by Jo Malone
We were throwing around names one afternoon when Josh wandered in after school and observed the usual scene of three adults looking vexed, with heads in hands. He went to the fridge, got himself a drink, and listened in from the sidelines to our haphazard brainstorming, as I said, ‘Like it, don’t love it’ or ‘Hate it! Not me’.
That night, with Charlotte gone, and as we sat at the same table having dinner, Gary and I continued the name conversation when Josh suddenly piped up.
‘Mum, you’re always saying what you love and don’t love, and fragrance is about what you love. So if everything is about what you love, why don’t you call it Jo Loves . . .?’
I looked at Gary. Gary looked at me, and Josh looked at us both, as if to say, ‘Why have you been making this so hard?’
‘I love it,’ I said. ‘I love it!’
That evening, Jo Loves was born, inspired by our son.
Within the week, the colours and packaging clicked into place, too: a blood-red background with a central black box, bearing the name in white letters. Bold. Striking. Stand out. And way too loud. The boldness of those colours would be something I would later come to regret but, regardless, the spirit of Jo Loves was alive and kicking, bursting with life.
Before taking another step forward, I decided that the right thing to do was to approach Estée Lauder and declare our hand, out of respect more than anything else. In my heart, Jo Malone London was my first child and I didn’t want to do anything that would harm her in any way, shape or form, so we sat down with Lauder’s head counsel and showed them everything we were doing. And, for the sake of clarity, we suggested adding a qualifying statement on the underside of each box that said, ‘Jo Loves is not a subsidiary company or an associated business of Jo Malone Ltd.’
Gary had already started the process of legally registering the name of our trademark, and we officially joined the ranks of Britain’s SMEs (Small Medium Enterprise). That’s what the government today calls the small business owner but it sounds so dull, doing little to convey the dynamism of the people who make or build something, and contribute to our economy. Gary joked that the acronym summed me up perfectly – Stressed Menopausal Eccentric. Although I prefer my suggestion: Seriously Motivated Entrepreneur.
I certainly couldn’t have been any more motivated to start again. Of course, no one other than the three of us sitting around the kitchen table had an inkling about my return, and we wanted to keep it that way. Red boxes, registered trademarks and good intentions wouldn’t mean a thing unless I could create a whole new product range. Until then, all we had was an empty shell of a business, waiting for its soul to arrive.
I was well aware of the risks of re-emerging with a new brand. Unlike the first time around, there was now a reputation at stake; a height from which to fall. Comebacks in any field are only ever performed on self-made pedestals. It’s you, no one else, putting yourself back out there and past glories only buy a limited period of goodwill. It didn’t matter how successful I had been before, or what I had built. What I would go on to create as Jo Loves was all that mattered now.
I would be inviting the scrutiny, so I knew that I’d need a fragrance that would put me back on the map, which meant placing all my chips on red, and putting my faith in a sense of smell that was only just beginning to flicker back to life.
TWENTY-EIGHT
The boys were still dozing in bed. ‘I’m off to clear my head. See you at breakfast,’ I said to Gary, wrapping a white sarong around my swimsuit and slipping on my flip-flops before heading outside. We were on a two-week holiday to Parrot Cay, one of eight habitable islands on the archipelago nation of the Turks and Caicos, and beach walks had become my morning ritual.
At 7 a.m. the tropical heat was perfect, tempered by a cooling ocean breeze. I stepped off the tiny terrace at the front of the villa, cut through a gap in the hedge and turned on to the beach which, at that time of day, I had to myself – a sweeping expanse of the whitest, powder-soft sand I’ve ever known, in a setting far removed from the demands and pressures that come with preparing to launch a brand.
In that respect, this getaway couldn’t have been better timed. Back home, I had tried and tried to lock in a fragrance but to no avail. As much as my sense of smell had returned, I couldn’t build any exciting accords that promised something dynamic and original. I’d think about a lemongrass note but it would become nothing more than a lemongrass note; same with a grapefruit note, a mimosa note and a lime note. I remembered how Dad used to sit in front of his easel, staring at a blank canvas for hours, waiting for a painting to form in his mind. I hadn’t truly appreciated that struggle, or patience, until now.
