Daphné Bugey | Perfumer

A lifelong study of scent and the freedom to explore texture

Daphné Bugey began collecting miniature perfumes at around ten years old. Memorising and classifying them became an early education in fragrance, long before she entered the profession.

She studied chemistry and then attended ISIPCA in Versailles. Her career developed at Firmenich, with experience in Geneva, Princeton and Paris. In a first-person account, she describes continuing to pursue the same curiosity that first led her to compare scents as a child.

Bugey’s interviews show an interest in turning a word, place or sensory association into a complete composition. For Penhaligon’s, the idea of Chantilly suggested several linked directions: food, lace, delicacy and a particular atmosphere. Rather than illustrating only one of them, she explored how materials might communicate several impressions together. That way of thinking connects the technical discipline of her education with an imaginative approach to texture, contrast and the emotional setting of a perfume.