Cuir Ottoman

Parfum d’Empire is the house of Marc-Antoine Corticchiato, founded in 2003. Its first perfumes draw on the history of empires: Eau Suave for Josephine, Eau de Gloire for Napoleon, Ambre Russe for the Russia of the tsars. Cuir Ottoman appeared in 2006, the same year as Iskander, dedicated to Alexander the Great.

Born in Morocco and raised among Corsican citrus groves, the perfumer was a competition rider before studying chemistry and completing his training at the École internationale de parfumerie de Versailles, the house reports, describing him as a perfumer who is also a scientist.

The leather of Anatolia’s tanners

Leather, a note the house considers so assertive that it remains rare in perfumery, is among Marc-Antoine Corticchiato’s favorite materials. He built his own interpretation of it on the smoky effluvia of burnt styrax and birch.

The perfumer drew on the age-old tradition of leatherwork in Anatolia: until the 19th century, the house recalls, Turkish leather was the most sought-after in Europe. He added iris, whose powdery notes were used to soften the smell of the finest hides.

To wrap this oriental leather, the house summons Egyptian jasmine, as opulent as the odalisques of Delacroix, Ingres and Matisse, and tonka bean, whose tobacco facet evokes the lazy smoke of the hookah.

A launch in the fall of 2006

At its launch, in the fall of 2006, Cuir Ottoman was announced as a leather perfume with notes of iris, Egyptian jasmine, styrax, Tolu balsam, benzoin and incense. The house now describes it as an iris and leather oriental, as languid as an afternoon in a hammam.