"Creating Vampyr was a particularly interesting experience because I didn’t want to approach the vampire through the obvious imagery of fangs, bloodstains, coffins and nocturnal attacks. The creature I imagined was a modern vampyre. You would not recognize them immediately. There are no visible fangs, no blood on their clothes, nothing overtly monstrous about them. They don’t need to hunt you through a dark alley or attack in the night. They can sit across from you, beautifully dressed, perfectly composed, perhaps even unusually charming. Their weapon is attraction. They lure rather than chase. By the time you sense that something is wrong, you have already moved closer willingly. That became the central idea behind the perfume: seduction first, danger second.

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As a perfumer, I work very visually and emotionally. Before thinking about individual notes, I normally see scenes, textures, colors, characters and fragments of a story. My task is then to translate something completely intangible — an emotion, a personality, a place that may never have existed — into physical materials. And then something rather strange happens. We combine those physical substances inside a bottle, only for them to disappear again when the perfume is worn, becoming invisible in the air. In that sense, I sometimes think perfumers are both alchemists and ghost-hunters. We take something imagined, give it a temporary physical body, and then release it again as an olfactive ghost. Perfume can change the atmosphere of a room, alter someone’s perception of you, awaken a memory or create a feeling that wasn’t there seconds earlier. We are, in a way, mood-shifters.

That philosophy is also very close to my work with Dark Tales, where fragrance is approached as a form of storytelling. Darker characters, folklore, forgotten places, history, beauty and the slightly uncanny have always fascinated me, so entering the world of "Vampyr" felt very natural.

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Olfactively, I wanted the fragrance to behave almost like the character itself. It begins with a certain polish — something warm, refined and inviting, touched by the richness of cognac and a darkened, almost velvety fruitiness. There is beauty there too, with a restrained floral presence rather than anything overtly romantic. As it develops, the perfume becomes more intimate and more ambiguous. Cooler green facets and earthy roots begin to appear beneath the surface, giving the impression that something slightly unfamiliar is hiding underneath the charm. The composition slowly moves closer to the skin, becoming softer, muskier and more physical. In the drydown, the darker architecture reveals itself more fully: woods, moss, patchouli, vetiver, incense and warm resinous shadows. The perfume becomes deeper and more persistent, but I wanted it to remain elegant rather than gothic in an obvious way.

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The idea was never to make Vampyr smell like death.

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It was to make danger smell attractive.

 

I wanted you to like them first.

 

Perhaps even trust them.

 

And only afterwards wonder whether that was a mistake."

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- Arina P. Franzén

Perfumer