Our interview with Mark Buxton, a Paris-based British master perfumer with over 40 years of experience creating iconic fragrances for luxury houses like “Comme des Garçons”, “Givenchy”, “Versace”, and “Cartier”. Known for his daring, modern style and passion for niche scents, he later launched his own perfume line, “Mark Buxton Perfumes”.
The Fashiongton Post: Mark, which raw material do you think is currently misunderstood or underused by younger perfumers?
Mark Buxton: I would say natural materials are very often misunderstood or underused because many younger perfumers do not yet fully know how to work with them. Natural ingredients are very powerful, they can easily become overwhelming and they contain many different facets. You need experience to truly understand how they behave in a formula and how to fully exploit their complexity and reactions within a composition.
F.P.: If you could erase one trend from modern niche perfumery forever, what would it be?
M.B.: I would not erase anything, actually, because there are trends which mark the industry, which I like and some which I dislike, but still I would not say I would erase them. For example, there is one trend with all these aquatic Muguet notes, like Lily of the Valley components, which for me are very cold and synthetic. It has never been a trend which I liked. And if fragrances are too green, very aggressive green, synthetic green, this is also something I don’t really like. I more prefer warmer fragrances. But I would not erase it. I would just say it is not really my cup of tea.
F.P.: Many consumers now buy perfumes through social media hype without smelling them first. Has this changed the way fragrances are being created?
M.B.: This is something which has come up in the last 10 years very strongly, something we simply didn’t have before… I would not say that it has changed the way of creating fragrances.
This young population enjoys purchasing fragrances online. They listen to bloggers, what they have to say, the way they sell it, the feelings they try to transmit. I do not think it has changed the way we create fragrances, but it has changed the way we are selling fragrances. This was something which did not exist 10 years ago, and I actually find it quite fascinating.
F.P.: Which city in the world smells the most inspiring to you right now?
M.B.: I would say Florence. It is one of my favorite cities in the world, and I think it smells beautiful. Although it is close to the river, you never get that stagnant watery smell you often notice in cities like Venice or Amsterdam. Florence feels warm and cosy, full of inspiring aromas from small restaurants, open markets, and everyday street life. It is incredibly inspiring to me.
F.P.: What does “good taste” in perfumery actually mean to you — and can it even be taught?
M.B.: That’s a difficult question because everyone has their own taste. People wear what appeals to them personally and what suits them emotionally. You cannot teach a good taste. You can have a good feeling for a movement or a new movement which could come up in the future in perfumery by experimenting with new chemicals or new natural products which have come out. Originality may be a good taste! I think every perfumer has his own taste , but not always his own handwriting. That is something you have to teach yourself, and work on it every day: When you put five perfumes on a table and ask several people , who are the creators behind them, and one of them should be mine, I’m sure you (they) can pick it out because I have a certain style (hand writing), that makes the difference.
F.P.: What’s more difficult today: creating something commercially successful or something artistically relevant?
M.B.: I think the easiest thing is to create something more commercial, where you expect the fragrance to have a big success. It has to do with following trends and seeing that a certain type or family of fragrances is performing particularly well at the moment and with a lot of success. You twist something around that, and you know that it will most likely have a greater commercial success than if you do something really artistic. But what I prefer working on myself is something more artistic, different, and creative. I do not want everybody to wear the same fragrance. I think to create something distinctive, you have to be different and you have to dare more, and sometimes go completely overboard creatively. That’s it.
F.P.: Do you think niche perfumery has become too polished and safe?
M.B.: Yes, to some extent it has. Niche perfumery has grown enormously over the past fifteen years, and after working almost exclusively with niche brands for nearly twenty years, I’ve noticed that many brands are starting to copy each other or trickle down or twist off big successful fragrances… You see countless reinterpretations or variations of highly successful fragrances like Baccarat Rouge 540 or Black Afgano, just to name a few.The industry has become more polished, but also less daring. At the end of the day, niche perfumery has become a huge business, and everyone wants to sell as much as possible. The more daring a fragrance is, the more difficult it is to sell.
F.P.: Which fragrance note do you personally wear differently now than you did 20 years ago?
M.B.: For the last 40 years, I have been wearing Vetiver fragrances and started off with the Guerlain. Then I changed to the “Vettiveru” from “Comme des Garçons”, which I created years back. And then I changed to the “Emotional Drop”, which is in my black series, which is also Vetiver theme. And lately I am wearing a fragrance which I created in my series called “Wild Wild Wood”, a modern innovative woody note. So, for 20 years I am just wearing my own creations.
F.P.: After decades in fragrance, what still gives you the same excitement you had at the beginning?
M.B.: Well, the excitement you get every day because this is an endless hobby. You can do millions of combinations and it will always smell different. So every day brings something new.
It is just an excitement every day and I do not think I have ever gotten up in the morning where I said to myself I don’t feel like going to work. It is not a job actually, it is my hobby, a part of my life. There is a new challenge every day and there is so much to explore: you learn something new every day. That’s what I love about this job.
F.P.: Traditionally, your piece of advice to The Fashiongton Post readers?
M.B.: Follow your gut feeling, wear whatever you like, do not pay attention if it says “for him” or “for her”. If you like an odor, if you like a fragrance, wear it, discover it, live with it. Be open. I think we still have more room in the niche world to find something different and distinctive!
• Official site of Mark Buxton: www.markbuxton.com
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