Amouage - Love Hibiscus

LOVE HIBISCUS
Amouage Returns to the Secret Garden

written ALBAN E. SMAJLI

Amouage has always understood perfume as a form of architecture, structured, atmospheric, dense with material memory. With Love Hibiscus, the Omani house returns to its Secret Garden Collection through a composition that treats floral sweetness as something more unstable, more textural, and more emotionally charged than the usual language of prettiness allows.

The Secret Garden Collection was first introduced in 2016 and reinterpreted in 2024, with each fragrance built around the meeting of a flower and a gourmand note. Love Hibiscus continues that principle, yet its point of departure feels unusually grounded. Renaud Salmon, Chief Creative Officer of Amouage, found the central flower not in an abstract fantasy of femininity, but in the daily landscape of Oman, where hibiscus grows with a vividness that is immediately visual before it becomes olfactive. Its petals suggest colour, heat, paper, fragility, a kind of botanical theatre that does not need to be softened into romance.

Hibiscus is a difficult flower to translate into scent, because many varieties are almost odourless, and the note is often understood through infusion. In Love Hibiscus, this gives the fragrance its most interesting tension, the flower is approached through tartness, red fruit, herbal depth and a slightly earthy undertone, closer to the sensation of hibiscus tea. Love Hibiscus is precise and sensorial, with a sour brightness that cuts through the composition from the opening.

Jérôme Epinette, creating his first fragrance for Amouage, builds the scent around hibiscus, salted caramel, passion fruit, bergamot, iris, frankincense, sandalwood, cypriol and vanilla. The opening brings passion fruit and bergamot into the sharper register of hibiscus, giving the fragrance a bright, almost edible acidity. Salted caramel enters with a buttery warmth drawn from Salmon’s childhood memory of palmiers, the sugar-coated puff pastry associated here with domestic kitchens, folded dough and caramelised edges. The memory stays tactile and specific, carried by the sensation of folded dough, caramelised sugar and the warmth of a kitchen surface still holding the trace of preparation.

That is where Love Hibiscus becomes most aligned with the current moment in perfumery. Gourmand fragrances no longer need to announce sweetness as indulgence alone. The more interesting direction is material, where sugar becomes surface, butter becomes texture, fruit brings acidity and vanilla settles into shadow. Love Hibiscus belongs to this movement without losing the Amouage sense of density. Its gourmand element gives the hibiscus body, skin and a warmer afterimage, allowing the floral note to feel vivid, textured and fully held within the composition.

Frankincense, a material deeply connected to Oman and to the history of Amouage, plays an important role in keeping the composition from becoming purely confectionary. Here it appears soft, woody and luminous, creating a veil through which the fruit and caramel feel more diffused. Iris adds a subtle cosmetic dryness, while sandalwood, cypriol and vanilla give the base a rounded, lasting weight. The structure moves from vivid red brightness into something creamier and more resinous, with the hibiscus still present as a pulse. The flacon, presented in an intense hibiscus red with the Secret Garden Collection’s tactile ceramic finish, extends the fragrance’s language of saturated colour and surface.

From May 18th, 2026, Love Hibiscus will be available in 100ml Eau de Parfum, presented at €365. Its form carries the intensity of hibiscus red. Its essence holds the trace of flower, sugar, fruit and shadow.

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www.amouage.com

(c) all visuals
lemilestudios

Amouage *Decision and Existence

The Final Elevation
*Amouage's Decision & Existence

written MONICA DE LUNA

Jebel Shams, the high mountain of the sun, stands above Oman in stillness and breath. Here, light cuts through juniper crowns and stone holds silence. From this summit, two fragrances arise—Decision and Existence.

Amouage offers them as the final compositions in the Odyssey Collection, a series shaped by time and devotion to sacred terrain. Under the creative direction of Renaud Salmon and through the hands of Quentin Bisch, these perfumes were born from intention and presence. The mountain offered scenery—it became origin. Its altitude, texture, and rhythm entered each formula with care and clarity.

(c) AMOUAGE

(c) AMOUAGE

Decision opens with tension shaped into elegance. Pink pepper sparks first—sharp, clear, with a lift that stirs the senses awake. Bergamot follows, cool and radiant, while cardamom moves through it like a steady current. The opening carries momentum, structured with fine detail. Simply adorable!

The heart unfolds with depth. Incense forms the central pillar. Juniper, resinous and green, curves around it with dry intensity. Myrrh completes the triad with density and warmth. These materials rise in tandem, each one distinct, yet gathered into harmony. They offer an interior space, held open by intention. At the base, patchouli enters the composition with steady depth. Cedarwood adds clarity. Vanilla brings warmth with round edges and a golden tone. The drydown arrives without gesture or flourish, it simply remains. So Decision becomes atmosphere on the skin, surrounding without overtaking.

