The Hermessence Haïkus

The Jardins Albert-Kahn in Boulogne-Billancourt is a magical enclosure just off Paris where the banker Albert Kahn (1860-1940), who dedicated part of his colossal fortune to foundations fostering world peace, created a series of gardens in different styles conjuring his favorite landscapes.

It is, naturally, the Japanese garden that Hermès chose as the setting of a lovely, poetic tribute to the Hermessence collection.

Jean-Claude Ellena, who is particularly sensitive to Japanese esthetics, has long called this series his “haikus”: in Japan, he met with haiku masters who composed poems inspired by the Hermessences, which in turn inspired installations set in the Albert-Kahn garden.

Purple-painted stones marked an itinerary along which were erected a series of ten little “shrines”: at each stop, a Hermès ribbon sprayed with one of the Hermessences was tied to a stylized fan. The perfumes mingled with the delicate vegetal scents of the garden in the moist, warm air of early summer…

Paprika Brasil

 A towering tree

Sets its blossoms aquiver

Sweet cool of the night

Kaï Hasegawa

Osmanthe Yunnan 

 Apricot blossom

Making a hairpin in jade

And the evening star

Dhugal Lindsay

Poivre Samarcande

 Blessed cool of evening!

We live on this sparkling planet:

Land of oases

Shugyô Takaha

Brin de Réglisse

One summer’s evening

A swift gust brings out the blow

Of the evening star

Hadoka Hayuzumi

Vanille Galante

 Multicoloured shells

Washed up onto the beach

Long spring afternoon

Minoru Ozawa

Iris Ukiyoé

 Every time she meets

A man, she then gives to him

Her iris perfume!

Teiko Inahata

Ambre Narguilé

 Carthage, one evening

Where a cat narrows his eyes.

And breathes in the moon.

Seegan Mabesoone

Vétiver Tonka

 And away it flows,

Robbing the sun’s bright light

Such is the source!

Michiko Kaï

Santal Massoia

Let them come to me,

Poetry and your love and…

That doe on the hill!

Saki Kôno

Rose Ikebana

 I nibble your ear

Which is so like a soft rose

Ah, I smell roses!

Yûmu Yamaguchi