Style Edit: Henry Jacques’ Les Toupies presents a triptych of scents in sculptural crystal flacons
Henry Jacques’ Les Toupies collection sees perfumes as conversations, and the crystal flacons housing them as objects to be owned – and held – for life
Artistic director Christophe Tollemer spent more than three years challenging Europe’s great crystal houses to reach the limits of their craft, insisting on perfectly symmetrical, multifaceted flacons with no central axis – stable enough to cradle rare perfume, yet designed to be held and turned rather than simply displayed. The facets catch and scatter light with the slightest rotation, elevating the flacon from simple container to a statement in its own right. It is the kind of object that reveals itself fully the longer you hold it.
Mr H and Mrs Y honour the house’s founders, Henry and Yvette Cremona, with cedar leaf and geranium meeting ylang-ylang, rose damascena and jasmine; sandalwood, tobacco and amber balanced against iris and lily of the valley; and tonka bean threading the two together. His woody trail shapes her floral diffusion; her brightness gives his depth somewhere to land. Neither leads, yet together, they arrive at something complete.
Our next pair, Fanfan and Galileo, work through rhythm rather than contrast. Galileo’s patchouli, lavender and Italian mandarin deepen into tobacco, myrrh and amber, while Fanfan answers in saffron, rose damascena and a shared note of lavender. The balance these two find isn’t symmetrical but has a momentum to it: expansion answering softness, depth answering glow.
Finally, No 16 and No 81 operate through friction: No 81’s bergamot and grapefruit sharpening into smoke, wood and spice; No 16 countering with Rose de Mai settling into a honeyed warmth. Where one draws lines, the other softens them – and where one builds, the other blurs.