Alejandro Acosta was born in Castellón de la Plana in 1991 and grew up in Benicarló, a town on the Mediterranean that is home to one of IFF's largest ingredient plants. His father was a perfumer at IFF. Acosta studied Fine Arts at the Universitat de Barcelona and built a career as a painter, with shows in Shanghai, Taipei, Brussels, Berlin and Madrid. The scent work began as a private project after his father died.
He calls himself an artist rather than a perfumer, and perfumery is one of his materials. It grew out of installations: El Indiano was made for an exhibition told entirely through smell, about a man who comes home rich to Barcelona from the American colonies. Each 30 ml bottle is crowned with a figure he models, sculpts and paints by hand, so no two match, and the formulas mix modern molecules with natural tinctures and essential oils. Dark Souls and Bloody Mire take the line into smoke, leather and dark rose.
La Candelaria, the one we carry, began in a downpour in Bogotá's old quarter and goes back to the guava tree in his grandmother's courtyard in Colombia, his family's country. Ripe guava, mango, lime and white flowers sit over café con leche, palo santo, cinnamon and Virginia cedar, with ginkgo for a green edge. Its sculpture is a scarlet macaw.