I’ll go in search of inspiration anywhere – cafés, busy streets, or city parks – but, sometimes, I need to remove myself from distractions and find that mental blank canvas, so Parrot Cay was ideal. I’ve never meditated in my life but my beach walks were the nearest thing I could imagine to finding a meditative headspace. I’d practise deep inhale-exhale exercises, becoming conscious of each breath, trying to clear the mind and relax the body, allowing myself the space to reconnect with creativity. I don’t find it easy to relax, especially when anxious about an inability to create. At night especially, I lay wide awake in bed, listening to the waves crashing over coral reef. It seemed that even the ocean was calm by day but more restless in the dark.
I knew exactly the type of fragrance I wanted to create – something unique, beyond trend, with qualities never before created, powerful without being overpowering, neither male nor female, neither soft nor strong – a scent that was in danger of almost contradicting itself and yet always self-assured. The kind of scent that when it walks by you in the street, you want to turn on your heels and follow it. I needed something exceptional, worthy of a comeback. With that outcome in mind, I was intent on creating an unbelievable citrus, staying true to my signature.
I had arrived in the Turks and Caicos with many loose ideas swimming around my head, but the one that had the most potential concerned the pomelo note I had brought with me. This scent was already forming but it was more a lone drumbeat, awaiting the rest of the orchestra to create the symphony.
I had been fascinated by this tropical, melon-sized fruit ever since being introduced to its bittersweet taste in Thailand. But when I first started experimenting with its capabilities, I discovered that it’s a watery, temperamental note; nothing I added gave it dynamism, charisma, or any sense of magic. The other inherent challenge was the fact that it’s such a fleeting note; it smells amazing but evaporates in an instant, so it needed other notes to give it power, strength and hold it in place. Good for washing sheets and liquid hand soap maybe, but its fuller structure as a fragrance eluded me. It was such a frustrating time because I could smell its presence tantalisingly close but couldn’t see or reach it.
Wherever I travel, even if it’s for a weekend, I always pack my little fragrance kit: vials of notes, strips of fragrance-testing blotter paper, my teat-pipettes, and a notebook. In the same way some people will relax in the evening with music, I relax by fiddling around with different notes. In the villa at Parrot Cay, I’d sit at the table as the sun went down, smelling a single note to see if an image or memory came to mind. Even when I drew a blank, I still persevered, as all creatives must. Dad sat there with a blank canvas and brushes to hand. Writers face an empty screen and play with words until a paragraph strings together. Likewise, I still worked my nose, even when nothing stirred. Pursue creativity in its absence. Invite inspiration. Keep the door open. Eventually, creativity will manifest itself and whisper to you in the most unexpected forms. Which is what happened to me on that morning when I took my walk.
I had removed my flip-flops and was strolling alongside the blue, crystal-clear water. Aside from the sea breeze in my ears, there was not a sound. I glimpsed a slate-coloured object out of the corner of my eye in the shallows, a few yards away to my right. At first, I thought it was a giant pebble but then it quivered slightly – a
stingray. I stood there, trying to get a closer look, and the ripples produced by my shuffling feet didn’t even cause it to twitch. With my curiosity satisfied, I ambled on; it followed. I stopped; it stopped, hovering, with its long tail flat against the sand. I giggled, thinking how gentle and graceful this beautiful creature was. Remarkably, as I continued further along the beach, it mirrored my movements for the next twenty minutes or so, seemingly as intrigued by me as I was by it. Even when I reached the far end of the island and turned around, it turned back with me.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt such oneness with nature, as if life was reminding me that whatever comes naturally will always be by my side; at least, that’s how I interpreted the symbolism. This moment wasn’t about a smell or a memory, and it conjured no notes. All I know is that I felt a surge of creative energy and, with it, a tremendous feeling of peace – an inner calm that I hadn’t felt since 2003 or so, prior to my cancer diagnosis. And, as soon as that calm arrived, my walking companion disappeared, darting away into the ocean.
