The Story
Why it exists.
The beginning
Upper East Side arrived from Retrouvailles in 2022, composed by Alexis Dadier. Its name points to a very specific kind of New York polish, but the composition itself refuses easy sophistication. Bitter almond brings an immediately recognizable sweetness. Black Pepper snaps beside it, while Sesame gives the opening a warm, almost granular texture. The effect feels less like a pristine lobby and more like velvet shoes on pavement. It has poise, but not the tiptoeing kind. Dadier places that tension at the center of a unisex fragrance meant to feel composed without becoming predictable.
What makes Upper East Side worth a closer look is the collision between materials that rarely behave politely together. Bitter almond offers soft sweetness, yet black pepper keeps it from becoming dessert. Sesame adds a roasted warmth underneath that brightness. Tonka Bean brings another creamy layer, while Vetiver introduces dry grass and earth. Guaiac Wood, Patchouli, and Vanilla then give the composition weight. The result is a little polished, a little smoky, and impossible to reduce to one easy adjective.
The evolution
The first impression is concise and tactile: almond sweetness, pepper heat, and the faint nutty warmth of sesame. As those notes loosen their grip, Vetiver introduces a dry, green edge, while Cypriol deepens the earthy center. Tonka Bean rounds the middle without erasing its spice. Patchouli adds a faintly smoky soil note that gives the sweetness somewhere to stand. Guaiac Wood brings polished structure, and Vanilla settles underneath with a soft sweetness that never turns overtly sugary. Together, the notes create a warm, woody composition with contrasting textures: crisp heat at the opening, green dryness through the heart, and smooth woods balanced by soft vanilla. The almond and sesame tones lend a rounded warmth, while pepper keeps the sweetness from feeling static. As Vetiver and Cypriol gain definition, the profile becomes broader and more grounded.
Cultural impact
Upper East Side fits a place-and-memory sensibility: its New York title arrives through a warm, woody unisex composition rather than a literal skyline or city postcard. The scent places itself among readers who like fragrance as a personal reference point, turning a coat, hotel entrance, or evening plan into a scene worth remembering. Almond, pepper, sesame, Vetiver, Cypriol, Tonka Bean, Patchouli, Guaiac Wood, and Vanilla create a composition that can move between crispness and warmth. Its opening has a clean, lightly spiced brightness, while the middle brings greener and earthier textures.
The House
RetrouvaillesRetrouvailles is a French-inspired niche fragrance house that draws on decades of perfumery expertise rooted in Grasse, the Provençal town long regarded as the center of the fragrance world. The brand operates as an independent label, offering a compact catalog of scents released steadily since 2019. Its portfolio spans atmospheric compositions like Strong Feeling and Ignorance is Bliss, alongside evocative place-named works such as Upper East Side, Belgravia, and Parisian Lights, suggesting a sensibility shaped equally by travel and intimate emotion.
The Creator
Alexis DadierDadier's fingerprint is visible in his handling of natural materials, particularly at Robertet where he has access to exceptional raw ingredients. He has a particular affinity for gourmand and oriental compositions, though his range extends far beyond those categories.
