The nostalgic landscape of Diptyque’s Florabellio

For its new scent Florabellio, the French fragrance house collaborated with fine-art photographer Terri Weifenbach, whose images leave you remembering standing between  land and sea — and the scent of both.

The French fragrance house Diptyque likes to describe its various scents in stories and storyboards, in real landscapes and imagined scenarios.

It’s no different for its newest scent Florabellio, for which  the perfumer and maker of luxury candles collaborated with American fine-art photographer Terri Weifenbach, who is also an author and a teacher at two Washington, DC schools: Georgetown University and American University where she teaches film and media arts.

For Florabellio, Weifenbach took photos that depict the scent in an olfactory landscape — “a fragment of nostalgia, breaking through the barriers between memories and reality.”

Born in New York and raised in Maryland, the acclaimed photographer is the author of 10 books with two recent ones called Lana and The Politics of Flowers. Her photo book Lana is named after the town in Northern Italy where she took pictures between 1998 and 2001 — images of nature fragments, of  trees and flowers juxtaposed with spaces and colors, while The Politics of Flowers is a 150-page limited-edition book (only 250 copies were printed).

Weifenbach has been exhibiting globally for the past 15 years. Her work can be found at the Sir Elton John Photography Collection and the Museum of Ludwig in Germany. 

Her photos for Diptyque’s Florabellio perfectly capture the nostalgia for land and sea that is Diptyque’s new scent.

Florabellio is, as the brand managers at exclusive distributor Rustan’s Department Store tell us, “a glimpse of nature, a path that leads from the woods to the shore.? In the foreground, an invigorating and salty sea spray mingles with the vegetal bitterness of sea fennel.”

But it smells more complex than that. Or at least it does, if you put your nose to your wrist from the time you spray it to a few hours after.  

This fragrance is an unlikely mix of notes that come together and stay long on your skin — the smell of apple blossoms, marine accords, and finally, coffee.

 “It develops around soft and sensual apple blossom on the wings of apricot-scented osmanthus mist. In the background, like an optical illusion, swirling wafts of roasted coffee with toasted sesame accents, foreign yet familiar. A floral trail, blurring the perspectives between land and sea, flower and fruit, softness and bitterness... the senses are led toward distant coastlines.”

I’ve been a fan of Diptyque for the longest time. I love its candles and its room sprays. This is the first Diptyque fragrance I’m trying on and it doesn’t disappoint. To me, only a few fragrance houses, which start either with candles or perfumes, are able to translate their fragrance in separate collections with success.

Diptyque is one of them.

When you first spray Florabellio on your skin, the scent is flowery and sweet, then it subtly changes to fresh, the smell of the sea, of standing at the edge of the water on a breezy day, and then — is that coffee and sesame seed accents? Yes, it is a little bit of both and more complex than a single note.

It leaves a floral trail on your skin — of orchards upon orchards of apple blossoms and then the sea…flower and fruit, softness and bitterness. It is an olfactory landscape of both.

Weifenbach’s photos evoke exactly what the notes bring up to the surface of one’s skin— a landscape of nostalgia.

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Diptyque’s Florabellio is exclusively distributed by Rustan’s Department Store and available in 100 ml. eau de toilette for P6,750.