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little whiff of childhood memory in bottles of perfume samples, a strong measure of love for roses, and a principal passion for aromas heated the desire of Marie-H*l*ne Rogeon to revive an eight-decade-old ignored-but-not-forgotten rose fragrance in 1991. She is still cooking up fragrances to put roses into bottles, but now to her own recipes.

Naturally, the conversation with The Jakarta Post started with her impression of the fresh cut roses at the store Papillion 2 which is showcasing the revival of Les Parfums de Rosine.

"They smell good," the French woman said of the orange roses from Bandung in her thick French-accented English.

She smells everything - soap, food, fabric, and surely flowers - and, if her schedule permits, she does it for some three hours a day. She can tell one rose from another, even the same species planted on different rose-beds. Roses are definitely one of the things she likes most, because roses are the only scents she sells.

Her garden with over 300 species of roses has become her inspiration. She even imagines rose fragrances in her head and works with two perfumers to create new ones - without doing market studies.

"I trust myself and my perfumers," she said.

This confidence was well founded. She has spent some 15 years marketing major fragrance brands and knows enough about the market and its love for fragrances.

However, more influential for her was her upbringing surrounded by fragrances.

"My great grand father worked for Napoleon. Then Paul Poiret come to my grand father to ask for help manufacturing the perfume he had," she said.

Paul Poiret was a ground breaking designer that *freed' European women from their corsets. He launched a perfume line called Les Parfums de Rosine in honor of his deceased daughter Rosine. Rogeon's grandfather was commissioned to manufacture fragrances for him but did not create them himself.

Later the great depression and war came, and production ceased. Poiret came back after the war only to find himself being replaced by new fashions like Coco Chanel and his fashion house disappeared. The perfume bottles disappeared too.

Rogeon, though, met them really early in her life - in her grandparents' attic.

"My grandparents kept some labels and some old bottles in their attic... unfortunately the perfume was sold out - there were only labels left," she said.

"I realized also during my studies that this range of perfume was really creative because Paul Poiret just wanted to use some geraniums, nobody else used it before," she said.

The creativity amazed her and prompted her to revive the manufacturing. She does not follow the original bottle design but kept the logo and the tassel, and the fragrance expected of de Rosine.

She has gone beyond the resurrection of the old fragrances - with some tweaking to follow modern safety regulations. She has come out with her own blends of rosy scents - for men and women - drawing her experiences from different cultures.

In her hands, a rose is no longer about a rose. Rose blended with a musky leathery mix in Rose d'Homme, for example, brings out elegant masculinity in men. Rose Praline is like having a tint of chocolate herb tea while rushing through a rose bush, bringing that playful but yet not girly feeling.

Rose Kashmirie is a garden of roses and Chinese peonies in one place. La Rose de Rosine combines ylang ylang, jasmine, iris and tonka beans in the same flower beds.

She said the key was in the quality of raw materials and the freedom to create. Unlike major commercial perfumes that put a significant amount into bottles, heavy promotion and expensive advertisement faces, Rodeon said she puts most of her costs into what's inside the bottle.

She does not limit the price of the materials nor the time frame during the process of creation although she admits to changing some materials to make the price more possible for the clients.

"It depends on the balance *of the scent* that we want to obtain. Some are beautiful and can work fast. For Rose d'Ete, we were working with my perfumer for six months and it was very quick because he understood immediately, and what he understood could be done," she said.

But another time, to have citrus scented rose for example, it took other fragrances and aromas to balance up the product. Rose d'Homme took 11 years to come out to her taste - and to expectation.

"When we launched in France, we got a lot of press coverage because we were the first to dare to do a rose fragrance for men. People were really excited," she said.

Rogeon still runs only the small boutique she opened in 1991, at Jardin du Palais in Paris as she always dreamed she would, but her products have found their ways onto the shelves of exclusive retail stores worldwide and onto the skin of the famous like Donatella Versace, Johnny Depp and Naomi Campbell.

In Indonesia, they are sold exclusively at Papillion 2, Plaza Indonesia.

Les Parfums de Rosine was not started by her, but the perfumes she sells from Rogeon are striking yet subtle, attracting those that appreciate good things with passion.