This half-empty glass jar is all that’s left of my Annick Goutal Le Sac de ma Mère, the first and most imitated of all makeup-and-perfume-inspired candles.
It was created by Annick Goutal’s daughter Camille as a sense memory of her late mother’s leather Hermès Kelly bag and its cigarette, face powder and lipstick contents after her far too early death at age 53. It predated Astier de Villatte’s Rue St. Honoré (commingled women’s fragrances in a Paris dress shop) Ladurée’s Rice Powder (rose and violet face powder), Byredo’s Loose Lips (lipstick) and Diptyque’s 2016 limited edition rose, violet and leather Rosa Viola, also inspired by a mother’s purse (and also needing a reissue.)
They’re all good, but Le Sac de Ma Mère is the queen: powdery violet, a rose ‘lipstick accord’ and oakmoss, tied together with a singular leather note. (I should go to Hermès and start huffing the bags to see if it’s a true ‘Kelly’ scent. That would get me banned pretty quickly I should think.) Le Sac de Ma Mère is complex, it’s fantastic, and it’s no longer for sale because it’s been bloody discontinued.
Korean cosmetics behemoth Amorepacific bought the brand in 2011. Goutal was best known for Eau d’Hadrien, a citrus and cypress aromatic cologne that’s been shorthand for in-the-know Parisian chic since its debut in 1981, but the brand was moribund and its packaging dated (gilt bows on ribbed Victorian cologne bottles, endearingly fusty, striped candle jars.)
It relaunched in 2018 as Goutal Paris with a snappy new font, the candles in faceted sleek glass vessels, all good, all fine, but they didn’t bring back Le Sac De Ma Mère which defies understanding.
Bad things can happen when brands get sold and favourites are discontinued, erasing the brand DNA that made the company desirable in the first place.
I don’t light my Sac de Ma Mère anymore, it’s way too precious. But it’s held its scent beautifully, so I put in my bureau, to perfume my scarves (which is a very mom thing to do, I think.)