PARIS — Jean Paul Gaultier is gearing up to launch a fragrance pillar, with the perfume La Favorite.
It comes as the fashion house enters a new creative era under Dutch designer Duran Lantink, whose ginormous couture gowns with drain-pipe protrusions paraded in Paris earlier this month referenced Marie Antoinette, who perfected the art of taking up space with voluminous gowns and oversized hats.
The wink back to the French royal court of yesteryear seems to sync up with the fragrance’s name, since “la favorite,” French for “the favorite,” referred to the king’s official mistress.
The fragrance also takes cues from Gaultier’s cinematic culture, since the founding designer costumed multiple films, including “The Fifth Element,” “City of Lost Children” and “The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover,” as well as cultivated friendships with actresses such as Catherine Deneuve.
From the get-go, Jean Paul Gaultier empowered women with strong tailoring, visible corsetry, sailor stripes and other signposts of Parisian chic. But it’s been 10 years since the Puig-owned house launched a major new feminine fragrance, the last one being Scandal.
“Gaultier is a jewel of the French patrimony in couture, in fashion and in fragrances. It’s a duty to treat that brand in a specific way — not rushing, being too commercial,” said Frédéric Appaire, vice president for Jean Paul Gaultier Beauty at Puig.
The beauty group integrated Gaultier fragrances into its brand portfolio in 2016, and since then multiplied its sales by five times. Gaultier has been one of the Spanish company’s fastest-growing labels recently. Last year, it ranked ninth among perfume brands globally.
Gaultier historically has been highly successful with masculine fragrances. Le Male, launched in 1995, has been having a resurgence, especially since 2024. That renaissance is due in large part to work the Gaultier team has done to highlight the brand’s creative codes, story and patrimony. They have connected with creators who played with those while developing content.
“It has been exploding,” Appaire said of Le Male. “We had so many people rediscovering the brand.”
Gaultier has been celebrating individuality since 1976, and that is striking a chord, not least today. The beauty brand has a community of 10 million people on all platforms combined.
When Le Male’s franchise was reworked and Le Male Elixir introduced in 2023, “the resonance was absolutely incredible,” Appaire said. That was thanks to the digital community. Teenagers were lining up in stores — especially in travel retail — to buy the scent.
“All that based on a fragrance and a universe from 30 years [ago],” he said. “Le Male went back to the top three worldwide. When you have such a phenomenon on the men’s side, you need to have a women’s [scent] at that level.”
That’s where La Favorite comes in, expressing Gaultier’s universe, inspiration and codes.
“Being the one everyone adores and being, of course, the favorite of all people, the crowd around her,” was the starting point for La Favorite, according to Appaire.
The fragrance is expected to have a core audience skewing somewhat younger than Gaultier’s other women’s scents, which include Gaultier Divine and La Belle, alongside Scandal.
La Favorite’s advertising embodies all things Gaultier, with bold femininity and a touch of humor anchored in a surreal Paris. Model Ella McCutcheon, who has walked Gaultier runway shows, is the face of the new scent. “She has strong character,” Appaire said.
Ella McCutcheon for Jean Paul Gaultier’s La Favorite.
Courtesy of Jean Paul Gaultier
In the campaign spots, McCutcheon is surrounded by cherry-picked friends of the house, including Gigi Goode and Lyas. “It’s recreating that community spirit and not just having faces,” Appaire said. The talents have individual perspectives.
As La Favorite channels everyone’s favorite person, so she stands as an effigy, proud in a black strapless gown and chic sunglasses, atop a podium — literally — in the fragrance bottle. It’s a nod to Gaultier’s Fragile fragrance bottle, dating from 1999.
“The lady inside is made 100 percent in France with three different molds,” Appaire said.
The new flacon’s making was a technical challenge, with two cuts needed, creating a first for the glassmaker.
“We were very intrigued and excited by the idea of reshaping and restarting one of the iconic codes of the house to create and repurpose the new era of Gaultier,” Appaire said.
The La Favorite fragrance was created by Givaudan’s Amélie Jacquin and Quentin Bisch. The scent centers on a clash between a very floral note and an enveloping rich one. There’s a Queen of the Night, with jasmine sambac absolute and rose essence; a benzoin duo with ylang-ylang and Virginia cedar, and tonka beans with vanilla bean and white musk notes.
“It’s a beautiful floral without being that well-behaved,” Appaire said. “When it’s Gaultier, it has to be different, to stand out.” It cannot be elitist.
The 100-ml. eau de parfum will be priced at 157 euros, the 50-ml. edp at 116 euros and 30-ml. edp at 80 euros. A 10-ml. edp spray is 30 euros, and the line has ancillaries.
La Favorite’s global launch will begin in early August, starting in Europe.
Appaire would not discuss sales projections for the scent, but industry sources estimate it will generate first-year retail sales of 75 million euros.
The launch of La Favorite comes after Gaultier introduced its collection of six fragrances, called Les Ateliers Gaultier, last month.
Gaultier continues to produce limited-edition Le Male fragrances, such as Le Male in Blue. “We’re pushing quite a lot the creativity on these fragrances,” Appaire said. “It’s working super well every time.”
The brand is boundless, as it has so many stories to tell and codes to mine, Appaire contended, adding: “It’s an incredible playground.”
