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To put it in one sentence, the event was a marketplace. But then it didn’t pretend to be anything else. Yes, the idea of perfumery as an artistic endeavour was never far below the surface of its frenetic atmosphere, but the focus was on selling, which is why the attendees who elicited the brightest sparkles in the brand-owners’ eyes were the buyers and the distributors. Given how explicitly transactional the whole shindig was, I confess I was somewhat surprised by the negativity with which so many described it. Indeed, of the people I spoke to who’d attended before, not a single one stated that this year’s event was an improvement on previous editions. The only aspect they felt able to praise was the layout.
To read the rest of this article, please click on this link to my Substack: Leonardo And The 10% – Esxence 2025. Please note the article is free to read.
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As I can’t comment at the substack (not being a paying subscriber) let me say here that I entirely agree. Apart from the selection of attention-worthy smaller brands that you have mentioned (among them some of my favorites, like Parfum d’Empire, Papillon and Hiram Green), would it not be a good start just to make a full list of those that you discovered at Exsence 2025? It would go some way to supporting them – I will not be the only person to seek them out based solely on them being named by you – and would be much less work than showcasing their perfumes in detail.
Thanks very much for writing, Sebastian.
Even though not all the brands in the list in the Substack article were at Esxence, I think they’d make an excellent starting point.
I find myself drawn more and more to the small, hard-to-find fragrance lines. Some have unique fragrances . Others just have a fragrance I enjoy. The big budget houses may get all the attention, but fragrance is more personal for me. I wear fragrance to please myself, not to smell like everyone else.
That’s wonderful — keep doing what you do. And if you find some gems, maybe you could let us know about them.
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