Gary and Josh were already sitting at the table on the terrace having breakfast by the time I returned to the villa, but first I lay on a sunbed, needing five minutes to digest what had happened, like someone waking and trying to remember a vivid dream.
My mind raced with the sights and smells that lined up in a chain-link of images: the heaviness of the stingray yet how gracefully it floated; Josh’s red bucket by my side, filled with sand dollars collected the previous day; the dazzling white of the beach; the clean white towels rolled up on the neighbouring loungers beneath the umbrellas – more stark white against blue; the salty air; the lemongrass broth being cooked nearby; the peppermint geraniums and herbaceous scents from the hedges behind me; the bottle of fizzy water Gary had half-drunk while I was on my walk, plus a glass with crushed ice melting reluctantly around a slice of lime; my manicured toes with red nail polish, tanned, sun-kissed. And when I headed back into the villa, I saw the crisp, ruffled bed linen on our unmade bed, and felt the coolness of the wooden parquet floor beneath my feet.
There and then, I consciously started to construct the concept for my comeback fragrance. This process wasn’t necessarily about finding the scent – not yet; it was about painting a picture in my head and asking myself how I would interpret each of those moments and sights with a fragrance. And that clean, crisp, simple picture was a beachy, sun-kissed landscape, with a refreshing sharpness in the air, capturing that feeling on the last day of a memorable holiday when you want to gather all the moments together and relive them. I wrote everything down in my notebook before going to breakfast – every thought, theme and observation, not wishing to forget a single thing. Those very pages were what I would later show the perfumer in Paris as we brought to life the creation that would become my new No.1 fragrance: to be called, quite simply, Pomelo.
No sooner had we touched down on European soil again than I was jumping on the Eurostar to Paris. Months earlier, I had already decided not to renew my collaboration with the perfume houses and ‘noses’ with whom I had worked previously. If there was to be a clear distinction between old and new, then it made sense – and felt right – to find a team who had no knowledge of my methods. I was so wary of perceived similarities with the past that I didn’t wish to repeat anything, regardless of how successful that team and formula may have been.
For the same overcautious reason, I somewhat naively expected my new ideas to be accepted on merit, and not simply because of who I am. So when it came to ringing round the different perfume houses in search of new collaborators, I thought I’d use my married name, announce myself as a fragrance designer and land a meeting. It goes without saying that discarding a known calling card for an unknown name was futile.
‘I’m sorry but we’re not taking on new clients’ was the stock response and no one returned my calls either. I dialled-and-smiled for about five days in the forlorn hope that my enthusiasm would shine through, but I didn’t receive a single receptive response.
Sod this, I thought.
I brought out my light from under the bushel, called back the first house on my list, went through the same spiel as before, and ended my call by adding ‘ . . . and can you tell them that it’s Jo Malone. I’d appreciate a call back when they can.’
My phone rang within the hour, a new door swung open, and a new relationship formed with a perfume house and different ‘noses’ whose identities are the secret ingredient to a winning formula. Suffice it to say that these genius collaborators would be as precious and important to me as my old industry relationships had been.
My opening words at my first meeting in Paris, in the months before Pomelo came to me, were something along the lines of: ‘Look, I’ve not done this for five years so while I think I can still do it, I might need a little assistance.’
I felt like a little girl asking for help when I first sat around the table with my new team and admitted to that vulnerability. Initially, I think they saw my reputation walk in ahead of me, which was why I was quick to issue the reminder that the person seated before them was perhaps more tentative in her approach than first time around. I understood that I would need to refresh, relearn and be retaught a few things.
The team, from the CEO down, were amazing with me. ‘We will work with you and offer whatever assistance you need until you feel comfortable in creating again,’ they said.
