ESCENTRIC MOLECULES Escentric 05

"Cashmeran is dry, radiant, warm and woody with an unexpected touch of pine resin," says Geza Schoen. "That gave me the idea to create a different kind of summer fragrance. I wanted to evoke what it was like to be by the sea, but not using the usual marine notes, which I find too artificial. Instead, I wanted to recreate the experience of being on an island in the Mediterranean.

The top note of Escentric 05 is very simple: bergamot to keep things light and orange, an ingredient that has an emotional, bright and cheerful tone. It reflects the orange trees that cover this island.

Laurel and rosemary are typical Mediterranean plants with a spicy freshness, juniper brings an herbal tonality and cypress is a very dry and spicy wood.

The drydown has two classic Mediterranean ingredients, cistus labdanum and mastic. Putty is a resin produced by a small tree that grows especially near the sea. It has the clean, pungent aroma of freshly cut branches. Cistus is a small plant that grows everywhere in the Mediterranean. It has a sweet, leathery, balsamic quality that I love. And, of course, there's about 15% cashmere, which gives the fragrance its piney warmth.

I also introduced a subtle fig, both the bitterness of the leaves and the ripeness of the fruit. The figs had to be there because there is a fig tree next to our house on the island. Fig feels authentic to the place, it reminds me of the happiness of summer by the sea.