Cover Henry Jacques’ Les Toupies brings together three fragrance duos in spinning top-inspired crystal flacons designed for interaction
Henry Jacques’ Les Toupies brings together three fragrance duos in spinning top-inspired crystal flacons designed for interaction
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Les Toupies, a collection from French perfume house Henry Jacques, brings together three fragrance duos in mouth-blown crystal flacons inspired by the spinning top—delicate, but designed for interaction
A perfume, on its own, tells one story; when paired with a counterpart, it tells another entirely. It is this premise that lies at the heart of Les Toupies, the signature fragrance series from French perfume house Henry Jacques.
Founded by Henry and Yvette Cremona in the south of France in the 1970s, Henry Jacques was built on the belief that perfume is a form of personal expression rather than mass-market commodity. The house has only ever produced small-batch releases, with an emphasis on rare raw materials and bespoke craftsmanship.
The Les Toupies collection consists of three fragrance duos— each pairing two perfumes that complicate and enrich one another when experienced together. The three pairings are distinct in their dynamic.
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Above The Les Toupies collection
Above A closer look at the flacon detail of the Les Toupies collection
The Les Toupies collection
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The first, Mr H and Mrs Y—a tribute to the brand’s founders—is the most intimate of the three. Mr H opens with the crisp clarity of cedar leaf and geranium before settling into sandalwood, tobacco and amber; Mrs Y answers with ylang-ylang, rose damascena and jasmine, then softens into iris and lily of the valley.
Fanfan and Galileo complement each other because of a shared note: lavender. Galileo opens with patchouli, Italian mandarin and the purple flower before deepening into tobacco, myrrh and amber. Fanfan follows with saffron, rose damascena and lavender.
The most charged of the three pairs is No 16 and No 81. No 81 opens with a crisp burst of bergamot and grapefruit before unfolding into smoke, wood and spice, while No 16 answers with Rose de Mai.
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Above The Les Toupies flacon in the making
Above a finished bottle from the Les Toupies collection
The Les Toupies flacon in the making
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Henry Jacques has long treated the flacon as an extension of the perfume itself. The house’s artistic director, Christophe Tollemer, is a distinguished French architect and interior designer whose most celebrated work is Le Grand Contrôle—an ultra-luxury hotel set within the royal grounds of Versailles, where he transformed a series of historic buildings into a lavish 18th-century retreat.
That architectural sensibility extends to his flacon work. Tollemer spent over three years developing the Les Toupies flacon, a design that draws its name and form from the spinning top: each mouth-blown crystal bottle is multifaceted and symmetrical, yet deliberately without a base on which to stand it upright. The intention is simple—to take something precious off the highest shelf, and make it an object people reach for, turn in their hands and keep close.
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Cathy Huang is the fashion editor of Tatler Hong Kong, overseeing fashion and lifestyle coverage in both English and Traditional Chinese.
