Glamour (1953)

When Bourjois launched its own Glamour in 1953, the name already had a Chanel precedent: Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel had introduced a perfume of the same name in 1933. The reuse was less surprising than it might seem, however, because the Wertheimer family had long-standing interests in both companies. Pierre and Paul Wertheimer controlled Bourjois and, through Parfums Chanel, became Chanel’s business partners in the commercialization and distribution of her fragrances. Within this closely connected perfume world, the return of the name Glamour to the market was far less unusual than it would have been between two entirely unrelated houses.

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Bourjois’s Glamour was named for an idea rather than a flower, place, or romantic heroine. The word is English, pronounced GLAM-er, and carries a much older sense of enchantment. It entered English through Scots, where glamour originally meant a spell or bewitching illusion before evolving into its modern meaning of mysteriously exciting attractiveness. For Bourjois, it was an ideal name: short, international, fashionable, and suggestive of polished femininity. It evokes satin, candlelight, jewels, pale gloves, soft furs, cocktails, theatre premières, and the quiet confidence of a woman who has attended to every detail of her appearance.

Launched in 1953, Glamour belonged to the mature postwar years, when Paris had reclaimed its position as the center of fashion and Dior’s New Look still defined the ideal of feminine elegance. Fitted bodices, narrow waists, full skirts, gloves, stoles, pearls, hats, and carefully chosen accessories made dressing for a dinner, cocktail party, theatre performance, or intimate gathering at home feel like an occasion. Fashion favored a highly composed femininity, romantic but disciplined, decorative but impeccably tailored. A perfume called Glamour would have appealed to women who wanted more than a pleasant scent; it promised an aura of refinement, youthfulness, and social assurance.

 

Created by Henri Robert and Constantin Mikhailovich “Kot” Weriguine, Glamour was an aldehydic floral chypre that expressed this ideal in scent. Its fresh, green-fruity opening and springlike floral heart gave it an easy brightness, while its mossy, balsamic, woody base provided the depth and polish expected from a serious French perfume. Here, glamour would not mean something heavy, theatrical, or overtly seductive. It would be a sheen: sparkling aldehydes making the flowers seem more luminous; citrus and Provençal herbs suggesting sun-warmed hills and open air; then moss, woods, musk, and ambergris giving the composition a graceful, dressed-up finish. It was the fragrance equivalent of a well-cut cocktail dress—radiant at first glance, yet carefully structured beneath the surface.

The image of Provence added an appealingly French pastoral note to the perfume’s elegance. Rose, jasmine, and ylang-ylang would suggest flowers warmed by sunlight, while the herbal, mossy, and woody elements kept the scent from becoming merely sweet or cosmetic. The advertising claim that Glamour particularly suited blondes should be understood as the beauty language of its period: it positioned the fragrance as radiant, airy, and softly golden, appropriate to pale fabrics, pearls, and hostess gowns. Yet its chypre foundation gave it substance. This was not innocence, but youthful sophistication.

Within the perfume market of 1953, Glamour followed an established but fashionable direction rather than attempting a radical break from it. Aldehydic florals had long been associated with modern French luxury, while green floral chypres—built on moss, woods, balsams, and sometimes leathery undertones—were especially admired in the postwar period. Glamour’s distinction was its softer, more sunlit interpretation of that style: less severe than a sharply leathery chypre, less lavish than a grand oriental, and more suited to cocktails, premières, and small dinners than to the boudoir. It captured a central ideal of the early 1950s: a woman who appeared effortlessly elegant, while every element of her appearance had been chosen with care.

Fragrance Composition:

So what does it smell like? Glamour is classified as an aldehydic floral chypre fragrance for women. It starts off with a fresh green and fruity top, followed by a green floral heart, layered over a mossy, balsamic, woodsy chypre base. Press materials read: "It evokes the warmth of the Provencal hills. Chypre type, fruity (citrus), green and woody perfume. Rose, jasmine, ylang-ylang, mosses and herbs of Provence, musk, and ambergris. Spring-like and youthful, it stands out for its subtlety and elegance. With its carefree freshness, it is said to suit blondes particularly well. A “dressed-up” perfume, ideal for cocktails, premières, and small dinners in a hostess gown."

