dsm-firmenich will bring its floral perfumery portfolio into focus at Beautyworld Middle East, October 6–8 in Dubai, with Flowers Are Watching Us, an immersive exhibition exploring new interpretations of floral fragrance and the relationship between nature, science and culture.
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“With Flowers Are Watching Us, we are inviting our customers to experience florals from a different perspective,” shares Olivier Viejo, vice president, MET (Middle East and Turkey), for fine fragrance. “One that brings together our creative heritage, scientific expertise and a deep understanding of the Middle Eastern fragrance culture. Beautyworld Middle East is a unique opportunity to share this vision and to show how we are opening new creative possibilities for the future of floral perfumery.”
The centerpiece will be a collection of fragrances created exclusively for the exhibition by dsm-firmenich perfumers Honorine Blanc, Nathalie Lorson, Hamid Merati-Kashani, Ilias Ermenidis, Carmita Magalhaes, Abdulkader Fattouh and Florian Pellegrin. Rather than literal floral recreations, the compositions explore floral expressions through themes including strength, softness, contrast and sensuality, with an emphasis on contemporary Middle Eastern luxury and locally resonant olfactive perspectives. The fragrances will be housed in bespoke bottles created by Identiscents.
A key ingredient story will be Muguet Firgood, the company's natural lily of the valley extract. The ingredient addresses a longstanding technical challenge in perfumery: lily of the valley is considered a “silent flower” because conventional extraction does not yield an essence that captures its characteristic scent. When Muguet Firgood was introduced in 2021 through a partnership between then-Firmenich and French vertical-farming company Jungle, it was positioned as the first commercial extract safely obtained from the flower. The resulting captive ingredient was described as pure, 100% natural, with fresh and authentic olfactive characteristics.
Its production combined Jungle's vertically farmed lily of the valley with Firmenich's proprietary Firgood extraction technology. Rather than relying on conventional solvents, Firgood uses electromagnetic waves to release the water naturally contained within plant material, capturing odorant-carrying water and producing a solvent-free, 100%-natural extract. The technology has since been scaled from laboratory and pilot production to industrial lines capable of producing quantities ranging from hundreds of kilograms to several tons of primary extracts.
For dsm-firmenich, Muguet Firgood also illustrates the broader evolution of its floral ingredient palette, from historically significant molecules such as Iralia and Hedione to extraction technologies designed to capture previously inaccessible facets of natural materials. At Beautyworld, that progression will be presented alongside the new fragrance collection, effectively linking molecule, natural extract and finished fragrance creation.
The fragrance programming will extend beyond the exhibition itself, with company experts discussing regional raw materials, global fragrance dynamics and emerging trends. Sessions include “Scent of Place: Celebrating the World’s Most Distinctive Regional Ingredients,” led by Zalfa Al Achkar, and “What to Follow Next Year: A Look Ahead at Fragrance’s Future,” featuring Catherine Dolisi. dsm-firmenich will exhibit at booth Z1-D20.
