Louis Vuitton sold its first perfume in 1927. It was called Heures d'Absence. Then the house left fragrance alone for nearly ninety years.
The company began in 1854, when Louis Vuitton opened a Paris workshop making flat-topped travel trunks for the French aristocracy. Luggage built the name. He became the packer of choice for the Empress Eugenie, and the monogram canvas the brand is known for came decades later. Scent was an afterthought for most of that history.
Perfume returned properly in 2016. Louis Vuitton hired Jacques Cavallier Belletrud, a Grasse-born perfumer from a family of perfumers, and gave him a home in the flower fields of Grasse. He had joined the house in 2012 and spent four years on the first collection, seven scents released together, the brand's first real fragrances since the 1920s.
Two later releases did the numbers. Afternoon Swim landed in 2019, a bright orange and bergamot scent built on a clean, almost mineral freshness. Imagination followed in 2021, a lighter citrus and tea aimed at men, and it became the one strangers stop you to ask about.
The catch is the price and the plumbing. A 100ml bottle sits around two hundred pounds, and Vuitton sells the fragrances refill-only through its own stores, part of the ritual it is selling. None of that changes the formula. A citrus and tea accord like Imagination, or the salted citrus of Afternoon Swim, is well within reach of a capable lab. The bottle and the maison carry the cost, not the juice.
Our UK-made sprays track the two people ask for most. Imaginaire is our take on Imagination and Swim our take on Afternoon Swim, each at 35% concentration. Browse the full Louis Vuitton collection, or start with the best Louis Vuitton Imagination dupes in the UK.
