The term "fragrance" is often used as a catch-all for thousands of under-regulated ingredients. Sure, this protects trade secrets, but it leaves consumers in the dark. I learned this decades ago when I became a mom. I began looking for ingredient transparency with products I used. I couldn’t imagine exposing my children to anything potentially toxic on my skin, so I gave up fragrance altogether. But I really missed it. Eventually I realized that if I wanted a safer sophisticated scent willing to reveal its ingredients, I would need to create it myself.  

At first, I thought it would be organic and plant-based, but in the first call with the Environmental Working Group, we learned there are safer synthetics that in some cases are less allergenic than natural ingredients. And so, the learning curve began to steepen...

This was getting complicated. I realized that to meet the EWG Verified™ safety standards, I needed them at the table with me throughout the process. After a lot of false starts and dead ends, we finally found our partners in IFF, a luxury fragrance house, and made a list of high quality ingredients we could trust. Then, we upped the ante and got the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute involved, to make sure we met their standards too.

It was a huge challenge for everyone, especially our perfumers. I was demanding the same level of mastery and quality as other fine fragrances, while also limiting the palette of ingredients that they typically formulate with from 3,000 to about 300.  

It took years of us mixing and matching our short list of ingredients. Finally, our talented IFF perfumers created five distinct-feeling scents, each meant to evoke a personal memory, person, place or feeling that I love.

These aren’t just the first fine fragrances to be both EWG Verified™ and Cradle to Cradle Certified™, they’ve also been spritzed, whiffed, and refined by my closest friends, family and complete strangers.

Yes, you can - and should - dive into every single ingredient we used. Yes, you should experiment with our samples and find which fragrances make you feel your best. We’ve got nothing to hold back, no recipes to protect. If there’s anything I’ve learned through this journey, it’s that real intrigue - the best kind of romance - comes when you have nothing to hide.

“I set out to see if it was possible to develop a line of fine fragrances proving you don’t need to sacrifice quality and sophistication for safety. And we did it!”

Michelle Pfeiffer

Founder, Henry Rose

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