From playing Black Widow in Spider-Man: Brand New Day to Princess Irulan in the eagerly awaited Dune: Part Three, it is no secret that Florence Pugh is in high demand in Hollywood. Now the actress is taking on a new leading role, as brand ambassador for Max Mara’s first-ever fragrance, Le Parfum.
The timing is significant. Max Mara celebrates its 75th anniversary this year, and the house is known for a quiet-luxury aesthetic anchored by founder Achille Maramotti’s menswear-inspired outerwear, from the original 101801 coat to the viral Teddy Bear and the more recent Ready Coat. A fragrance is a natural extension of that world rather than a departure from it.
“From the beginning, the brand has expressed a certain idea of femininity,” explains Maria Giulia Prezioso Maramotti, the Max Mara Fashion Group’s global brand ambassador. “Fragrance felt like a natural way to extend that expression. It allows us to explore a more intimate dimension of the brand, something that accompanies women in a different way. In that sense, it feels like another way of translating the spirit of Max Mara.”
The scent itself is built to match that philosophy. A refillable composition of sandalwood, cedarwood, tuberose, benzoin and lemon primofiore, developed by perfumers Marie Salamagne and Fabrice Pellegrin, Le Parfum is designed to envelop its wearer like a second skin, or an olfactory coat. Its ingredients are nearly 100 percent natural in origin, sourced from Grasse, Guatemala and Italy.
The design carries the house codes through to the last detail. Le Parfum’s streamlined glass bottle features a distinctive camel-colored tie accent that nods to the brand’s timeless fashion, tying the fragrance visually to the outerwear that made Max Mara’s name.
For Pugh, the partnership adds a fashion-house chapter to an already crowded year on screen, and for Max Mara it marks a considered first step into fragrance. Rather than chasing a trend, the house has framed Le Parfum as a continuation of its identity, an attempt to bottle the same restrained, coat-shouldered femininity that has defined it for three-quarters of a century.
