/posts/odeuropa-documenting-our-olfactory-heritage/

**“Fleeting, Scents in Colour” An olfactory art exhibit at the Mauritshuis

https://www.essencional.com/en/posts/fragrant-moments-in-time-smelling-the-past-in-the-hague-1/