#Unexpected encounter

Origin of a perfume

She is a delicate flower he comes from precious wood. The White Lily and Sandalwood are part of precious and unique components that Issey Miyake gathered to create L’Eau d’Issey, twenty-seven years ago. In a dreamlike discussion, the two reminisce about their nature and the perfect fit that offered an iconic fragrance.

White Lily

Some people call me the Madonna lily. They celebrate my undeniable aura of purity, they admire my elegant and majestic silhouette and my petals so dazzlingly white they are almost blinding. There are also many myths and legends about me. Some say I was born from a drop of maternal milk from the Greek goddess Hera. Others tell the story of Aphrodite who was so jealous of my beauty that she gave me a prominent and fragrant pistil to punish you.

Sandalwood

My bark is dark red and hides a pale green heart. My essence is said to provide a strong sense of warmth and sweetness and my velvety sensual aroma creates a natural link to the roots of our mother earth. When people touch me, they feel calm and stillness. Time seems to go by slowly for trees. We also have an unfailing memory, we remember the bad and the good, we learn, we evolve, we survive. In our forests, we form friendships and we take care of one another. Wood is the storyteller of many stories of joy and pain and love. Trees are the poet of the earth, a symbol of nobility and refinements.

White Lily

I’m a symbol of immortality and I’ve been a muse to many artists like Arthur Rimbaud, Robert Mapplethorpe, Balzac or DH Lawrence who wrote: “ The tall white lilies were reeling in the moonlight, and the air was charged with perfume, as with a presence. She touched the big, pallid flowers on their petals then shivered. They seemed to be stretching in the moonlight. Then she drank a deep draught of the scent. It almost made her dizzy”. Thousands of years ago, Egypt and Rome were already using my suave white note in perfumery. The Greeks even proclaimed I was the “flower of flowers”.