The Letter No. 10 — oh hello, Jessica

Hi Fragrant Friend 👋

Last week I told you a contract had come in for scent two, signed by a perfumer who reads this letter. Her name is Jessica Sofiatti, and today she gets to introduce herself.

Who she is

Jessica started out as a pharmacist. She spent several years as an R&D scientist in cosmetics and beauty in Brazil, and in 2021 she began training as a perfumer. Since then she's been between Grasse and Paris, with a Master's at Université Côte d'Azur together with ISIPCA, and years of practice next to senior perfumers, the last two of them with Cécile Zarokian.

This year she spent a season creating for the Italian house Farotti Essenze and was accepted into the Société Française des Parfumeurs. Her signed work so far includes fragrances for the Brazilian niche brands Becquer and Brasco, and one for The Scent Era for UNESCO. She's now back in Paris with her own studio, and in February 2027 she opens an atelier there. She'd like to host a few sessions for this community in it. So would I.

In her own words

"My approach seeks to blend the classic school with the natural experimentation and sensory richness rooted in my origins. I'm mostly interested in the connection fragrances have with memory, identity and emotions."

And a few things you won't find on her CV:

Why Jessica

Let's get the obvious part out of the way. If things with scent two had gone differently, I wouldn't have been looking at all, so timing played its part and I won't pretend otherwise. Her way of working is very structured, which for someone coming from the analytical business side, like me, makes things a lot easier than I expected. Two other things weighed more, though.

A few months ago she sent me some demo formulas. One of them was called Tropical Like. In the description she wrote that, as a Brazilian, she wanted to break with the usual picture of her country, Copacabana, sunscreen and caipirinha, and show a side of Brazil that rarely gets talked about. The Amazon, for example, with a green coconut, the less creamy kind. There are plenty of perfumes that take something familiar and put it in a new bottle. This one read to me like she was going after something from where she actually comes from, and I still think about that coconut.

The second thing is the moment she's in. After her training and the years with Cécile Zarokian she worked for a fragrance house, and she could probably have stayed and worked her way up there. She's going independent instead, which takes a kind of courage I recognise, or at least I like to think I do. An independent fragrance publisher and an independent perfumer, both somewhere near the start.

What happens next

We'll share as much of the work as we can out in the open, including the steps where neither of us knows yet where they lead. I'm properly excited about it and you'll hear more soon.

If you'd like to say hello to her, reply to this email and I'll pass it on. Let's make something that has a reason to exist. That's the whole brief for now.

As always, if any of this sparks something, just hit reply. I read everything.