Jacomo

Jacomo, styled Jacomo Paris, is a French perfume house based in Paris. Its founders, the American leather craftsman James Kaplan and the French pianist Gérard Courtin, met in New York in 1961 and conceived the name from their initials and a shared enthusiasm for the Museum of Modern Art: JA from James, CO from Courtin, MO for MoMA. The fragrance house itself dates from 1970, when Courtin opened an atelier at 45 Avenue George V in Paris [2]; the brand's own tagline is "Fragrance creator since 1970." It is best known for two perfumes of the late 1970s and early 1980s, the women's green chypre Silences and the men's Jacomo de Jacomo.

The house remains active. It is owned by the French group Groupe Vabel [5], sells through e-commerce in both France and an English-language store, and has continued to issue new fragrances, including "Jacomo de Jacomo In Black" in 2021 and "J de Jacomo" in 2024.

By the house's account, the story begins in 1961 on Fifth Avenue, where Kaplan, a leather craftsman, met Courtin, a pianist. The two shared a passion for art, and the name JACOMO was assembled from their names and the Museum of Modern Art. In its earliest form the house made luxury leather goods rather than perfume, and according to the company its clients in that period included Betty Ford and Elizabeth Taylor [2].

The pivot toward fragrance came through Courtin. In 1965 he moved to Grasse, the centre of French perfumery, to learn the craft and work with local perfumers. Five years later, in 1970, he established the Paris atelier and the house took the name Jacomo Paris. Because of this two-stage history, the founding date is recorded in two ways: the brand and its parent treat 1970, the year the perfume house was established, as its founding [5], while the 1961 New York meeting marks the origin of the earlier leather-goods venture [2]. Jacomo itself uses 1970.

The first fragrance, the men's Eau Cendrée, appeared in 1970, followed by Chicane in 1971. The two perfumes that would define the house came later in the decade: Silences, a women's green chypre, in 1978, and Jacomo de Jacomo, a men's woody-spicy fragrance, in 1980.

In 1981 the company opened a production facility in Deauville, in Normandy, to serve demand that it describes as spanning more than 50 countries. In 1987 Jacomo Paris added a ready-to-wear fashion collection, which the house characterises as the first instance of a perfumer launching a namesake clothing line [2]. More recent releases include "Jacomo de Jacomo In Black" in 2021 and "J de Jacomo" in 2024.

Jacomo Paris is owned by Groupe Vabel, a French cosmetics and perfumery group founded in 1969 and also known as Laboratoires Sarbec [4]. Vabel lists Jacomo Paris among its perfumery brands alongside names such as Corine de Farme, Inessance Paris and a Pierre Cardin fragrance line. The group describes itself as present in around 60 countries with roughly 2,000 employees. Neither the brand nor the parent states when the acquisition took place.

Jacomo presents itself as a haute-parfumerie house that joins what it calls "the vibrant energy of New York" with the expertise of master perfumers in Grasse, and frames perfume less as a product than as a journey of "sensations and emotions" [1]. Groupe Vabel positions the brand as a luxury house and a "perfume creator since 1970," and says the perfumes are made in Deauville, where, in the group's words, production has continued "for over 35 years" [5].

That stated positioning sits at some distance from how the older fragrances now circulate. Fragrance editorial describes classic Jacomo scents as widely available at discount prices — Jacomo de Jacomo has been noted selling at around $10 in the United States [11]. This reflects the secondary and discount market for the back catalogue rather than the brand's own luxury positioning.

The house's two best-known fragrances both date from the late 1970s and early 1980s. Silences, launched in 1978, is an old-school green chypre; Fragrantica calls it "the real face of Jacomo, the brand's most popular and best-known fragrance," and reviewers have frequently compared it to Chanel No. 19 [8]. Jacomo de Jacomo, from 1980, is a smoky, spicy fougère for men that one fragrance publication described as "a cult favorite from the '80s" [11].

The current line, sold through the brand's own stores, centres on the J de Jacomo family of men's and women's fragrances, and the catalogue also extends to a small number of skincare items such as a facial gel-cream and an after-shave balm. The house says its perfumes are conceived in Grasse by French master perfumers and produced in Deauville.

Jacomo de Jacomo was named best men's fragrance of the year in the prestige category in 1981 [7]. The house and its perfumes have also drawn continued attention in the fragrance press: in 2024 Fragrantica ran a feature on Jacomo de Jacomo under the title "What Men Wore Before the Niche Era," and the critic blog Bois de Jasmin has reviewed Silences in the context of classic green chypres [10].

The brand is active. It operates live e-commerce sites at jacomo.com and jacomo.fr, has released new fragrances as recently as 2024, and is managed within Groupe Vabel's perfumery portfolio. The parent describes Jacomo as a house that launches perfumes "year after year" [5].