BERLIN — You could call it an afterglow, bottled.
German niche perfume brand Humiecki & Graef’s seventh fragrance, called Bosque, is meant to evoke a certain kind of contentment.
The new release features notes of narcisse absolute (narcissus poeticus), buffalo grass, grapefruit and saffron, to represent glowing yellow tones and the smell of warm skin.
As the brand’s co-owner Tobias Müksch said, “[Bosque] is very warm, and has a certain sweetness, a flowery note. But [it is] still fresh.” The name is meant to bring to mind a small wooded forest dappled with light.
The fragrance was created for Müksch and Sebastian Fischenich, also co-owner of Humiecki & Graef, by Les Christophs, the union of independent perfumers Christophe Laudamiel and Christoph Hornetz, who used ingredients supplied by Firmenich. Les Christophs have an ongoing relationship with Humiecki & Graef and, together or separately, the two noses have created all seven scents.
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Müksch describes the creative partnership as a passing of ideas between the two pairs.
“We start writing the book, and Les Christophs finish it off,” said Müksch. “And then it comes back to us for the book cover.”
In the case of Bosque, this cover is the scent’s plain glass bottle, which features a linen-textured, paper ribbon printed with the scent’s name in light yellow-green, and is topped with a rustic-looking, yellow-green fired pottery cap, made with a salt-glaze technique that results in a crackled surface.
Two advertising visuals for the scent each feature a reclining nude, one a man, one a woman, amidst rumpled white bedsheets.
Bosque, a unisex, 100-ml. eau de toilette spray, is priced at 149 euros, or $199.22 at current exchange.
Industry sources estimate that Humiecki & Graef’s total sales will be more than $5 million this year. Frank Koehler, co-owner of Aroma Company, which distributes Humiecki & Graef, predicts that, based on presales, Bosque will quickly sell out of its initial production run of 3,500 bottles, which would translate to retail sales of $717,829, and he has already started discussing plans for a follow-up production run with Fischenich.
“Bosque could easily be the best seller of the line,” said Koehler, whose firm also distributes the Mark Buxton, Montale and Histoires de Parfums brands. “Where Creed is on the market, in five years, Humiecki & Graef could be there. We get unbelievably good feedback for the brand.”
Humiecki & Graef’s poetic, niche approach to fragrance has proven especially popular with customers in Russia and the Ukraine. The brand’s sixth fragrance, Clemency, a November 2009 launch said to evoke “a mother’s pride,” was a strong seller in Eastern Europe for International Women’s Day March 8, an important gift-giving holiday in the region.
Romania, Slovakia and Khazikstan are new markets for the brand and, in the next few months, the line is set to enter Pakistan, Saudia Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Dubai, where entry into Harvey Nichols and Bloomingdale’s is planned. However, the home countries of those two big stores, the U.K. and U.S., respectively, remain elusive markets for Humiecki & Graef.
Bosque was unveiled concurrently at the Esxence fragrance fair in Milan, which ran from March 25 to 28, and at the Global Art of Perfumes fair in Düsseldorf, which ran from March 26 to 28.