In 2017, Oliver Polge, CHANEL’s master perfumer, created Gabrielle Chanel Eau De Parfum – a fragrance inspired by the free-spirited and rebellious spirit of the brand’s namesake, Gabrielle Chanel. I didn’t find Gabrielle particularly rebellious; at the time, I dubbed it a pretty floral abstraction with an ease of wear and a millennial lean. Others were less impressed, however. Now it seems CHANEL has taken heed.
Gabrielle Essence is a new addition to the Gabrielle family in 2019, a flanker Monsieur Polge says is inspired by the true essence of Gabrielle Chanel’s intensity that features, but reimagines Gabrielle’s floral quartet of jasmine, orange blossom, ylang-ylang and tuberose. Reflected in a more opulent composition than its predecessor’s luminous character, Essence “bestows a majestic role on tuberose, which is given a stronger presence and upheld by creamier notes to become more enveloping. Tuberose plays a key note and the headier trail sings in tune with greater intensity,” explains Polge.
CHANEL provides the below notes list, to which I would only add peach:
citrus notes, red fruits, jasmine, ylang-ylang, orange blossom, tuberose, sandalwood, vanilla, white musk
As is fair to expect of a flanker, Essence shares a familiarity to Gabrielle, composed again from the original’s four white florals, though in Essence the resultant floral abstraction is certainly more sumptuous. The opening rather drastically dials back the citrus fizz of Gabrielle, filling the void instead with red fruit and peach. The peach here is ripe, fleshy, its lactones lending a supremely velvety quality to the opening from which the florals emerge. Grasse tuberose is the mainstay of Essence’s floral accord – don’t let anyone tell you otherwise (I have seen jasmine mentioned, repeatedly) – and it certainly lends body to the composition. The tuberose, which CHANEL claims they have used ten times more of than in Gabrielle, features all of the blossom’s trademark intensity and creaminess with none of the indoles. Wanton as tuberose is, Essence amplifies its sultriness against the backdrop of ylang-ylang, and a rather heaping dose of orientalesque vanilla, sandalwood and musk.
Essence is dense, heady, sumptuous even – seemingly in beautiful rebuke to each of the criticisms made of Gabrielle. I thought of Gabrielle that it captured the innocence of the adolescent Gabrielle Chanel, but this, well this embodies the same woman coming into her own – more enigmatic, utterly self-assured, subversive and sultry – on her way to becoming Coco. Much of this newfound gusto is owed to Essence’s masterful working of tuberose, which in itself seems a self-assured masterstroke from Oliver Polge given that tuberose has never before played any significant part in the CHANEL fragrance palette; Gardenia and N°22 contain a soupçon, Gabrielle a trifle more, but tuberose has never before been the driving force in CHANEL composition. In Essence, Monsieur Polge has delivered a fuller, more sensual, more tempting perfume than Gabrielle, all the while maintaining a distinctly CHANEL style.
Year of Release: 2019
Perfumer: Olivier Polge
Alternatives: Guerlain Jardins de Bagatelle, Gucci Bloom Eau de Parfum
Available: CHANEL Beaute boutiques, MYER and David Jones from $175, 50ml