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History of the house
The Celine house, originally Céline, was founded in Paris in 1945 by Céline Vipiana and her husband Richard. The company began as a made-to-measure children's shoe house, before moving over the following decades towards women's ready-to-wear, accessories and luxury leather goods. The house name takes the first name of its founder, born in 1915 and who died in 1997.
Over time, Celine established itself as a reference of restrained Parisian chic. The house came under the control of the LVMH group in 1996. It then went through several notable creative directorships, including that of Michael Kors at the turn of the 2000s, and that of Phoebe Philo between 2008 and 2018, who set out a highly influential minimalist aesthetic often cited as a template of contemporary quiet luxury. Through these decades, Celine's identity was built around leather goods and a pared-back wardrobe, with no structured fragrance activity, which makes its 2019 choice to return to perfume through the high end rather than a licence all the more striking.
In 2018, LVMH appointed Hedi Slimane as artistic, creative and image director of the house. Slimane removed the accent from the logo, which became Celine, and considerably broadened the brand's scope by launching menswear, couture and fragrance. He left the house in October 2024, and Michael Rider succeeded him as creative director in 2025.
Perfume holds a particular place in this project. Celine had not launched a fragrance since Vent Fou in 1964. In returning to this activity, Slimane chose not a mainstream licensed perfume but a haute parfumerie collection conceived as an extension of his own aesthetic, in the couturier-parfumeur tradition.
It is in this context that the Celine Haute Parfumerie was created in 2019, and it is now the house's anchor in niche perfumery and the heart of what makes it of interest to enthusiasts.
Celine Haute Parfumerie, the niche collection of the house
Created in 2019 by Hedi Slimane, Celine Haute Parfumerie is the house's niche collection and its first fragrance since 1964. It gathers eleven unisex eaux de parfum, nine of them available at the autumn 2019 launch, presented in a dedicated Haute Parfumerie boutique opened on rue Saint-Honoré in Paris. The collection explicitly claims the couturier-parfumeur tradition and the craft of French high perfumery.
Most of the compositions draw on Paris and its imagination. Saint-Germain-des-Prés evokes a neighbourhood and a certain Parisian bourgeoisie, Dans Paris and Cologne Française extend that anchoring, while Eau de Californie stands apart by drawing on the light of Los Angeles. Other perfumes translate Slimane's personal world: Black Tie transposes his sharp, androgynous wardrobe, and Nightclubbing recalls the Parisian nights of his youth as a club-goer.
The collection is unisex, concentrated as eau de parfum, and distributed exclusively by the house, outside the selective perfumery channel. The bottles share a common pared-back identity, faithful to Slimane's minimalist graphic direction. The opening of a dedicated Haute Parfumerie boutique, separate from the fashion stores, signals a wish to treat fragrance as a world of its own rather than a by-product of couture.
One trait clearly sets Celine Haute Parfumerie apart: the house does not disclose the identity of its perfumers. Hedi Slimane claims a personal olfactive direction and signs the collection as an author, without crediting the noses who built the formulas. For this reason the perfumer attributions remain undisclosed, and Osmetheca repeats none of the speculative attributions that circulate.
It is through this collection, rather than a licensed fragrance, that Celine holds its place in niche perfumery: an author-led, Parisian and confidential haute parfumerie, anchored in the identity of a couture house.
Notable perfumes
Here are seven Celine Haute Parfumerie compositions, all from the 2019 launch. As the house does not disclose the identity of its perfumers, that column is marked as undisclosed. The olfactive register is given only where documented by the house; otherwise the stated inspiration is noted.
| Year | Perfume | Perfumer | Register / inspiration |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Cologne Française | Undisclosed | Citrus cologne |
| 2019 | Eau de Californie | Undisclosed | Fresh, Californian inspiration |
| 2019 | Saint-Germain-des-Prés | Undisclosed | Parisian inspiration |
| 2019 | Dans Paris | Undisclosed | Parisian inspiration |
| 2019 | Black Tie | Undisclosed | Woody chypre, iris and moss |
| 2019 | Nightclubbing | Undisclosed | Green chypre, galbanum and patchouli |
| 2019 | Parade | Undisclosed | Daytime fragrance |
Olfactive signature
Celine's perfumery stands out for its coherence and its rarity. Unlike most couture houses, which run a mass-market line alongside a confidential collection, Celine relaunched its perfumery only through a single haute parfumerie collection, with no licensed pillar. The house signature therefore merges with that of the Haute Parfumerie.
The writing is firmly Parisian and literary. It favours classic registers of French perfumery, from cologne to chypre and woody accords, treated with precision rather than display. Several compositions sit within the tradition of the great French structures, such as the cologne of Cologne Française or the moss and iris of Black Tie, while Nightclubbing takes on a darker green chypre.
The direction of the collection is that of a single author, Hedi Slimane, who conceived the whole as a coherent project until his departure in 2024. On the map of olfactive schools, Celine belongs to a contemporary author-led French perfumery, at the crossroads of couture and high perfumery.
What makes the collection legible is this unity of tone: a sober, Parisian and concentrated perfumery whose deliberate rarity and silence on the perfumers are fully part of the image. That unusual opacity is itself an editorial trait of the house.