ABOUT GERMAINE
A petite lady named Germaine is the inspiration behind House Germaine Handcrafted Fine Fragrance. (Photo) She was born in 1934 and is our grandmother. We call her Memé.
Memé grew up in Damar, Kansas, a village originally settled by French Canadians in the 1870's. She remembers the 1940's when the treeless landscape of western Kansas succumbed to the worst effects of the Dust Bowl. Pepe Thyfault covered all the window with wet sheets to protect the family from the danger of breathing the fine dust day and night. Eventually he moved his family to Oregon for a period.
My memories of Germaine go back to 1979 in Salina, Kansas. I was 3 years old, and it was from this age that I have my first impression of my grandmother. I would escape into the pastoral scene of a framed landscape painting in her living room as she stroked my hair. I lay on her lap, feeling loved.
Though Germaine worked a full-time job, she made space in her life for fun and frivolity and attended dances bedecked in dazzling rhinestone high heels. She nurtured deep and true friendships with women like “Lou” and “Deanie” and they had fun together. Too much delight was just enough.
Our holidays were a flurry of bodies and hands in her small kitchen, tables pushed close so we could all “say grace” and eat turkey and layered salad together. Our gatherings were boisterous with little cousins darting in and out of cabinets, knocking over Memé’s heavy brass shelf decorations. There was nothing perfect and that’s what made it perfect.
As a child, she impressed my imagination as a lady who put powder on her face and kept nailpolish in her drawers. Later, I admired her dresses accented with velvet and lace and her petite, just-right-sized makeup table. Her artist’s tools were the tubes, palettes, and sticks of pure magic. Her collection of glass perfume bottles had names I could not read, but when sprayed, were the portals to an ethereal realm where I wanted to be.
To me, Memé has always had an eye for beautiful things and keeps an air of “fancy” about her to this day. She has been an example in taking care of oneself as much as we take care of others.
She would not take credit, but Memé taught me that
elegance is a choice and
beauty doesn't need a special occasion.
And for all these reasons, House Germaine is my invitation to become part of the family. Make room in your life for the finer things, and do it authentically. Each fine fragrance is composed according to human artistic sensibility. You will savor the exquisite quality in each fragrant mist and know the heart of the perfumer.
While the big fragrance houses leave more and more creative work to computer algorithms, my work is to maintain a human approach by selecting each aromatic component. You will cherish the beauty of each scent, the feel of the bottle and the quality of the mist. Keep making room for the pleasure of luxury every day, like Germaine.
