PARIS — Maison Crivelli, the buzzy niche French fragrance brand, is opening its first freestanding boutique on Sept. 19 in Paris.
Located at 314 Rue Saint-Honoré, it joins a street that has become the main perfume-selling thoroughfare of the French capital.
“It’s a major milestone for the brand,” said Thibaud Crivelli, founder and chief executive officer of Maison Crivelli, which launched at the end of 2018 with four eaux de parfum. “It’s actually something I had in mind since even the early days of the preparation of the brand’s launch. It is a tremendous opportunity for us to be able to propose to our customers one dedicated place worldwide.”
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The boutique is part of a long-term strategy. Crivelli said after two years of development, it is a unique location where the full brand experience can be lived. “It’s not only about the perfumes,” he said. “It’s much more than that.”
The store, with a transparent facade, sits on two levels, each measuring about 320 square feet. “The ground floor is treated as an agora of perfume,” Crivelli said.
It’s a circular space, where people are invited to slow down and pause after escaping the city’s hubbub. This is punctuated by a globe composed of LED screens broadcasting day and night scenes, and colorful, totem-like glass sculptures. Wall niches display fragrances, books and Crivelli’s found items, such as bark or a feather he’s collected during travels.
“The idea is it’s a living space,” he said. “Those elements will change through the adventures I will live.”
People can talk with beauty advisers and sample scents in various ways, including through “magic” blotters that gradually reveal a fragrance’s olfactive ingredient.
Upstairs is the VIP/VIC salon, set up like a living room or a hotel suite. Sheltered behind a wardrobe are red “discover” boxes containing visuals, words and ingredients linked to bestselling scents, backed by the sound of Crivelli’s voice recounting an adventure, as well as music.
Visitors to the boutique are handed a booklet in which their fragrance blotters can be placed and notions of perfumes jotted down. They can leave with a Polaroid taken by Crivelli, with a handwritten description on each.
“It’s the Maison Crivelli experience at its upmost level,” he said.
A network of boutiques is expected. “We are working right now on the roadmap,” Crivelli said, explaining key learnings should be gleaned from the Paris location. Maison Crivelli stores will be tailor-made yet retain the brand’s DNA and the highest level of personalization possible, he outlined.
“The experience of discovering a perfume is highly personal,” he said. It’s been his ethos since the start, along with the view that life is an adventure full of surprises.
Crivelli, who has worked at Guerlain, Dior and Givenchy, wanted to create a perfume brand since his teenage years.
“I do believe in the power of synesthesia, and I actively do synesthesia on an everyday basis,” he said. “I also pay a lot of attention to all the tiny details around me. That could be textures of wood and floral elements, architecture. With the Maison Crivelli, the idea is to encapsulate some of the most surprising moments, adventures I have lived in contact with perfume ingredients, and encapsulate them into perfume formulas.”
The objective is to surprise people with unexpected perfumes with which they can connect.
Perfumers working with Maison Crivelli are sent a mood board, including photos, videos, oral descriptions of people met, music heard and food tasted — varied sensorial components that describe an adventure Thibaud Crivelli has had.
“We use perfume ingredients to express all those facets,” Crivelli said. Some will be used directly, others figuratively.
“The rhythm of the music can be expressed through different combinations of perfume ingredients,” Crivelli said.
Maison Crivelli’s team has from the outset worked on the consumer experience. Crivelli aims for people to leave their comfort zone for an olfactive adventure.
Today, Maison Crivelli has eight edp and 11 extraits de parfum. Prices range from 90 euros for a 30-ml. edp to 370 euros for a 100-ml. extrait.
“The launch of perfume extracts has been a first milestone for the house, especially Hibiscus MahaJád, which was the very first extract we launched and which became a global iconic perfume in the world of artistic perfumery,” Crivelli said. It was introduced in September 2021.
Now that fragrance generates about 40 percent of Maison Crivelli’s sales and registers high growth, the executive said.
The brand altogether posted 120 percent gains in 2025 compared to 2024, and this year it is generating a high-double-digit sales increase over 2025. Crivelli would not discuss sales figures, but industry sources estimate Maison Crivelli generates well above 30 million euros in annual retail sales.
Other brand pillars include Musc Nurāsana, Oud Maracuja and Oud Cadenza, which is exclusive to Harrods and maisoncrivelli.com. The latter scent, plus its candle, are to be stocked exclusively in the Paris boutique for a month.
The most recent launch, earlier this month globally, is Tobacco Carnaval, the second scent in a series called the Mystères Olfactifs. It takes a cue from a joyful, music-filled, nighttime carnival party Crivelli attended long ago. A Tobacco Carnaval candle will be exclusive to the Paris boutique for a month, too.
Altogether, Maison Crivelli is present in 824 doors in 67 countries.
“This year, we start to have top rankings in key iconic doors, such as Harrods, Selfridges, Galeries Lafayette in Paris, Bloomingdale’s and Harvey Nichols in Dubai,” Crivelli said. “There are some iconic doors worldwide where Maison Crivelli is no longer a challenger. We are ranking among top-performing brands.”
Key geographic markets for Maison Crivelli, which is privately held, are Europe — including France; the U.K., where there is a subsidiary; the Netherlands; Germany, and Italy — which generates about 70 percent of sales and experiences strong growth. The Middle East, especially the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, represents about 20 percent of the sales.
“The next big markets for us will be the Americas and Asia-Pacific, where we have a huge growth opportunity,” Crivelli said. The brand has not yet in South Korea or China, for instance.
He is focused on productivity as well as brand expression through a consistent image (Maison Crivelli’s color is terracotta), personalized displays and eventful pop-ups. His objective is to build a steady, solid business over time with the backing of a robust team, which now counts about 130 employees, including in-store beauty advisers.
“We have a very strong internal teams, and all of this happens thanks to them — their passion, their dedication, their care,” Crivelli said. “It’s also how we connect with our customers, our retailers, our business partners, but also the end-customers. The house is deeply rooted with authenticity and true connection with people.”
Maison Crivelli will fete its 10th anniversary in 2028.
“We are starting to work on the project,” Crivelli said. “We want it to be a very strong, festive celebration to express the DNA of Maison Crivelli, but also the cultural connections that we can build with our community. It will be another milestone. We have a lot of projects down the road, which is very exciting.”