IN THE PRESS

I can’t stop thinking about the cumin note in Les Cahiers Secrets by Jouissance. I was kindly gifted a discovery set by Cherry Cheng, founder and sweetheart of the house. Les Cahiers Secrets boasts my favorite floral (heliotrope) paired with cumin, a kitchen spice that usually emits a sweaty aroma in perfume (love). This combination is genius, risky, and sultry—which is perfect for a fragrance inspired by the literature of Anaïs Nin. It is definitely going on my full bottle wish list.

It’s delicate territory, and one I tread quite often – when girls call powdery fragrances “grandma perfume,” they do a disservice not only to their grandmothers but to their senses of smell. That said, I love not only how unabashedly powdery Cahiers is but also how sweaty it is. The fragrance is primarily cumin and lily, two notes often associated with underarms and funeral homes, yet in the right hands, can be some of the most gorgeous. Its drydown yields a sort of expired body powder tang that reminds me of Diptyque’s Fleur de Peau, and is outright addictive to someone like me. I’ve found myself reaching for this on days when I just don’t know what to wear and want something to cover me like a second skin or gauze of thinly veiled fabrics.

[La Bague d'O] Like some mirage descending from the pages of Dangerous Liaisons, via the set of Eyes Wide Shut, it is lascivious, tender and visceral. Pink pepper and geranium inject brightness. Rose and violet bring the curves. And in the base, musks and unabashedly animalic notes turn up the heat. It’s an explosive mix, which is precisely why it works so beautifully.

You can’t help feeling a tiny bit suspicious when a brand claims their perfumes will explore the vast and irreducible topic of female sexuality. Surely that’s all just grand marketing, you say to yourself. But if their opening threesome is anything to go by, then Jouissance are going to take their assignment very seriously indeed — and nowhere is their earnestness more evident than in La Bague D’O.

I chose my fragrance based on notes that I felt would most suit me, but honestly, the references for En Plein Air, inspired by Catherine Millet, evokes both intellectual detachment and a secret rendezvous at the witching hour. And while the notes, a base of musk with white flowers and rain, topped with bergamot, lemon, and grapefruit offers a whiff of effervescence that is bright and clean, it has just a twinge of sensuousness. When I wear it, I often feel enlivened and really feminine, but it's not overt. Just a bit like I have a secret.

[La Bague d'O] This is a dream gift for those who love all things Old Hollywood or who religously watch Sofia Coppola films. Aside from being packaged beautifully in a pink satin-lined box, and housed in a vintage-inspired bottle, it smells divine; starting with a burst of sweet and floral rose and then easing into something warmer and velvety. Spritz to feel like a glamorous starlet of the silver screen.

When it comes to fragrance, the French approach favours niche boutique perfumers over big blockbuster brands. Jouissance has just three scents, each inspired by vintage perfumes and female creatives. Les Cahiers Secrets is a blend if fresh cut lilies, pressed powder, and musk.

One of my biggest goals of 2024 was to open up my fragrance collection to scent profiles that still smell like me but with something unexpected sprinkled in. The Les Cahiers Secrets Eau de Parfum by Jouissance hits the nail right on the head with a second skin–like base backed by warm spices. To me, the star note has to be the delicate and sweet fresh-cut lilies.

Options abound at the 600-square-foot store [Stéle NY], whose assortment of niche fragrances ranges from Jouissance’s erotic novel-inspired scents, to Mabelle O’Rama’s floral-infused odes to her motherland, Lebanon, to China’s Aromag, best known for its Wild Garlic Eau de Parfums.

I’m glad to have been introduced to Jouissance — a UK brand that aims to explore female-authored sexuality. Les Cahiers Secrets is a charming take on sweet, powdery iris — all gentle blushes on white cheeks — but the real standout is La Bague D’Or. A veritable Madame De Merteuil beckoning you to an orgy in a velvet-lined boudoir, it is both filthy and regal, pushing out its central rose note with buxom insistence. Imagine a lecherous Portrait Of A Lady and you’ll get a sense of how it operates.

I wonder if this was the one that was made first, because this really seems to encompass what the brand’s trying to do. We’re back with Glenn Close in Dangerous Liaisons but she’s kind of parting the velvet curtains and inviting us to a full-on orgy. The Michelle Pfeiffer character is there as well. She’s thrown all decorum to the wind. A few extras from Eyes Wide Shut have joined in. Some are wearing Venetian masks. Some aren’t bothering. And everything is kind of covered in this haze of white, strongly scented talcum powder… It really really is deliciously lascivious.

