In 2006, Hermès introduced Terre d’Hermès, a men’s Eau de Toilette inspired by the richness of nature. Created by Jean-Claude Ellena, it was a study of the elements, a dance between mineral, wood, and sky. Over the years, it evolved: first as a Pure Parfum in 2009, then as Eau Très Fraîche in 2014. When Christine Nagel took the helm as the Director of Olfactive Creation at Hermès Parfums around a decade ago, she approached it with reverence. 

“Terre d’Hermès, for me, is a monument,” Nagel reflects. “When I arrived at Hermès, it took me years before I felt ready to work on it.” That patience shaped her approach. She eased into it, first with Eau Intense Vétiver, then Terre d’Hermès Eau Givrée, after which she found herself at a crossroads. “I wondered at one point: is there still something in the earth, the actual soil, that still touches me?”

That question unearthed a memory, one forged in heat and struggle. Nearly 25 years ago, she embarked on a gruelling two-hour climb to the top of a volcano. Despite describing it as the “worst experience” of her life, it became the defining source of inspiration for her latest creation. “When I made it to the top, it was magical,” she reminisces. “Very intense, yet at the same time, very light. The black landscape against the reddish lava. That feeling never left me.” Now, she returns to that moment, to the core of the earth itself, for the next chapter of Terre d’Hermès.

“At that time, I said to myself that this would be worth doing something about, creating something. And in order to create, I need the emotions and the feeling, but not only that, I also need the right material to create the perfume.” 

To capture this energy, Nagel turned to an unexpected palette of ingredients: bergamot, burning wood, lava stone, coffee beans, and liquorice. “To create a perfume, it’s very important to have freshness in the top notes. I used a very special bergamot, created only for Hermès. But I distilled this bergamot with black pepper to give it more signature, more character. For the heart of this perfume, I was looking for burning wood, and I found an incredible combination: roasted coffee and natural liquorice wood.”

Ingredients like these require precision to source and perfect. With coffee, for instance, roasters rely on their noses to determine the exact moment to stop the process. But in perfumery, when extracting an olfactory essence, even a minute too long or too short can alter the scent drastically. “That’s why coffee is considered unstable in perfumes,” Nagel explains. “You cannot use a material that is not stable.” But it was MANE, a French society that had perfected the extraction process, allowing her to finally harness the scent. As for liquorice wood, it had never been used in its natural form in a men’s fragrance before, but it was crafted specifically for Hermès. “If I want a certain type of bergamot or if I want natural liquorice, which was the case this time, even if it takes a year, two years, I have the money. And in fact, this ability to create products on our own terms, it’s extraordinary.”

Yet true freedom at Hermès isn’t just about access to ingredients. It’s a freedom of time, where a fragrance is released only when it’s ready. And it’s creative freedom too, something Nagel tells me is “rare.” At Hermès, there’s no marketing department dictating trends, no strict deadlines, no market-driven formulas. Most notably, there’s no consumer testing because it “removes the character of the fragrance” as Nagel tells me. The fate of a fragrance lies then in the hands of just four people: Nagel herself; Pierre-Alexis Dumas, Hermès’ artistic director; Véronique Nichanian, the artistic director who has led the house’s menswear for over 30 years; and Agnès de Villers, the chairman and CEO of Hermès Parfum and Beauty. 

“When I arrived at the house,” Nagel recounts, “Pierre-Alexis Dumas told me, ‘Christine, keep your courage, because, without courage, there is no creation.’ Then he added, ‘You have the right to be wrong,’ He would rather I make a mistake by trying something new than be wrong by doing it like the others. Honestly, if you are told that, it is the most beautiful gift you can receive. But of course, I don’t like making mistakes.”

And Christine Nagel is certainly not one to make mistakes. With years of experience and a legacy of iconic perfumes to her name, she continues to shape the world of fragrance with intention and artistry.

Her source of inspiration? “There are two sources,” she explains. “The Hermès house, with its history. It’s an incredible playground for me. And then, my personal emotions. In every creation, there is Hermès, and there is a little bit of me. When the two resonate, I believe that’s when a fragrance becomes a signature.”

And in this Eau de Parfum Intense, there’s more than just a little bit of Nagel. Mirroring the burning fire that inspired the fragrance, one can sense her fiery passion when talking about her craft. Even with an interpreter between us, her enthusiasm transcends language. “I’m half Italian, so I talk with my hands, I touch,” she says with a smile. “The tactility is very important to me.” 

Given how integral textiles are to Nagel’s creative process as a perfumer, the challenge for this fragrance wasn’t to bottle the literal scent of a volcano, because as she points out with a laugh, “If you relied on smell at the top of a volcano, all you’d get is sulfur. And sulfur does not smell good!” Instead, she sought to capture the texture and irregularity of a volcano—the molten magma infused with the vigour of fire—its sensations, raw energy, and elemental force. “There’s this power, this internal strength inside a volcano. That’s what I wanted to portray.”

For Nagel, a perfume is as much about the scent as it is about the emotions and memories it stirs, good or bad. Scent, after all, is deeply intertwined with our experiences, often revealing truths before we even recognise them ourselves.

“I’ll give you a story that perfumers tell,” Nagel says. “When you are in love, you love the smell of your partner. And when you start falling out of love, little by little, you begin to dislike their scent. Often, it’s your first indicator that things are going wrong.” 

I respond, “And after the breakup, their perfume becomes a trigger. It’s something that reminds you of them, so you hate it.”

Nagel snaps back, quick-witted as ever, “Or you look for it. Depending on the breakup.”

This delicate dance between scent and emotion is at the heart of her creations. Terre d’Hermès, for instance, speaks to the fire within each of us. As for its wearer, Nagel explains, “It can be someone very extroverted, with a lot of character. But it can be someone more shy who needs this strength. You have to be free in your choices. But trust your instinct at the same time, because your nose is your instinct.”

And instinct, she believes, knows no gender. For Nagel, fragrance is an intimate expression of identity rather than a matter of classification. “When I smell a woman wearing this around me, it’s really sexy for me,” she says. “Perhaps the men who have been wearing Terre d’Hermès for 20 years are surprised by this. And perhaps the men who don’t like Terre d’Hermès are surprised too with this new version. But the very important point is: it’s an Hermès fragrance. And in the bottle, all the values of Hermès are inside.”

Words: Sami Abd Elbaki