Égoïste is a men's perfume produced by French fashion house

Chanel Chanel ( , ) is a French luxury fashion house founded in 1910 by Coco Chanel in Paris. It is privately owned by French brothers, Alain and Gérard Wertheimer, through the holding company Chanel Limited, established in 2018 and headquarte ...

. It was created by perfumer Jacques Polge. The perfume was released in 1990. The word is French for "egoist" and "egotistic" (both noun and adjective), which means selfish or self-centered (person). Commercials for the perfume have been directed by

Jean-Paul Goude Jean-Paul Goude (born in Montreuil, Seine-Saint-Denis 8 December 1938) is a French graphic designer, illustrator, photographer, advertising film director and event designer. He worked as art director at ''Esquire (magazine), Esquire'' magazine i ...

Product history

Based on Bois des Îles, Égoïste is the first male perfume with

sandalwood oil Sandalwood oil is an essential oil obtained from the steam distillation of chips and billets cut from the heartwood of various species of sandalwood trees, mainly ''Santalum album'' (Indian sandalwood) and ''Santalum spicatum'' (Australian sanda ...

as its main note. Another of its components is ambrette seed. The fragrance's name when it was introduced domestically in the 1980s was Bois Noir, French for "Black Wood", a name that was originally used in the working stage. Prior to its 1990 international launch, the product was

rebranded Rebranding is a marketing strategy in which a new name, term, symbol, design, concept or combination thereof is created for an established brand with the intention of developing a new, differentiated identity in the minds of consumers, investors ...

because Chanel's marketing department did not like the Bois Noir name. The company had to purchase the rights to use the Égoïste name from photography magazine publisher Nicole Wisniak.Gaboué, Stéphane. "Q&A with Legendary Chanel Perfumer Jacques Polge," Hint (web fashion magazine), Thursday, September 2, 2010.
Retrieved December 2, 2017

Advertising

The centerpiece of Chanel's advertising campaign to launch Égoïste first in Europe in April 1990 and in the United States one year later was "Le Carlton",https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYJW6VK2vjg English-dubbed version of the French original a 30-second commercial in French without subtitles, directed by

and costing more than $1 million. It was filmed in a desert outside of

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...

. A stucco facade inspired by that of the Carlton Cannes Hotel was constructed by 300 workers in less than four weeks. Its primary feature was 36

balconies A balcony (from , "scaffold") is a platform projecting from the wall of a building, supported by columns or console brackets, and enclosed with a balustrade, usually above the ground floor. They are commonly found on multi-level houses, apartme ...

situated four high and nine wide, each with shuttered doors. With " Dance of the Knights" from

Sergei Prokofiev Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev; alternative transliterations of his name include ''Sergey'' or ''Serge'', and ''Prokofief'', ''Prokofieff'', or ''Prokofyev''. , group=n ( – 5 March 1953) was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor who l ...

's ballet ''Romeo and Juliet'' as its background music, the film opens in black-and-white with a sequence of women dressed in ball gowns shouting lines adapted from Pierre Corneille's tragicomic play '' Le Cid'': The ad won a Gold Lion award at the International Advertising Festival held at Cannes. Égoïste's sales exceeded initial projections by 35 to 40 percent fifteen months after the international launch.

Notes

References

{{Chanel Perfumes Chanel perfumes History of cosmetics Products introduced in 1990 20th-century perfumes