Heritage
A house, in its own words
Christopher Brosius entered the fragrance world while working at Kiehl's in the early 1990s. After leaving the retailer in 1993 he launched a short‑lived venture called Demeter, which allowed him to experiment with raw materials outside the constraints of commercial perfumery. In 1992 he drafted a personal manifesto that outlined his intent to create scents that resisted market trends and instead served as olfactory diaries. The first public offering under his own name appeared at Henri Bendel in the spring of 1994, where a handful of experimental bottles sold out quickly. Over the next decade Brosius refined his approach, producing water‑based perfumes and absolutes that emphasized texture and memory. In 2004 he formalized the operation as CB I Hate Perfume, a name that references his experience as a taxi driver who grew weary of the overpowering aromas carried by passengers. The brand’s Brooklyn storefront opened in 2007, providing a physical space where visitors could sample the line, read the manifesto on the walls, and purchase limited‑run bottles directly from the creator. Since then, CB I Hate Perfume has maintained a steady output of releases, each accompanied by a brief essay that situates the scent within a broader narrative. Milestones include the 2005 launch of At The Beach 1966, the 2009 introduction of Smokey Tobacco, and the 2014 debut of Wet Pavement London, a fragrance that captured the damp concrete of a city after rain. Throughout its history the house has resisted conventional retail channels, preferring direct sales and occasional pop‑up events, a strategy that preserves the intimate scale envisioned in the original manifesto. The brand’s guiding principle stems from Brosius’s 1992 manifesto, which frames scent as a lived experience rather than a decorative accessory. He describes perfume as a "conversation with the self," encouraging wearers to recall specific moments, places, or emotions triggered by a particular aroma. This perspective rejects the idea of fragrance as a status symbol; instead, each composition is intended to act as a personal archive. The house avoids trend‑driven ingredients, opting instead for materials that evoke memory—wet pavement, tobacco smoke, or the salty tang of a beach from a particular year. Brosius also embraces chance in the creative process, allowing raw materials to interact in unpredictable ways before committing to a final formula. The resulting scents are documented with brief narratives that explain the inspiration behind each note, reinforcing the notion that perfume is a story rather than a product. By limiting batch sizes and distributing primarily through the Brooklyn shop and a curated online platform, the brand ensures that each bottle remains a unique artifact, aligned with the philosophy of intimate, unmediated olfactory expression.