Born in Italy, Alessandro Gualtieri began his career as a student of historic perfumery techniques at a German training institute, an education that was quickly supplemented with lessons from an experienced Italian ex-pat he met in the town’s only bar. After years creating scents for Fendi, Versace, Helmut Lang, and others, and a stint in-house at Diesel, he decided to follow his own vision of bold, transgressive perfumery with the launch of his Amsterdam-based “Nasomatto” line. Gualtieri’s philosophy contends that our sensory perceptions are the major catalysts behind all human action and decision-making. As a result, he designs his scents to reinforce certain feelings in the wearer: Duro for strength, Black Afgano for bliss, Silver Musk for sexual charisma, and so on. Having tried them all, we certainly have no argument.
“The parts of the body that carry more smell are those where more soul is collected. The strong smells have become unpleasant to us, because the excess of soul is insupportable to the extent that our innate animalism is repressed and breaking from civilization. This project is my garden I have planted, fertilized, cultivated, and harvested. ‘Orto Parisi’ states that our body is experienced like a garden, and its smells are a true mirror of our soul.”
Alessandro Gualtieri