No products in the cart.
Chanel is launching a new fragrance called Coco Mademoiselle Crush Absolu on 19 August, chosen because it is Gabrielle Chanel’s birthday. The scent comes 25 years after the original Coco Mademoiselle first launched, and it was created by the house’s in-house perfumer, Olivier Polge. A pre-sell period opens on 31 July for existing Chanel clients through their site and in Chanel boutiques, ahead of a wider rollout across Chanel-owned and multibrand retailers. Coco Mademoiselle still holds the title of the number one eau de parfum in the market, according to Simona Cattaneo, Chanel’s president of fragrance and beauty.
Polge built the new scent around a contrast. There’s an ambery woody accord running through it, paired against a fruity note that hits you almost immediately. Grapefruit and lychee do the heavy lifting there, and Polge has described the lychee specifically as carrying a rosy sweetness that plays well against the amber. Rose, jasmine, patchouli and vetiver round things out underneath. Polge also spoke about balancing a powdery quality against the woodier base notes, saying that powder alone felt too simple on its own. He said he was looking for what he called “the correct impression and contrast,” along with the right dosage of fruity notes to sit against it.
He wasn’t given a brief for this one. Polge started by thinking about the wider impression the original Coco Mademoiselle leaves, rather than trying to update any single note. He’s described the project as an extension of what his father, Jacques Polge, built when he created the original in 2001 and has referenced an old interview in which his father spoke about the tension in Chanel perfumes between floral and what he called “baroque” elements.
Chanel has used the word “Crush” before, for a jewellery line called Coco Crush that launched in 2015, and Polge said he liked how the word sounded and felt it had already become familiar to Chanel’s audience. Pairing it with “Absolu,” the French word for absolute, was deliberate too. Cattaneo has said the name works because it holds both a lightness, in the idea of a crush, and an intensity, in the word “absolute,” and she’s pointed to the scent’s long-lasting trail as part of that intensity. She described first encountering the fragrance as a “wow” moment, saying it captured the instinctive, bold spirit of a young Gabrielle Chanel arriving in Paris.
Cattaneo joined Chanel in September 2024, and she has talked about a three-part approach guiding decisions like this one: creative excellence, respect for the house’s heritage, and close attention to how everything gets made at every stage. She has also connected the launch to a Gabrielle Chanel quote that has become part of the house’s language: that beauty is about the freedom of becoming who you want to be.
Visually, Crush Absolu keeps the same silhouette as the original Coco Mademoiselle bottle, so anyone who already owns the perfume will recognise the shape immediately. The differences are in the details. The juice itself sits in a deeper beige than the original, and the label swaps in a black background with “Crush Absolu” printed in gold.
In the US, the 1.7-ounce eau de parfum will be priced at $162, with the 3.4-ounce size at $195. UK and European pricing hadn’t been confirmed at the time of writing, so anyone shopping locally should check with Chanel or an authorised retailer closer to the 19 August launch date. Cattaneo didn’t share specific sales projections for the fragrance, though industry sources have estimated its first-year retail sales at around 100 million euros.
The original Coco Mademoiselle launched in 2001 and has stayed at the top of its category ever since, which is part of why this addition to the line has been handled with this much care around naming, colour, and the perfumer’s own account of his process. Polge worked from the fragrance’s overall impression rather than a single note and drew a direct line back to his father’s original creation and settled on a name that pairs a jewellery reference with a French word for ‘absolute’. Cattaneo has framed the launch through Gabrielle Chanel’s own words on reinvention, tying a new product to the house’s founding story rather than treating it as a standalone release.
Stay inspired with exclusive brand features, luxury insights, and the latest in fine fashion and beauty — directly in your inbox.
