It’s the perfume that’s on most people’s Christmas lists – not to mention makes us yearn with desire every time we walk through the Duty Free shops. Heck, even Marilyn Monroe wore it (and apparently nothing else!) to bed. But there are plenty more fun facts about this glamorous 95-year-old perfume that you probably didn’t know…
- It was one of the first fragrances to pioneer the use of synthetic ingredients such as aldehydes. Chanel No 5 is probably the best example of how addictive aldehydes can be – a synthetic note which doesn’t have its own ‘smell’ as such, but which makes the other notes appear fresh and ‘sparkly’ giving a perfume that little extra magic.
- As opposed to the other perfumes of the time, which were focused on a single flower like the rose or peony, this was “a woman’s perfume with a woman’s scent”. Although it contains notes like jasmine, rose, lemon and orange blossom, the composition is so complex that no single note ‘dominated’ the rest.
- The name itself “No.5” was also extremely modern and a far cry from the sentimental names usually used in perfumery. It was named after the fifth sample Chanel chose from the many that perfumer Ernest Beaux had given her (over 80). As legend has it, another reason it was called No. 5 was because Chanel thought the number itself brought good luck.
- When it launched in 1921, instead of a glossy launch party, Coco Chanel took Beaux and a group of friends to a restaurant on the Riviera and sprayed it around the table – passers by kept stopping to remark on it and ask what it was – and Chanel realised she had a hit on her hands.
- Echoing Chanel’s pioneering fashion designs, the bottle itself was also incredibly sleek and modern, far less showy and ornamental than other perfumes at the time. It became a cultural icon of the 20th Century and was famously painted by Salvador Dalì and Andy Warhol. The stopper is said to echo the shape of Paris’s famous Place Vendôme (where all the lovely jewellery shops are!).
Chanel No. 5 is available for £44.10 at John Lewis
