The inspiration behind Assada

For our Assada fragrance, here's what came to our mind to achieve the scent we were looking to bottle.

Source of inspiration

We do not write briefs to create our perfumes. It rather comes from an experience, an emotion or a memory, but for our Madagascariensis collection, our main source of inspiration came from the local fauna and flora, or meaningful geographic areas. 

The most popular perfume flower

First of all, we will say that it naturally came to our mind that we should create a floral fragrance, and this with the most representative perfume flower of Madagascar, our native country: Ylang ylang.

Nosy Be

Thus, since ylang ylang is produced in "Nosy Be", the largest islet of Nosy Be, a small archipelago off Madagascar North West coast Its largest islet, coined as "The Perfume Island" with ylang ylang scent hitting your nose as soon as you get off the plane, it was only natural to pay tribute to this iconic place in Madagascar and world’s largest ylang essence producing area.

So, as a Malagasy perfumer, we wanted to encapsulate the authentic story of Nosy Be island that has an identity that is as multifaceted as its star flower, being at the crossroads of various worlds: Madagascar, Africa, Arabia, Asia, and France as it was the French colonizers who introduced the cultivation of ylang ylang in Nosy Be. And the French influence is still present to this day. From Hellville, Nosy Be's capital city to the cultivation of ylang ylang but also sugar cane, coffee, vanilla and pink peppercorn, all captured in our composition.

Behind the name

The name "Ylang Ylang Nosy Be" was already taken by another perfume house. We could still name our perfume "Nosy Be Ylang", nothing wrong with that, but as we aim to offer unexpected fragrances revealing the mysteries of Madagascar, we had to dig further.

We found out that the Arabs gave an Arab name to Nosy Be "Assada", which was perfect for a floriental scent. Arabs sailors were the first to explore Indian Ocean islands and archipelagos and gave a name to each of them (e.g. the name "Comoros" come from Arabic qamar or qamr, which means "moon").

The name "Assada" is unknown to even most Malagasy people, so, we decided to call our perfume, "Assada" to bring awareness on the proto-Malagasy influences of Madagascar and its dependencies.

Also, we thought that "Nosy Be" would be a bit too cliché as the island is the country's most popular touristic destination.

Lastly, we must say that "Nosy Be" is quite a tongue twister for non-Malagasy speakers as it is pronounced "Noo-sea Bay" and not nosy bee!

Aiming for the best ylang ylang perfume

Yet an ylang ylang perfume by a perfumery house inspired by Madagascar would again be too simplistic and expected. So, we decided to create THE epitome of all ylang ylang perfumes as a soliflore, so a perfume around one main note. And this, because, believe or not, we found out on many perfume reviews websites that most aficionados don't even know the true scent of ylang ylang.

This raw material is so used an overused in the perfume industry, but not as a star ingredient to build oriental and floral perfumes such as Chanel No5 or fragrances from the house of Guerlain. So it was another good reason to use it as a hero ingredient and educate the nose of XXI century perfume lovers in search for natural and authentic raw materials.

Tribute to the Real Queen of Perfumery

Furthermore, we wanted to pay homage to the Real Queen of perfumery, with a glorious accord made with the best ylang extractions (Nosy Be ylang Extra, the Champagne of ylang extractions, ylang Complete, ylang I, and ylang absolute from the Comoros) with the addition of secondary notes to make its multifaceted nuances shine.

Our Assada fragrance

Our Assada fragrance is a complex soliflore depicting Nosy Be at the confluence of multiple influences, yet very niche and unique. It features Nosy Be ylang ylang Extra but also some of the ingredients produced in the island such as sugar cane, pink peppercorn, coffee, vanilla. It's an Ambery floral, or "floriental" in the former perfume family classification, with oceanic smoky notes, that makes it wearable by all genders. Order our Discovery Set or try an Assada flacon.