Goutal

An eventful biography: Annick Goutal was born in 1945, the third of eight children of a well-known Parisian confectioner, and followed two extraordinary career paths until she found the third and thus her vocation as a perfumer. Her talent at the piano was recognized at an early age. From then on, a great deal of energy was devoted to training her as a classical pianist, and the young Annick had to submit to iron discipline. But at the age of 16, after winning an important prize, she rebelled against this way of life. She fled from the piano and her strict father to London as an au pair. There, by chance, she was discovered as a model and her second career began: successful and in demand, she suddenly earned big money and was a young star on the floor of the fashion world. However, she suffered from the fact that she performed without actually having learned anything for it and without having to be able to do very much for it. The ex-pianist, used to discipline and training, found no happiness or satisfaction in the modeling job. She rebelled and fled again. Back in Paris, she worked as an antique dealer, among other things. From the mid-seventies, she had to take up the fight against breast cancer. In the middle of this crisis period and after an operation, a good friend offered her a business idea: they both took up the production and distribution of natural cosmetic products. At first, this meant pure manual labor from production to elaborate packaging to trading at the flea market. Annick Goutal tirelessly learned all she could about the new craft with her characteristic diligence, and when she found that the cosmetics line needed its own fragrances, she visited the Robertet perfume house in Grasse. There she was overwhelmed by the world of fragrance and discovered her own talent as a perfumer. She became a student at Robertet and, in her mid-thirties, completed a relevant apprenticeship. In 1981, Annick Goutal opened her first boutique in an old Parisian bookstore and quickly her very natural and artistic perfumes became famous. In 1985, the champagne company Taittinger took the small private brand under its wing and the large international market was successfully developed. In 1999 Annick Goutal died of breast cancer at the age of 54. Her daughter from her first marriage, Camille Goutal, and Isabelle Doyen are today the perfumers and creative directors of the house, which they continue in the tradition of Annick Goutal.