Farina Perfume

JEAN MARIE FARINA

DIST BREV.

RUE SAINT HONORE 333 A PARIS

Johann Maria Farina, Cologne, Germany

Fancy Perfume

Provenance: Eric McGuire Collection

The consignor of our feature bottle said it is possibly the oldest of three Farina perfumes we have on display in the museum from his collection. The example was purchased around 1998 at the St. Ouen flea market in Paris, France. 

The fancy bottle is ornately embossed on six panels using six dolphin figures for decorative base support. Each panel depicts different coats of arms that most likely represent other European countries. On the shoulders of five panels is embossed ‘JEAN MARIE FARINA DIST BREV.’ The words are followed by a letter that is too small to distinguish. The final embossed panel, embossed “Brev,” also appears to have a small letter, probably an abbreviation for “Brevet,” which is French for patent or patentee. Around the base panel, the bottle is embossed, ‘RUE SAINT HONORE 333 A PARIS.’ The clear glass bottle is 5-1/4 inches tall, has an applied rolled mouth and is pontiled.

Existing for more than three centuries, “Johann Maria Farina gegenüber dem Jülichs-Platz GmbH” is considered the world’s oldest perfume factory. The still-in-business perfumer is located in Cologne, a 2,000-year-old city spanning the Rhine River in western Germany, the region’s cultural hub. “Farina,” throughout its existence, is also known for its many counterfeiters, imitators, product pirates and legal cases involving trademarks.

On July 13, 1709, Giovanni Battista Farina founded the company “G. B. Farina” in his adopted home, Cologne. His family originally came from Santa Maria Maggiore in Piemont, Italy. The new Company primarily sold fashion items until Johann Maria, Giovanni’s younger brother, joined the Company in 1714. Johann Maria Farina (1685-1766) developed a fragrance water, “Aqua mirabilis” or “miracle water.” At the time, perfumes were also said to have a medicinal effect, which manufacturers seldom denied. The fresh fragrance of Johann Maria Farina differed significantly from the heavy, costly perfumes common among the nobility of the time. It was not based on musk essences but on bergamot, lemon and orange notes. Johann Maria said, “My fragrance is like an Italian spring morning after the rain.” 

When Farina first moved to Cologne, there were stringent laws regarding foreign settlers. Farina was eventually granted citizenship, and to show off his gratitude, he named his very first creation “Eau de Cologne.” The product was to slowly launch a world career and finally give its name to an entire fragrance class. In the 18th century, the subtle fragrance became famous worldwide and an indispensable accessory at all royal courts. This sensation contributed to Cologne’s global fame.

Farina succeeded in maintaining the quality of his products at a consistently high level through a sovereign purchasing policy for raw materials, a well-structured manufacturing operation, and, not least, thanks to his skills as a perfumer with his sense of smell. He was practically the inventor of the brand perfume. To this day, the company Farina has produced Eau de Cologne according to his original recipe.

Initially, the sale of fragrance water remained a secondary business, and it was not until the years passed that “Eau de Cologne” became the focus of Farina’s activities. After the death of his brother, Johann Maria continued the business from 1733 under his name and at the new location “Obenmarspforten 23, gegenüber” (opposite) Jülichs-Platz.” The short form of this address, “Farina gegenüber,” became a trademark.

The product’s popularity grew rapidly, first in France and then throughout Europe, as Eau de Cologne dominated the perfumery market until the end of the 19th century. The family business Farina became the most famous perfume manufacturer in the world at the time and a supplier to many royal courts and personalities, from Mozart, Schiller, and Napoleon to Heine, Beethoven, Oscar Wilde, Thomas Mann, and Bill Clinton. In the company archives—existing since 1709—you can find orders from Queen Victoria (600 bottles), Goethe (“6 glasses”), or Kaiser Wilhelm I (“the usual shipment”).

See the spinning Museum example of a figural barrel form embossed “Jean Marie Farina 333 Rue St. Honore.”

See the spinning Museum example of a six-sided pontiled perfume embossed “J. M. Farina A Cologne.” This bottle appears to be a “knockoff” of an original Farina, but one of the very few colored examples. There are probably ten different “imitations.”

This success aroused desire and called imitators to the scene. Before the days of functioning industrial property rights, product pirates were able to flourish unhindered. Several competing products appeared on the market under very similar manufacturer names. One of them finally became better known than the original.

Wilhelm Mülhens was a Farina agent selling Eau de Cologne in Cologne’s Glockengasse since 1799. He named his company “Franz Maria Farina, Glockengasse 4711, Cologne” to profit from Farina’s reputation. This was the beginning of lengthy disputes with “Farina gegenüber .”Again and again, Mühlens took persons named Farina (a common name in Italy), who had nothing to do with the “gegenüber” family, as employees or partners on board to give the plagiaristic company name an appearance of justification.

The Farina family became one of the pioneers in developing industrial property rights in Germany. Jean Marie Farina (1809-1880) fought for decades for legal trademark protection. In 1836, he made his first corresponding submission to the responsible Prussian ministerial bureaucracy. In November 1874, the first Trademark Protection Act was finally passed in the German Reichstag and came into force on May 1, 1875. Johann Maria Farina gegenüber dem Jülichs-Platz was the first Cologne company to register its labels as trademarks.

“Eau de Cologne” is today the generic term for a light perfume with about 3 to 5 percent perfume content and cannot be protected as a trademark in the corresponding class of goods. The family still owns Farina. Today, it is easier for them to defend their intellectual property than three centuries ago.

Primary Image: “Jean Marie Farina Dist Brev. Rue Saint Honore 333 A Paris” bottle imaged by Eric McGuire, FOHBC Virtual Museum West Coast Studio.

Secondary Image: Figural barrel form embossed “Jean Marie Farina 333 Rue St. Honore.” bottle imaged by Eric McGuire, FOHBC Virtual Museum West Coast Studio.

Secondary Image: Six-sided perfume embossed “J. M. Farina A Cologne” bottle imaged by Eric McGuire, FOHBC Virtual Museum West Coast Studio.

Support: Reference to World’s oldest perfume manufacturer Johann Maria Farina company. Three centuries of fighting imitators, German Patent and Trade Mark Office

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