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When a new Yves Saint Laurent perfume came out in 2001, Tom Ford, the creative director of the house at the time, threw a sensational party at the Paris Stock Exchange, where he put a gaggle (bầy, đám người) of practically nude (khỏa thân) models on display (trưng bày) in a giant (khổng lồ) plexiglass container. The fragrance (mùi hương) was called Nu, French for “nude.”

Linda Wells, the founding editor in chief of Allure and a partygoer, likened Mr. Ford’s soiree to a “human aquarium,” teeming with models “writhing about” in their underwear. It was like a ball pit one might find at a children’s birthday party, except bigger, alcohol fueled and packed with nearly naked adults.

“It was all these bodies,” Ms. Wells said. “It was all this flesh. It was like an orgy.”

An event like that seems unimaginable today, and not just because unchecked hedonism became taboo after #MeToo. The whole marketing ideal has changed: Most designers and brands aren’t using sex to sell perfume — and people aren’t buying perfume to have sex.

For decades, the marketing around perfume made seduction (quyến rũ) a priority (sự ưu tiên). Fragrance was a bottled way to help someone find a mate, a construct that feels incredibly irrelevant since we now have dating apps (ứng dụng hẹn hò), a more efficient (hiệu quả hơn) and consistent way to find a partner than having someone catch your scent and fall in love with you.

“It just feels really old fashioned and kind of offensive,” Ms. Wells said. “Now we all feel like, ‘This advertiser is going to tell me how I’m supposed to feel or that I want to have sex because of their fragrance or that I want to become an object because of their fragrance?’”

Today, brands talk about fragrance in terms of places and how it will make the wearer feel.

Bài trước: Chào Hạnh