António Paraíso, Luxury Marketing Consultant – The Century-Old Perfume Tribute to a visionary woman

Gabrielle Chanel was a woman who was ahead of her time. She was a fashion designer, businesswoman, extravagant Rolls Royce driver, she spied for the Germans during World War II, lived at the legendary Ritz Hotel in Paris, was a lady of French high society and lover of powerful men. In 1921, she created a perfume which, 100 years later, is considered the most iconic in the world. Marilyn Monroe said she wore a drop of CHANEL No. 5 to bed and nothing else. Andy Warhol, the king of pop art, created nine colourful paintings of the bottle, which are on display at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
Coco CHANEL was educated at a convent school and her main olfactory memory was the smell of soap in the bath.
In the 1920s, fashion houses created their own perfumes for loyal customers. Gabrielle did the same and thought of the scent of soap from her youth. 
While on holiday on the Côte d’Azur with her lover, Grand Duke Dimitri Pavlovich, she met Ernest Beaux, a perfumer who had worked for the Russian Royal Family. She commissioned him to create a perfume and Beaux presented her with 10 samples numbered from 1 to 5 and from 20 to 24. Gabrielle chose No. 5 without hesitation.
It is said that sample No. 5 is the result of a laboratory error, as Beaux’s assistant inadvertently added an excessive dose of aldehyde, a chemical ingredient that smells like soap.
The designer then said: ‘This is exactly the perfume I was looking for. The fragrance of the emancipated woman.’ It symbolises the balance between adolescence and luxurious adult life. 
Chanel was a bold and visionary woman. She secretly planned a marketing ploy. She invited friends to lunch at a fancy restaurant on the French Riviera. She perfumed the room with a spray bottle of CHANEL No. 5. Ladies would walk by and ask what that mysterious perfume was. It was then that she knew the perfume would be a hit. A unique moment in the history of perfumery.
But Gabrielle could never have imagined that this scent would enjoy more than a hundred years of success.