The fragrance speaks with still force. Each stage holds structure. Its power builds with weightless control, carried by a resinous column and settled through soft wood. Worn close, it pulses. Carried on air, it gathers presence.

Existence moves in a different register. Its beginning is luminous. Lily of the valley rises first, delicate, vivid. Rose enters beside it, open yet serene. These florals radiate quietly, suspended in light.

Incense appears once more, placed with precision. Mystikal blends into the heart, airy and translucent. Labdanum introduces a golden resin, smooth and glowing. These elements hover between substance and shimmer, never forming edges, always in motion.

The base gathers softness. Amber breathes gently across the foundation. White musk lifts it upward. Benzoin holds the finish, smooth and lasting. These accords rest within the skin’s warmth, diffusing slowly across time.

Existence creates a space of calm expansion. It breathes without urgency. The transitions move with ease. Every phase lingers with intention, offering light without projection, depth without density.

(c) AMOUAGE

also read
AMOUAGE PURPOSE 50 *An Extrait of Skin, Memory, and Resonance

(c) AMOUAGE

(c) AMOUAGE
Quentin Bisch

Both fragrances reflect the patience of their creation. Decision contains 33% pure perfume oil. Its formula matured for three weeks in maceration and two in rest. Existence carries 20% concentration, shaped by two weeks of each process. Every phase, from blending to bottle, received time as a central element.

Together, Decision and Existence form a pair based in parallel movement. Each fragrance travels its own line—Decision through earth, fire, but also spice; Existence through bloom, air, and light. Their bond is origin, their shared source the mountain that gave them breath.

Here, the journey continues.

From May 19th, 2025, Decision and Existence will be available in 100ml Eau de Parfum, each presented at €365.
Their form reflects dedication. Their essence carries the trace of elevation.

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AMOUAGE *Purpose 50

AMOUAGE PURPOSE 50
*An Extrait of Skin, Memory, and Resonance

written ALBAN E. SMAJLI

Amouage distills time, memory, and olfactory science into something beyond mere scent—an artifact of human essence. Purpose 50 Exceptional Extrait embodies intensity, a composition that commands presence.

Sitting in his Oman studio, overlooking the alchemical heartbeat of Amouage, Chief Creative Officer Renaud Salmon dissects its creation. “We call it an exceptional extrait,” he begins. At 50% pure perfume oil, Purpose 50 demands a recalibration of what perfume achieves, engaging with the skin in a way that shifts perception.

PURPOSE 50 / Exceptional Extrait
— a composition that inhabits the skin, crafted with 50% pure perfume oil,
frankincense, sandalwood, and vanillin form a resonance of depth and presence

Quentin Bisch, the nose behind it all, approaches perfumery without hesitation. “I add,” he declares. “Why repeat something that exists?” Purpose 50 emerges as a crafted entity with depth and intention. This fragrance follows an anatomy. Frankincense forms its vertebrae, shaped by the Omani landscape—a tree that endures, producing a resin unlike any other. “I was rediscovering Purpose in the air, on people’s skin,” Bisch recalls. The transition from creation to wearer reshaped its identity. “I looked at the tree again—its roots, its branches. A human form emerged, standing, grounded.”

This relationship between raw material and human experience adds texture. Sandalwood moves across the skin, its caress deliberate and immersive. Vanillin enhances its presence, drawing the senses in. A specific rose appears, designed for structure rather than decoration, binding the elements with a weightless elegance. Perfume vibrates, and Bisch tunes frequencies, seeking a precise accord. Vetiver and papyrus establish movement, incense pulses through the layers. Each addition amplifies the foundation. Purpose 50 carries a distinct resonance, existing beyond the boundaries of tradition.

“I was rediscovering Purpose in the air, on people’s skin. The transition from creation to wearer reshaped its identity.”

Quentin Bisch on Purpose 50

PURPOS 50 / Exceptional Extrait
—an olfactory force shaped by Oman’s soul

Renaud poses the essential question: Why do people call this the archetype of Amouage? Bisch responds without hesitation. “It carries Oman. It exists in freedom.” Purpose 50 demands skin, movement, and presence. “We categorize perfume like we categorize people,” Bisch reflects. “Who elects the ‘best’?”

Purpose 50 Exceptional Extrait resists classification. It extracts something from the wearer, a perfume designed to be felt rather than worn. Amouage shapes a force of creation, its presence extending beyond words, living within the space between sensation and memory.