Givenchy Gentleman, the fragrance of a modern and free-spirited man. Givenchy is a fashion house created by Hubert de Givenchy in 1952. At the outset, Givenchy focused solely on haute couture. Gradually, the house extended its expertise to other fields such as leather goods, jewelry, and perfumes
While gentlemen in the 1960s had only eau de cologne to wear, Hubert de Givenchy offered them simultaneously two distinguished and elegant fragrances, Pour Monsieur and Eau de Vétiver, which quickly went down in history. To continue on the path of success, the house of Givenchy offered an elixir of masculine sensuality in 1974 under the name Gentleman, now Gentleman Original since the release of its modernized version in 2017.
Gentleman Original by Givenchy, or the legendary men’s fragrance composed by Paul Léger
While women’s fragrances have for several decades now been rather creative, in the men’s perfumery aisle fougères and eaux de cologne compete with one another without changing very much. Yet in the 1960s, men too sought to distinguish themselves through their fragrance, and it was precisely Pour Monsieur and Eau de Vétiver that opened the way for virile, muscular, and original scents.
Riding the wave of this enormous success, the house of Givenchy persisted and, in 1974, offered Gentleman, a distinguished, very present, even opulent fragrance signed by the great perfumer Paul Léger. This perfumer also co-signed, with other great names, the same decade’s major women’s success, Anaïs Anaïs.
In any case, Gentleman, through its virile strength as much as its supreme floral sophistication, would remain for many years one of the great classics of men’s perfumery. So much so, in fact, that it was reformulated in 2017 by Olivier Cresp and Nathalie Lorson to be reborn once again — proof of its incredible aura!
Givenchy offers a modern and offbeat vision of masculine elegance in which respect for convention, kindness, and a taste for shared pleasures combine with boldness, ardor, and spontaneity. Givenchy on Gentleman 2017.
Between chypre, wild, and fresh scents, the man of Gentleman is unforgettable…
Often compared to its feminine contemporary of the same decade, Aromatics Elixir, Gentleman Original spares neither quantity nor quality of raw materials in sending strong olfactory messages to gentlemen. Paul Léger was not restrained in his concentrations, and this is certainly also one of the reasons for its tremendous success in a decade that sought opulence and power, much like Aromatics Elixir.
The 1970s were rich in chypre and leathery compositions; women had Aromatics Elixir, men had Gentleman, its masculine counterpart. Au Parfum on Givenchy’s Gentleman.
Gentleman opens first on a dynamic cocktail of lemon and bergamot wrapped in honey and rose. Then, at the heart, the flowers follow their path to glory, offering this Gentleman precious and highly original scents, for a men’s fragrance, of jasmine and iris. This luminosity is soon counterbalanced by cedarwood and the omnipresence of patchouli (concentrated at 60% nonetheless). Finally, vetiver, amber, and leather carry Givenchy’s Gentleman toward absolute animalic depths that do not hesitate for a second to play on their extreme sensuality to seduce the one who had already fallen for the bouquet of heart flowers.