Cirque du Soleil, the largest contemporary circus producer in the world, began in 1984. Since then, it has expanded to multiple countries and become an iconic brand in the circus space. Cirque du Soleil has started incorporating lifestyle products into its licensed lineup.
Its latest addition is L’eau de Parfum by Cirque du Soleil, a fragrance inspired by the essence of the company’s shows. License Global caught up with the Cirque du Soleil team and its fragrance partner, Flower Shop Perfumes, to learn more about the fragrance and how it celebrates Cirque du Soleil’s origins and big-top spectacles.
“It’s the idea of bringing the creativity, the inspiration, the art beyond this show,” says Stacy Delince, senior product manager and producer, Cirque du Soleil. “How can we continue to bring that feeling you just felt by seeing the performance at home? One of the beautiful things about the fragrance is that we were able to do that but also bring nostalgia in the same way. You have the memories, and you remember the emotions, the connection, the feeling of everybody being surprised at the same time [by the show]. We’re able to bring the imagination home so you can share the scent with the people around you.”
Cirque du Soleil reached out to Isaac Lekach, co-founder, Flower Shop Perfumes, to collaborate. Lekach jumped at the opportunity to take the project to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Cirque and to fulfill a dream that his father had started.
Lekach comes from a line of perfumers. More than two decades ago, his father and mother traveled to California for business and saw a Cirque du Soleil show. Immediately, Lekach’s father started dreaming up a perfume for Cirque. While the timing wasn’t right for Lekach’s father, a Cirque du Soleil fragrance was created by his son more than 20 years later.
“At the time [when my father dreamt of this], it wasn’t the right time, so nothing really came of it, but then I get an email with the subject line saying, ‘Would you like to join the circus?'” says Lekach. “Now we’re here, we’ve done it, and it’s come full circle. Every day now, I get a phone call from my dad, and he wants to talk about the perfume. I’m definitely not going to get tired of that.”
The fragrance evokes memories of going to the circus, with notes of buttered popcorn, caramel apple and cotton candy. As it dries, floral notes, sandalwood, amber and vanilla take charge to make the composition more day-to-day friendly.
The bottle design aims to bring a high fashion take to Cirque du Soleil iconography. Lillian Shalom, creative director, Flower Shop Perfumes, took inspiration from multiple sources in Cirque’s 40-year history. The package opens to designs of clouds and stars surrounding the bottle, with a transparent blue and purple glass bottle on display in the center. A gold sun tops the cap, a nod to the Cirque du Soleil logo.
“There’s an element of surprise, which is literally what the shows are,” says Shalom. “You ask, ‘What’s going to happen now?’ which I think you get when you open the bottle. We dove into archival Cirque posters and costumes. We paid attention to the costumes and the set design at the shows.”
Cirque du Soleil was heavily involved in the designing and perfuming process for the fragrance.
“This was a true collaboration between our teams,” says Delince. “We worked very closely with Flower Shop on every aspect of the creation, whether it was the bottle design with Lilian, the colors, the scent. Everything was a real collaboration.”
The Cirque du Soleil fragrance is available now online and at Cirque du Soleil shows.
{ SOURCE: License Global }
