Maison Jannobi: three founders, one Arabic word, two extraits macerated for nine months

Some houses give themselves a name. Maison Jannobi gave itself an origin.

Jannobi means “South” in Arabic. The word also brings together the first names of the three founders of this French perfume house, created as a family. The South, it explains, is for them neither a backdrop nor an image: it is an anchorage, a way of giving value to what is essential and moving forward steadily. Two extraits de parfum have come of it, and they join the PlanèteBeauty catalogue today.

A writing of structures, not of effects

The house claims a restrained aesthetic and stable olfactory architectures, where each material is chosen for its role and its resonance rather than for the impression of the first instant. The compositions are built around clearly defined accords, measured contrasts, and careful work on texture — an evolution that stays under control from top to base.

It names its perfumers, which not every house does. And it lets its extraits macerate for at least nine months, sometimes longer, before bottling. Its fragrances are imagined and made in France.

Van Cao — vanilla and its shadow of cocoa

Signed by Vincent Ricord, Van Cao explores a broad, luminous vanilla, worked with restraint to avoid any heaviness. Almond milk and hazelnut open gently; Madagascar vanilla absolute settles a roundness it makes no apology for; then West African cocoa absolute comes to contradict it — drier, more textured, almost velvety. White musks, tonka bean and amber close this measured dialogue between roundness and structure.

“Van Cao is an intense cocoa bean wrapped in a warm, addictive vanilla: an invitation to travel through lands of intoxicating raw materials that reflect a dense and generous warmth.”
— Vincent Ricord, perfumer

Soleil de Givre — the cold that burns

Signed by Romain Keller, Soleil de Givre is a study in contrast, where the cold never erases the warmth but reveals it. Lemon, cardamom and CO₂ ginger draw a brisk, almost mineral breath, crossed by the delicate brightness of wild strawberry. The heart tips into light with Brazilian orange, orange blossom and ylang-ylang. In the base, vanilla, sugar, sandalwood and amber carry the metamorphosis into a creamy, enveloping trail.

“Soleil de Givre draws on that paradoxical sensation of an extreme cold, so intense that it becomes burning. Here the cold does not refresh, it consumes: hot and cold do not oppose one another but coexist in the same brilliance.”
— Romain Keller, perfumer

Extrait de parfum, and what maceration changes

Both compositions are extraits de parfum in 100 ml. The term is defined by no regulation — we explain this in our article on what the percentages really say — but here it conveys a legible intention: a dense material, a trail that unfolds slowly.

Maceration, for its part, is not a figure of speech. Letting the concentrate rest for nine months before bottling gives the materials time to bind; it is a cash-flow cost that few young houses accept. Van Cao, the house says, “reveals its angles with time” — the phrase holds for the making as well.

The two Maison Jannobi extraits at PlanèteBeauty

• Maison Jannobi Van Cao Extrait de Parfum 100 ml — vanillic gourmand, by Vincent Ricord
• Maison Jannobi Soleil de Givre Extrait de Parfum 100 ml — citrus amber, by Romain Keller

Both exist as a Try Me 2 ml: an extrait is chosen on skin, and a sample costs less than the wrong bottle. The full collection is on the Maison Jannobi page.

Sources: Maison Jannobi’s presentation booklet and the house’s official site; the quotations from Vincent Ricord and Romain Keller are reproduced as they appear there. No wear time is stated here, in line with our editorial rule.