Hand-blended and hand-labelled since 2006Santal 33, Another 13 and the full classic collectionRefill your bottle, keep the glassCandles poured by hand in New York

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About

Slow perfumery, from Grasse to New York

Le Labo was built on one argument: there were already too many bottles of perfume and not enough soulful fragrance.

Le Labo apothecary lab interior in New York with wooden drawers and rows of hand-labelled bottles

The house

How the house started

In 2006 two French fragrance executives, Fabrice Penot and Eddie Roschi, left stable jobs to open a lab at 233 Elizabeth Street in Nolita. No advertising budget, no celebrity contract, no plans for a hundred doors. They mixed perfume to order and wrote the customer name on the label.

That first store became a cult address. Santal 33 arrived in 2011 and turned the small house into a global one. The Estée Lauder Companies acquired Le Labo in 2014, and the brand kept running its own labs, its own slow production and its own manifesto.

The name is still accurate. Perfume is formulated and filled in the labs, candles are poured by hand, and the label still records the date, the city and the person it was made for.

We believe that there are too many bottles of perfume and not enough soulful fragrances.

Le Labo manifesto
Le Labo journal page reading Wear the City pasted on a concrete wall
Le Journal

Manifesto

What the manifesto actually asks for

  • Craft over scale

    Small batches, hand pouring and hand labelling. The house grows slowly on purpose.

  • Irreverence

    No celebrity faces, no shrink wrap, no marketing theatre. The founders wrote that celebrities should pay full price.

  • The human hand

    Hand-picked roses, hand-poured candles, hand-formulated perfume. The work is visible in the bottle.

  • New York, with a dose of Grasse

    French raw materials and French perfumery training, executed from a Manhattan lab.

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House facts

Le Labo runs its own labs and its own production. The house is part of The Estée Lauder Companies and keeps its own manifesto, its own pace and its own labels.

Founded
2006
First lab
233 Elizabeth Street, Nolita, New York City
Founders
Fabrice Penot and Eddie Roschi
Parent company
The Estée Lauder Companies, since 2014
Known for
Santal 33, Another 13, Rose 31, hand-labelled bottles
Cities with labs
New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, London, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong and more

About the brand

About the brand

The name, the ownership and what the house actually makes.

What does Le Labo mean?

Le Labo is French for "the laboratory". The first store was literally a working lab where perfume was blended and bottled in front of customers, and the name described what the place did rather than what it sold.

Who owns Le Labo?

The Estée Lauder Companies acquired Le Labo in 2014. It runs as its own brand inside the group, with its own labs, counters and product development.