Legacy in a Bottle: Perfumer Xavier Blaizot on working with Grace de Monaco

The work of a perfumer is always full of challenges, but having the honuor of composing for the first luxury charity fragrance brand carrying the legacy of one of the most beloved princesses in the world is not an easy task.

We reached out to Xavier Blaizot, the young perfumer behind Grace De Monaco's latest scent, Ombre Sereine, to discover his approach to designing his debut fragrance for the maison.

What sparked your fascination for scent, and could you please share your path into perfumery with us?

My journey to my role is both straightforward and complex. I am a seventh-generation perfumer, and I still have relatives who are also perfumers. I always knew I wanted to work in perfumery, but my interest initially lay more closely to ingredient sourcing. I was fascinated by all the trips that my father and grandfather took to source the best ingredients.

I initially started studying chemistry but soon switched to an MBA in economics and started working in fragrance sales. Towards the end of my MBA, I started looking for a position that would give me the space to learn the art of olfaction so that I could talk more about fluently about perfumes and fragrance. I was lucky enough to be hired by Robertet, where I truly discovered and developed what is now a passion. Michel Almairac and Christophe Maubert then offered me a position at the Robertet Perfumery school, where I studied for two years.

As I cultivated my budding career in fragrance, I spent time in Mexico City and New Jersey, working as a perfumer. Since then, I have taken over my father’s company, PCW in Grasse, where I strive to continue the art of perfumery while also reinventing and refreshing it in my own way.

Ombre Sereine marked your debut for Grace de Monaco. What captivated you about the brand?

The honour of creating a new fragrance for Grace de Monaco was captivating in itself. Their interest in collaborating with young fragrance creators was really refreshing to me, giving me the creative freedom to put my own mark on the project while delving into the Maison’s rich and complex history. The brand maintains a rare balance of haute luxury, modern appeal, and bon goût that resonated with me immediately.

Grace de Monaco's unique brand ethos is deeply intertwined with supporting upcoming artists and the arts. As a perfumer, how do you navigate the balance between art, science, and innovation?

I could talk about this for hours! From a perfumer’s perspective, art comes into play whenever we find inspiration, have a vision, or create expansively within a brief. Personally, there’s no better feeling than having someone smell one of my creations and describe it using the exact descriptors that I had originally intended to convey. When it comes to science, it really lies in the ingredients.

During my time at Robertet, I worked extensively with natural blends and finding ways to layer unknown natural ingredients within my creations. I like to give my fragrances that edge. For example, I’m constantly working on new methods of extraction from natural sources.

For Ombre Sereine, I also employed natural molecules from a green chemical process – these new materials offer creators an opportunity to explore a whole new olfactive world.

We would love to learn more about Ombre Sereine! It introduces quite new and provocative facets to Grace de Monaco's fragrance line. Can you tell us more about your creative process for the scent?

When we first talked about Ombre Sereine, there wasn’t yet a set brief – it really all came from a conversation about the princess. During the conversation I started to envision an atmosphere, like in a dark room with a wonderful view, where the drapes and the carpet were lending a dusty and amber-like scent. In my head I could also hear some melancholic classic music in the background. In this vision, Princess Grace was having an indistinct yet somehow enticing conversation. With this vision in mind, I set about revisiting some classic 1970s fragrances, keeping the retro baseline without the traditional overpowering aldehydic / floral top note. I have a fascination for the chypre from the 1970s and 1980s so this was another starting point for Ombre Sereine.

I then deep-dived the natural flora of Monaco’s surrounding area, picking out Jasmine, Fleur d’Oranger and Mimosa to name just a few. The finishing touch and most provocative facet of the fragrance is a note complex that I had been working on for a long time, which attempts to mimic the elusive, mineral smell of the rock – reminiscent of the famous promenade, the city and the coastline.

Which key elements of Grace de Monaco's heritage inspired you for Ombre Sereine?
What was the most inspiring to me was her charisma, her legacy and the enduring fascination that people have with her – even decades after her passing.

This is what lies behind the balance of assertion and elegance in the creation. I wanted the fragrance to express independence, class and confidence – a tribute to everything the Princess represented.

How is Princess Grace’s iconoclastic imagery evoked in the fragrance?

There are so many small nods to her life and presence hidden in the scent.

I’ve already touched on my olfactive interpretation of rocks, which evokes the sea-soaked rocks of Monaco.
I also read that she enjoyed retreats higher inland in the mountains, where the floral landscapes include more lavender and rosemary. With that in mind, I worked closely with a lavender producer from Provence to carefully select the extracts I wanted to work with.

The composition is truly unexpected and full of sophisticated surprises, from leathery facets paired with creamy white florals, deep tobacco, and sunsoaked aromas from the Southern French Coast—a true delight for the cosier weather!

How did you work on interplaying such different facets to unite them in Ombre Sereine?

It felt self-evident that the composition would need to incorporate some dichotomies of the complex versus the simple, the modern versus the classic.

I reflected carefully on how to represent these different aspects of the fragrance before I set about creating it, but once I had a clear vision, it came together quite quickly. As a creator, it’s hard to know when a fragrance is finished – I always think I could refine a composition further.

This is why I like working with a creative director, so that there is someone to take a more objective approach to the finished product.

I like getting stuck into the detail and the creative director can help take a step back and find the perfect balance for the final product.

We'd love to end the interview by bridging the power of scent with the role of memory, and we would love to know: what is one of your most treasured scent memories?

One of my strongest scent memories is of my mother.

In the mid 1990s she was one of the first women to wear Mugler’s Angel, as my father was working at Quest back then. I have a very vivid memory of my mother dressed up in a black dress, in front of her mirror in the bathroom.

She was ready to go out, the babysitter had arrived, and I was watching my mother adding the final touches to her look before going out. Angel was the very last touch, sprayed around her neck, so when she walked out the gourmand scent was diffused throughout the house. Every time I smell that fragrance, I think of her and the memory of her getting ready in the mirror.