To uncover the mystery of how a perfume is created, the House of Dior opened its doors to film director Matthieu Menu and his crew. For one year, he followed in the footsteps of Francis Kurkdjian, the new Director of Perfume Creation, throughout one of his biggest challenges: reinventing the iconic J’adore. A unique sensory journey, from inspiration to launch, through a secret world of passionate artisans.
Creating a great perfume is a journey as fascinating as it is intriguing. It is a long-term adventure simultaneously inhabited by the inspiration and introspection of one fragrance creator, but accomplished by a multitude of complementary and essential men and women.
Director Matthieu Menu, curious about unravelling the mystery, approached the legend of J’adore on the occasion of Francis Kurkdjian’s first composition as Dior Perfume Creation Director. “Inside the Dream” orchestrates a lyrical and intimate immersion in the heart of the composition and production of a fragrance, and takes up the challenge of embodying the evanescent character of a scent. From Paris to Los Angeles, via the Château de La Colle Noire, the flower fields of Grasse and India, it is a symphonic portrait in which stars and creatives, decision-makers and expert hands all come together. Thanks to this unprecedented film narrative, a great fragrance is conveyed in beautiful and poetic images, studded with questions and revelations, suspense and sensations, powerful emotions and sudden illuminations. “Inside the Dream” is a captivating documentary that goes behind the scenes at the House of Dior, to the very heart of a human adventure, where the long and painstaking development of an exceptional fragrance is carried by a shared quest for Beauty.
A world-perfume and an entire fragrance, here l’Or de J’adore is like a celebration and a magic formula conveyed in images, so that the viewer can understand and experience the slow and mysterious birth of a fragrance. From the production sites near Orléans, where the fragrance finally emerges, to the opening of the “Dior J’adore!” exhibition in Paris, “Inside the Dream” nimbly weaves its touching way through the myriad spaces of multi-layered creation. This attentive and poetic film conveys the intimate subtlety and lyrical flights that embody the mystery of a legendary fragrance.
L’Or de J’adore by Jean-Michel Othoniel, $19,000
“L’Or de J’adore” by Jean-Michel Othoniel is produced in a limited series of 100 numbered pieces, available in select Dior boutiques. Inspired by the glass curves of the amphora, he imagined flower-like case to house the 1st J’adore fragrance by Francis Kurkdjian. This bronze rose is a brilliant incarnation of Francis Kurkdjian’s composition. The beaded petals form a hyperbolic flower. Made using the traditional jewelry-making technique of lost-wax casting, it is then hand-polished before being dipped in liquid gold. Balanced on top, almost weightless upon this blooming flower, is the J’adore l’Or bottle with a figure 8 silhouette: the artist adorned its cap with a cloak of liquid gold that wraps itself around the glass pearl and unfurls around the bottle’s crystal curves.
J’adore l’Or, 50ml | $220
