What Memo is known for
Niche Paris perfume house founded in 2007 by Clara and John Molloy, who build each fragrance around a real place they've traveled to — from Lalibela, Ethiopia (their debut scent) to Marfa, Texas and Cappadocia, Turkey.
Memo Paris was founded in 2007 by Clara and John Molloy — she a Parisian-Catalan poet who had written a book about perfumers ("noses") the year before, he an Irish traveler — after the two met on a ski lift in 2005. The couple built the house around a specific idea: that a fragrance could function like a travel diary, translating a real place they had visited into scent rather than working from abstract mood boards. The brand's name, a contraction of "memory," reflects that premise. Their debut fragrance, Lalibela, was built around the rock-hewn churches and incense culture of Lalibela, Ethiopia. Later releases followed the same method: Marfa drew on the high desert of West Texas, African Leather referenced the tanneries and landscapes of North Africa, and Cappadocia was built around the volcanic rock formations and history of central Turkey. Memo sources intense, high-quality raw materials for its compositions and has built a following alongside other independent Paris perfumers in the niche fragrance segment. The house remains associated with Clara Molloy's editorial background, treating each release less as a seasonal product line than as a discrete olfactory account of a journey the founders actually took.
How ORBIS reads this city
Best for — Travel- and leather-inspired destination fragrances from a Paris perfume house.
More in Paris
- Balenciaga — Paris
- Bourrienne Paris X — Paris
- Cartier — Paris
- Céline — Paris
- Chanel — Paris
- Charvet — Paris
- Creed — Paris
- Dior — Paris
Where next
- Billybelt — Paris
- Manfield — Paris
- Marc-Antoine Barrois — Paris
Hand-curated for ORBIS · no paid placement