Described as a powdery ‘grandma scent’ you’d be forgiven for thinking this perfume would be far from sexy... Jouissance, does however, is twist convention on its head by taking inspiration from the erotic novels of women in literature. Les Cahiers Secrets is therefore described as the scent for those who ‘want to smell like the only woman in an avant-garde literary circle’ and so, alongside the arguably old-lady powdery notes, you’ll also find spicy cumin and earthy orris root which rebel from the convention of traditional powdery perfumes.

I love a fragrance house that tells a story through its scents and Jouissance embodies this ideal completely. Currently, the brand has three fragrances on offer, each inspired by the books of three erotic writers. Of them all, Les Cahiers Secrets is my favourite, blending together spicy cumin, white florals and musk notes, it’s powdery yet possesses an unexpected twist.

Inspired by erotic literature, Joussiance is transforming and translating words on a page into scents on skin. And while Joussiance perfumes and the stories which inspire them are in many ways abstract and intellectual, on skin, the response is visceral. With inspirations like sexy grandma, al fresco sex, and sacred submission, the sexual nature of these fragrances is the point. It less of art through a sexual lens, and more of sex through an artful one.

It's less 'art through a sexual lens' and more sex through an artful one, and when I first smelled all three scents I was excited, especially by LA BAGUE D'O, which is this aldehydic, animalic floral that dries down flawlessly.

One of three debut fragrances inspired by erotic writers of the 20th century, this bottle [En Plein Air (2024)] honours writer and critic Catherine Millet with bergamot, grapefruit and musk.

...our featured collection this week comes from the new house of Jouissance Parfums, who are bringing powdery, vintage, and very high-minded sexy fragrances to the market.

Little details, all carefully attended to, create a cohesive presence catering to the intersection between a very modern post-coquette girlblogging clientele and the overindulgent, highly aestheticized women’s erotic literature predating mid-20th century feminist psychoanalysis. Finally, a niche perfume house for young women who liberally describe situations as ‘Kafkaesque’ and have notifications enabled for the Anaïs Nin Twitter bot.

Jouissance is an outward extension of founder Cherry Cheng’s admiration for literature from the female viewpoint. It was during the pandemic when Cherry found herself cosied up in her reading nook, flipping through pages that all had a recurring theme of sexual desires explored by women that were truthful and sometimes brutally so. Cherry shares that the “brands’ name descends from French literary theorist Hélène Cixous’ seminal 1975 essay, Le Rire de la Méduse, where Cixous connected women’s experiences of erotic pleasure to their creative prolificy.” Reflected as the focal point for Jouissance – to encourage creativity across literature and art through various mediums. Cherry has immersed herself in the fragrance universe as she’s training with a renowned French perfumer, aiming to bring new and fresh concepts to her brand. Since the brand was birthed during lockdown, the team is excited to bring more Jouissance activations to further grow their community.

There’s something subtly erotic about a good Jouissance perfume. The burgeoning fragrance brand knows this, having found its point of departure in pleasure and the “books we read beneath the sheets”.

Describing Jouissance as a ‘perfume brand’ almost feels like doing it a disservice. Straddling art, literature, critical theory, eroticism, and more, Jouissance is as much focused on the fragrances it sells as it is the imaginative world built around them.

Pink pepper grows on a different plant to the black variety but is often blended with it in both perfumery and cooking. “It’s fresh, spirited and sparkling with a rosy overtone,” says Jouissance founder Cherry Cheng, whose latest launch, La Bague D’O, works with the berry to “defile” a floral bouquet.

The world of fragrance often takes inspirations from unusual places, but how do you bottle the transcendent escapism of erotic literature? A new brand, Jouissance, endeavours to do just that. The three scents in the first collection are inspired by three French authors from the 20th century - Anaïs Nin, Catherine Millet, and Pauline Réage.

The brilliance of Jouissance perfumes however is not just in their scent, but in how they promote female authors that have been cast to the literary shadows thanks to their celebration of female eroticism.

...each fragrance is a tribute and opportunity to “shed new light on the controversial legacies” of iconic women.

...while we’re warned never to judge a book by its cover, we should also perhaps avoid judging Jouissance by the innocent connotations of its pale pink, silk-lined box which belies the subversive undercurrent at the heart of its creation.

Jouissance, in the theoretical sense, aptly describes what it feels like to experience the creations of Jouissance, the brand. Les Cahiers Secrets, based on the writings of Anaïs Nin, is, at open, so vulgar you can’t stop sniffing it. Powdery orris and fresh lilies are rudely interspersed with whiffs of sweaty cumin and animalic musk. It’s clean and dirty, gorgeous and sordid all at once.