• Top notes: aldehydes, bergamot, lemon, neroli, orange, gardenia, peach
• Middle notes: jasmine, rose, ylang ylang, carnation, narcissus, Provencal herbs
• Base notes: ambergris, oakmoss, musk, styrax, vetiver, benzoin

Scent Profile:

Glamour is an aldehydic floral chypre composed as a vision of Provence made elegant enough for cocktail hour: fresh sunlight and fruit at first, flowers and aromatic greenery in the middle, then the cool shadow of oakmoss, roots, resins, skin warmth, and ambergris. Although its advertising evokes the Provençal hills, no individual countries of origin are specified for the raw materials, so it would be unsafe to assign a particular bergamot, jasmine, rose, or vetiver provenance. Its “Provence” is better understood as an atmosphere—a perfumer’s landscape of citrus groves, herbs warmed by the sun, flowers, and dry woodland.

The opening begins with aldehydes, which lend the perfume its unmistakable vintage radiance: a bright, fizzy impression like citrus peel, polished wax, cool air, and silk freshly lifted from tissue paper. These aroma chemicals do not imitate a single flower; instead, they make the natural materials around them feel larger, cleaner, and more luminous. Bergamot adds its refined bittersweet green citrus character, more floral and tea-like than lemon, while lemon contributes a brisk flash of sharp, sunlit peel. Neroli, distilled from bitter-orange blossom, softens these citrus oils with a delicately green, honeyed floral quality. Orange rounds the opening with sweeter, juicier flesh and peel, preventing the aldehydes from becoming too austere.

The fruity element is completed by peach, which would almost certainly have been an accord rather than a literal peach essence. Fresh peaches do not yield an essential oil that faithfully preserves their soft, velvety aroma, so perfumers create the impression with aroma materials—often lactones that suggest cream, fruit skin, and the tender golden flesh near the stone. This synthetic peach effect gives Glamour a gentle, youthful warmth beneath its sparkling citrus. Gardenia is similarly best understood as an accord. The living flower has a lush, creamy, waxy, green-white perfume, but it does not provide a practical essential oil that captures that smell fully. Carefully selected synthetic floral materials would have made its creamy bloom more diffusive and lasting, enhancing the naturalistic richness of the jasmine, rose, and ylang-ylang to come.

At the heart, jasmine unfurls with its warm, creamy, faintly fruity sensuality, giving the composition a living, petal-soft depth. Rose follows with a dewy, lemony, wine-like bloom that brings poise and classical femininity. Ylang-ylang adds a more exotic shade—banana-like creaminess, sweet solar petals, and a lightly spicy floral richness—making the bouquet feel warmer and more languid without losing its springlike freshness. Carnation lends a dry, clove-like spice, the impression of red or pink petals dusted with pepper. Its distinctive character is often reinforced with aroma chemicals such as eugenol and isoeugenol, which naturally occur in clove but allow a perfumer to give the flower a clearer, more enduring spicy-floral profile than natural extracts alone could provide. Narcissus contributes an unusually beautiful green-gold facet: honeyed pollen, crushed stems, damp earth, hay, and a faint leathery bitterness. It draws the flowers toward the chypre base and keeps Glamour from becoming a simple, sweet floral composition.

The advertised Provençal herbs are not individually identified, so they should not be treated as a confirmed list. The effect most likely suggests an aromatic accord in the spirit of lavender, rosemary, thyme, and perhaps sage: lavender’s clean, softly camphoraceous flowers; rosemary’s piney, silvery sharpness; thyme’s dry, peppery warmth; and sage’s velvety, bitter-green herbal tone. Whether or not each material appeared literally in the formula, the intention is clear—an impression of a hillside garden, crushed beneath the sun, with aromatic leaves releasing their scent into warm air. These herbs would sharpen the fruit and florals, giving Glamour its distinctive green, outdoorsy elegance.

In the base, ambergris would have supplied a warm, saline, mineral glow, making the fragrance feel alive on skin rather than simply sweet or resinous. In a historic formula it may have been natural ambergris; today, its effect is generally recreated with aroma materials that provide the same airy, musky, ocean-warmed radiance without depending on the rare natural substance. Oakmoss gives the perfume its chypre identity: cool, inky, mossy, leathery, and faintly salty, like shaded earth after rain. Vetiver reinforces this with the scent of dry roots, smoke, bitter grass, and elegant woods. Together they make the bright floral heart feel tailored and sophisticated.

Musk lies beneath the entire structure as a soft, skin-like haze of powder, clean fabric, and quiet warmth. While historical perfumery once used animal musk, modern perfumery relies on synthetic musks for ethical and legal reasons; these materials are valuable because they make delicate florals and fresh citrus effects linger seamlessly on the skin. Styrax adds a darker, balsamic resinous touch—sweet, leathery, smoky, and slightly medicinal—while benzoin provides a smoother, more vanillic balm, like warm amber-colored resin with a trace of almond and incense. Together, these materials turn Glamour’s green fruit, flowers, and Provençal herbs into something more polished and enveloping: a perfume that begins like a bright morning on a southern French hillside, then ends as a softly glowing chypre against warm skin and evening silk.

