Ralf Schwieger is the Special Guest of Pitti Fragranze
Event
Edition 19
17.09.2021
Place of the event
Stazione Leopolda
Date of the event
17.09.2021 11:00
The great talent of global artistic perfumery will be the protagonist of a retrospective at the Stazione Leopolda, and an unmissable conversation with the curator Chandler Burr, in which he will tell us his very personal journey in the world of fragrances.
Ralf Schwieger, one of the preeminent perfumers working today, is the Special Guest of this years edition for Fragranze (Florence, 17-19 September 2021). Fragranze’s artistic director Chandler Burr has curated a major new exhibition, Ralf Schwieger: A Retrospective – the show exhibits Schwieger’s most important career works from 1999 to today in a fully experiential installation in the Stazione Leopolda exhibition (opening: Friday, 17 September at 11.00am). On the main stage’s Chandler Burr In Conversation with Ralf Schwieger (Friday, 17 September, 4.00pm, Conference Room) the artist will guide the audience through his creative processes and raw materials, all of which will be distributed during the conversation to audience members for simultaneous participation.

Born in Germany and now based in Manhattan, NYC, Ralf Schwieger lived a childhood of exploration and discovery; forests and their unusual scents were the first input to create fragrances with an unexpected personality. He describes the attitude to olfactory creation as a game divided in two parts: the first linked to the intellectual or conceptual sphere; the second to a deeper sensorial research. His scents, consequently, are both cerebral and intuitive.

Ralf Schwieger - since several years one of the perfumers of the French house MANE, worldwide leader of the fragrance and flavour industry - is above all famous for having signed the wonderful Lipstick Rose for Editions de Parfums Frederic Malle. Among his most important creations there are: Atelier Cologne Orange Sanguine, Autograph Rosie, David Yurman Summer Essence, Hermès Eau des Merveilles, Marc Jacobs Marc Jacobs Men, Naomi Campbell Naomi Campbell, Thierry Mugler Womanity, Yves Saint Laurent Baby Doll.
 
Bio
Ralf Schwieger was born in Germany. He studied chemistry, moved to Berlin to specialize in perfume chemistry before joining a perfumery school in Grasse. He likes to think of perfumery as something primary, which requires a highly developed but always playful aesthetic sense. Schwieger draws inspiration from the dynamic triangle of art, science and industry. So here are the delicate colors, the textures and the lightness of fabulous insects, the art of cooking, with a passion for pastry, contemporary dance (especially Pina Bausch). And then nature in its extraordinary strength: from simple rain to the sweet vulnerability of animals, to the raw materials of perfumes, of natural and synthetic origin, to be combined in unexpected proportions. His gaze then shifts to jewelry creation and Japanese culture, exemplified in packaging design. Among Schwieger's most important works: Thierry Mugler Womanity, Hermès Eau des Merveilles, Marc Jacobs Marc Jacobs Men, Yves Saint Laurent Baby Doll, Naomi Campbell Naomi Campbell, David Yurman Summer Essence and Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle Lipstick Rose.