I don’t doubt that they, like me, privately asked themselves if I could repeat my success but they took that risk and, as I outlined my vision for Jo Loves, they were prepared to do whatever I wanted to do, and go in whatever direction I chose. When that kind of collaborative spirit kicks in, it creates a shared passion and a synergy that I believe only benefits the end product and both parties.
In working with new perfumers and re-exploring an ever-competitive industry, I came to realise how much the landscape had changed in my time away. When I first started out as a fragrance designer, I was regarded as unique, but the marketplace was now crowded with like-minded designers with their own niche brands. I was no longer out front, leading the way. I was in the pack, trying to find a new way through. What’s more, consumer habits had changed, too: shoppers seemed more informed about fragrance, alive to the choices – buying a fragrance from one boutique and a scented candle from another. They sought out niche scents that were different and utilised alternative ingredients. And then there was the rise of social media and fragrance bloggers, who were now regarded as key influencers, transforming the way brands advertised, engaged with customers, and launched product.
Personally, I think competitive tension in any field is healthy – it prevents complacency and encourages originality. But before I could start thinking about raising my game, I first had to create more fragrances to complete my launch collection.
Originally, I intended to run with only one citrus, one floral, and one spicy fragrance but my love of orange blossom – the one note I would take to heaven – proved irresistible, so I ended up with a quartet. With my creative block released by Pomelo, the following three came to me effortlessly, with scents conjuring their own memories and inspirations: Gardenia; Green Orange & Coriander; and Orange Tulle.
The product line would be complete with the inclusion of two layered, scented candles, which in itself was a first. Instead of a single note, I wanted to structure a candle into three separate fragrance layers, and so I created: Lemongrass, Amber, Tiare Flower; and Frangipani, Wild Reseda, Tuberose.
It can take anything from three months to a year to move from concept to development to formulation to finished product, and the team of people I now had in place – a stellar staff replete with industry expertise and experience – would know when I had approved a product because, under a new system, it would be signed off with a red dot, the date and my initials. ‘Has Jo red-dotted it?’ is a question that can often be heard around our offices these days. It can be a fragrance, a photo shoot, a press release, a box, a ribbon or a bottle top – that red dot is
my green light.
But it was more of a red-letter day when the samples of those four fragrances and two candles were delivered to the first-floor office we now rented off Sloane Square. This temporary ‘headquarters’ had a white-walled meeting area that we called ‘the think room’ – a space where we could brainstorm as well as meet beauty journalists, bloggers and buyers. We also had an adjoining showroom whose walls were lined with black shelving, which was where I ‘displayed’ those samples on a single shelf – the first time I had stacked product since closing the door on Sloane Street. To see my fragrances again, in finished bottles, standing side by side – one year on from being unable to knit together any kind of notes – was one personally proud moment.
Unscrewing the top and putting the bottle rim to my nose, breathing in each scent, made me grateful for that day I stood in a small shed in Mile End, imagining this flashforward. I had struggled with making fragrance more than I thought possible. I had been scared, and doubted myself, more times than I can remember, but the sense of elation now made every ounce of angst worthwhile. My new range didn’t guarantee success but it was enough for me to know that my instinct had been right: this was unfinished business and I still had something to offer.
I compare this moment to looking down a telescope turned the wrong way, because that’s the best way I can sum up how emotionally different it felt second time around. Before, when we opened in Sloane Street, it was like looking through the lens properly: everything felt large and magnified, looking outward into infinite possibilities. Now, looking through the wrong end, everything felt narrow, reduced and small – just four bottles and two candles on a shelf – and no one yet knew of our presence.
That’s why November 2011 couldn’t come fast enough – the date we had scheduled for the official launch of Jo Loves, eleven months after the lock-out period had ended. All that was left to do now, in the absence of word of mouth, and with the aim of generating some anticipation during the spring and summer, was to formally make the announcement that no one expected.