Arquiste

Arquiste was founded in 2011 by Carlos Huber, an architect and historic preservationist based in New York who had trained and worked restoring historic buildings before turning to perfumery. Huber apprenticed under perfumer Rodrigo Flores-Roux, who was born and raised in Mexico City, studied biology before moving to France in 1989 to train at the ISIPCA perfumery school in Versailles, and interned under noted perfumer Jean-Claude Ellena. Flores-Roux had already built a career formulating mainstream fragrances, including Clinique Happy, before mentoring Huber and later working with him, alongside perfumer Yann Vasnier, to build Arquiste's early collection. The brand's defining idea is that each fragrance reconstructs a specific historical scene — a named date, city and moment — using Huber's architectural research into real places and events as the starting point for the scent's structure, rather than working from an abstract mood or ingredient story. Flores-Roux continues to work as a master perfumer for Arquiste while also serving as Senior Perfumer and Vice President of Fragrance Creation at Givaudan, one of the largest global fragrance and flavor houses. Arquiste's positioning — narrative, research-driven perfumery built around documented historical moments — has distinguished it within independent and niche fragrance retail since its founding.