Puig just launched an invaluable resource for fragrance enthusiasts everywhere. The Spanish luxury conglomerate, which acquired Byredo in June, cut the digital ribbon on WikiParfum, an online scent encyclopedia.
The website and accompanying app boasts a database of nearly 20,000 fragrances from 900 prestige, designer, and niche brands. Users can search this database for (almost) any scent their heart desires, yielding a page containing an olfactive profile of said fragrance including its perfumer, key ingredients, price point, and classification according to Fragrances of the World, the largest independent guide to fragrance that groups perfumes according to their primary scent (fresh, floral, ambery, or woody) and 14 "sub-scents."
WikiParfum also helps users discover scents they might like according to their olfactive tastes. Upon creating an account, users are prompted to select their two favorite fragrances — from there, WikiParfum determines their preferred fragrance family and ingredients. Recommendations are then generated according to these preferences.
Users can add additional scents to their "favorites" via the search tool, further customizing their recommendations.
As the luxury and niche perfume market continues to grow, WikiParfum will help ease the fragrance buying process, an effort complicated by the fact that scents are invisible.
Unlike a dress or a pair of shoes, digital retailers cannot hire someone to model, say, Byredo's Blanche or Maison Francis Kurkdjian's Baccarat Rouge 540. Instead, online shoppers must parse a list of notes and ingredients to determine whether Blanche or Baccarat Rouge 540 are right for them.
While the magic of fragrance buying lies in IRL discovery — a whiff of a perfume you immediately fall in love with, the mystery of a scent you can't quite put your finger on — Puig's WikiParfum augments this in-person alchemy with a digital database of brands, fragrances, and ingredients. So the next time you're fragrance shopping, you'll know what to smell for.
