Joy is a

perfume Perfume (, ) is a mixture of fragrance, fragrant essential oils or aroma compounds (fragrances), Fixative (perfumery), fixatives and solvents, usually in liquid form, used to give the human body, animals, food, objects, and living-spaces an agre ...

created for

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

ian couturier

Jean Patou Jean Patou (; 27 September 1887 – 8 March 1936) was a French fashion designer, and founder of the Jean Patou brand. Early life Patou was born in Paris, France in 1880. Patou's family's business was tanning and furs. Patou worked with his u ...

perfumer A perfumer is an expert on creating perfume compositions, sometimes referred to affectionately as a ''nose'' () due to their fine sense of smell and skill in producing olfactory compositions. The perfumer is effectively an artist who is trained i ...

Henri Alméras Henri Alméras (1892 – 1965) was a French perfumer, author, and painter. Early life and career Alméras was born in a garrison in Brittany, the son of an officer. In school, he excelled in chemistry. He performed his military service in 1913 a ...

in 1929. It is considered to be one of the greatest fragrances created and is a landmark example of the floral genre in perfumery. It is no longer produced.

History

Joy was created as a reaction to the 1929 Wall Street crash, which had diminished the fortunes of Jean Patou's wealthy American clientele. Despite its elevated price and the depressed economic environment, ''Joy'' became a success and has remained Jean Patou's most famous fragrance. Patou was acquired by

Procter & Gamble The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) is an American multinational consumer goods corporation headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio. It was founded in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble. It specializes in a wide range of personal health/con ...

in 2001. In 2002, Patou launched ''Enjoy'', a contemporary take on ''Joy'' meant for younger women. In 2011 Patou was bought by Designer Parfums Ltd, a UK-based firm. In August 2018,

LVMH LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE (), commonly known as LVMH, is a French multinational holding company and conglomerate that specializes in luxury goods and has its headquarters in Paris, France. The company was formed in 1987 through the ...

purchased Patou and

Dior Christian Dior SE (), commonly known as Dior, is a French Multinational corporation, multinational luxury goods company that is controlled and chaired by French businessman Bernard Arnault, who also heads LVMH. , Dior controlled around 42% of ...

, an LVMH brand, acquired the rights to the name "Joy". In August 2018, Dior launched a perfume named ''Joy''.

Composition

Joy is composed primarily of a combination of

jasmine Jasmine (botanical name: ''Jasminum'', pronounced ) is a genus of shrubs and vines in the olive family of Oleaceae. It contains around 200 species native to tropical and warm temperate regions of Eurasia, Africa, and Oceania. Jasmines are wid ...

and

rose A rose is either a woody perennial plant, perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred Rose species, species and Garden roses, tens of thousands of cultivar ...

; 10,000 jasmine flowers and 28 dozen roses are required to create 30ml of the parfum, contributing to its high retail price. ''Joy'' also contains other flowers such as ylang ylang, champak, and

tuberose ''Agave amica'', formerly ''Polianthes tuberosa'', the tuberose, is a perennial plant in the family Asparagaceae, subfamily Agavoideae, extracts of which are used as a Note (perfumery), note in perfumery. Now widely grown as an ornamental plant, ...

. Given its many ingredients, Joy does not smell like a specific flower. According to

Luca Turin Luca Turin (born 20 November 1953) is a biophysicist and writer with a long-standing interest in bioelectronics, the sense of smell, perfumery, and the fragrance industry. Early life and education Turin was born in Beirut, Lebanon on 20 November ...

, "the whole point of its formula was to achieve the platonic idea of a flower, not one particular earthly manifestation." The original bottle, designed by French architect and artisan Louis Süe, was designed to have a simple, classical feel.

Awards

"Joy" was voted "Scent of the Century" by the public at the Fragrance Foundation FiFi Awards in 2000, beating its rival "

Chanel No. 5 Chanel No. 5 is the first perfume launched by French couturier Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel in 1921. The scent formula for the fragrance was compounded by French-Russian chemist and perfumer Ernest Beaux. The design of its bottle has been an imp ...

". Joy is preserved in its original 1930 formulation in the archives of the

Osmothèque The Osmothèque (from Greek ''osmē'' "scent" patterned on French ''bibliothèque'' "library") is the world's largest scent archive, a leading international research institution tracing the history of perfumery, based in Versailles with conferenc ...

, donated to the collection by Jean Kerléo, formerly head

at Jean Patou.Gozo Jeroboam
/ref>

References

{{Perfume Perfumes 20th-century perfumes