The New Yorker - Volume 32, 1954: "Bourjois has put forth a little charmer called Glamour. In this one, a fillip of orange is added to the sharp, clean tang of jasmine; at Altman, $5.50 buys three-fourths of an ounce, in an oval bottle with a gold plastic cover."

Bottles: 

Glamour was housed in various bottles over the years, including green glass bottles with gold tops.

Product Line:

The Glamour Parfum would have been the richest, most complete expression of this aldehydic floral chypre. Its first impression would still have a touch of bright citrus and aldehydic sparkle, but the concentration would allow the opening to settle quickly into a smooth floral warmth. Jasmine, rose, ylang-ylang, gardenia, narcissus, and carnation would feel deeper and more velvety, while the peach effect would give the bouquet a soft, golden glow. On the skin, the mossy base would become especially important: oakmoss, vetiver, styrax, benzoin, musk, and ambergris creating a dry, balsamic, softly leathery finish. The Parfum would feel dressed-up and intimate rather than overtly loud—ideal for the hostess gown, a theatre premiere, or a small dinner where the fragrance could be discovered close to the skin.

The Eau de Toilette would present Glamour in a brighter, more animated form. Its alcohol-forward diffusion would make the aldehydes, bergamot, lemon, neroli, and orange appear first as a brisk, champagne-like citrus lift, softened by the velvety fruitiness of peach. The floral heart would feel greener and more open, as though the jasmine, rose, and gardenia were carried on a breeze across sun-warmed Provençal herbs. Carnation and narcissus would contribute their spice and green-gold depth without becoming heavy, while the oakmoss and vetiver would remain as an elegant, dry afterimage. It would be the most versatile form of Glamour: refined enough for cocktails, but fresh enough for daytime wear.

The Eau de Cologne would be the lightest and most refreshing version of Glamour, intended more as a fragrant revitalizer than a long-lasting perfume. The citrus materials would take center stage: bergamot’s green bitterness, lemon’s brisk peel, neroli’s airy blossom, and orange’s sunny sweetness, all made more radiant by the fizzy aldehydic note. The peach and floral notes would appear as soft touches rather than a full bouquet, while the herbs would give the scent a cooling, aromatic suggestion of lavender, rosemary, and crushed green leaves. Oakmoss, vetiver, benzoin, and musk would likely remain only as a discreet, clean, woody trace after the brighter top notes had faded. It would suit morning dressing, warm weather, post-bath use, or a quick refreshment before leaving the house.

The Glamour friction lotion would have offered the perfume as part of the daily toilette. Applied after bathing, it would likely smell cool, clean, and lightly aromatic at first, with the sparkling citrus, aldehydes, and Provençal-herb impression rising from warmed skin. As the lotion dried, the floral notes would become more subdued and powdery—suggesting rose, jasmine, and gardenia rather than announcing them—and the moss, vetiver, and musk would leave a faintly woody, softly perfumed finish. It would be less formal than the Eau de Toilette or Parfum, but beautifully useful as a first layer, making the later application of fragrance seem more continuous and natural.

The Glamour soap would translate the composition into a creamy, polished bath scent. Lather naturally emphasizes freshness, so the aldehydes, bergamot, lemon, neroli, and orange would become especially vivid, giving the soap a brisk, sunny, almost sparkling character. The gardenia, jasmine, rose, and ylang-ylang would soften the foam with a floral creaminess, while carnation and herbs would add a delicate spicy-green accent. Once rinsed away, the darker chypre materials—oakmoss, vetiver, balsams, ambergris, and musk—would remain only as a refined trace on the hands and skin. It would turn an ordinary bath into a small expression of early-1950s glamour: fresh, floral, clean, and subtly elegant.

 In 1972/1973, Glamour was available in the following:

• Parfum Presentation: In original bottles; purse and travel atomizers and refills; and gift sets.
• Related Products: Eau de Toilette, Eau de Cologne, lotion (friction lotion)
• Ancillary Products: soap

In 1977/1978, Glamour was available in the following:

• Parfum Presentation: Original bottles (from 5ml to 82ml); Purse spray (10ml)
• Related Products: Eau de Toilette; Eau de Toilette atomizer (65ml); Eau de Cologne; Gift sets
• Ancillary Products (Bath & Body): Soap

Fate of the Fragrance:

Discontinued, date unknown. Still being sold in 1978.