Rose Desgranges, descended from the Champagne bourgeoisie, arrives in Paris in 1940 with her mother, Henriette Rose Desgranges, following a family crisis.
« She is just 16 years old. War is raging and she is obliged to work to support her family, thus abandoning her dream of becoming a pianist. »
She answers a small ad and becomes an apprentice to a renowned hair stylist and wig-maker at the Figaro Club located on the first floor of 70, Rue du Faubourg St. Honoré, opposite the Elysée Palace. The Figaro Club belongs to Albert Meyer, a hair stylist popular with the Faubourg’s most elegant ladies. The artistically talented Meyer designs a never-ending stream of hairstyles and chignons exclusively for his clientele. His inventiveness leads him to produce a range of custom plant-based hair dyes. Rose is employed full-time at the salon. She soon stands out for her manual dexterity, showing a flair for wig-making and themed window-dressing. She is a stunning beauty and fills the salon with her bright spirit. Albert falls head over heels in love with Rose and marries her.
In 1945-1955, Rose converts the storeroom in the listed inner courtyard (historically the private courtyard of the Duc de Duras) into a small shop where she sells hair accessories and adornments, as well as a few beauty products. In 1958, Albert, a trained chemist, instead of offering her a gemstone, concocts a fragrance as a love tribute in the laboratory in his cellar using exclusive, handpicked raw ingredients. Defying all trends, the fragrance embodies everything that Rose represents for him: assured femininity, elegance, sensuality, the working woman, effortless style. The formula is then filed, protected and exclusively dedicated to Rose Desgranges.
In 1961, during the Faubourg’s festivities, which are held once a year to showcase some of the country’s finest design objects and collections, Rose decides to advertise her fragrance. She installs a perfume fountain in the courtyard and places a drop of her elixir on ladies’ handkerchiefs. The entire Faubourg is filled with the scent of “Rose Desgranges”! Her small shop becomes the showcase for the “French-style fragrance”. In 2013, a time when inventiveness in the olfactory world was everything, the descendants of Rose Desgranges (daughters and granddaughter) nurtured the idea of rekindling the flame of a perfume that encapsulated their childhood years. They thus decided to retrace half a century of French perfume-making and pay tribute to this exceptional creation. On 1st December 2014, the vintage fragrance “Rose Desgranges” was revived in its original setting at 70, rue du Faubourg St Honoré.
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